Portsmouth Harbor

Late Saturday afternoon we kayaked around Portsmouth Harbor, putting in at the Pierce Island boat launch near Strawberry Banke. If you use this map, you can zoom out one level to see the harbor area between Portsmouth and New Castle. We paddled up to Prescott Park under the Pierce Island Road bridge, then back under the bridge and along the shore lined with bait and tackle shops, sandwich shops, houses and docks. We passed by lots of cormorants drying themselves on rocks, resting on dock pilings, or flying low over the water and fishing. And we saw plenty of gulls as well as a bunch of ducks splashing around by someone's dock, presumably where food had been tossed to them.

We continued paddling out under the Newcastle Ave. bridge and on up towards the Goat Island boat launch so I could see my retirement shack up close (it looks even more dilapidated). The water was a bit choppier out there, but it's still protected from the Atlantic by a breakwater at Little Harbor. We did have some wakes from motor boats to deal with, but not dangerously so. This is my third time kayaking but the first time on salt water - I loved it! I love the smell and feel of seawater, and the whole salty atmosphere of the seacoast with its seabirds and the tides. The light at around 5 or 6pm was glorious. We made our way back by the Portsmouth Naval Base and then returned to Pierce Island.

Hungry after our adventure, we topped it off with some great seafood at my old favorite, the Old Ferry Landing, which will be closing up soon for the winter. Such a beautiful day.

4:43:42 PM      trackback [] 

The secret to happiness

What is the secret to happiness?

Thinking it's possible.

From yesterday’s NY Times Sunday Magazine interview, “Questions for Elizabeth Edwards.”

2:51:09 PM      trackback [] 

Must be love

I wrote this this morning while still at my friends' house where I was dog-sitting again.

My friend Amy and her husband, who I happened to fix her up with, have been married for five years. Second marriage for both. They got married in the yard just outside this house about a month after they bought it – you can imagine how stressful doing all this at once must have been? They had known each other about a year, like most of the 40-something people I know who've gotten married recently. As in any marriage, they’ve had their struggles, especially in the first year or two when trying to adjust to each other and create a household together. But they did it, and Amy reports that they’re happy and doing well now.

Staying in their house, I find notes – a note of apology and love tucked inside the medicine cabinet, a message tagged to the end of the to-do list stuck on the refrigerator:

5 Delmonico

zucchini

onions

--

Friday

clean bathrooms

finish mowing

buy groceries

        double

make ^  batch of brownies

Paul loves Amy!!!

This morning I found a piece of paper stuck in a coffee cup on a shelf (note: Amy is an art teacher) that reads:

Amy –

   Have a great

first day at school.

I love you and am

with you every

minute of every day.

    Love,

    Paul

2:37:49 PM      trackback []