When I was a kid, my father always pulled his boats around Columbus Day. He had Brownell back his boat into the yard and park it against the deck so we could easily climb on board.
It was always a bittersweet weekend. We did all the work on the boat ourselves, which meant I was the one stuck under the bottom scraping barnacles.
My father would always cook a lobster dinner for everyone as a reward for all the dirty work.
Four decades later, it’s different. Amazing Grace is much bigger. She is always connected to shore power, so she’s provisioned with food for weeks at sea. And all that food has to come off before she’s stored for the season. We also remove anything that might freeze and all the linens. Packing everything takes a couple of hours filling up my SUV and Peter’s truck.
The Closing Overnight
Amazing Grace winters in Plymouth, a fun seaside village, so last year, we started a new tradition. We spend the night before closing up the boat in Plymouth and celebrate the season.
We scheduled a small cocktail party at 4:30, but before that, we met with the management team at Safe Harbor Plymouth to go over the off-season maintenance and work plan.
Besides a few small projects, most of their work will be annual maintenance. Our big project will be a major thruster upgrade. We are replacing the Sleipner 210 KG stern thruster with a 300 KG – the most powerful electric thruster Sleipner makes.
We are also replacing all the motors with brushless, which will extend the operating time (before they time out or overheat).
And the final major thruster upgrade is the installation of the Dockmate Digital Positioning System.
The Dockmate DPS is a significant improvement over Volvo Position Hold and Mercury’s Skyhook pod-based positioning hold systems.
The DPS uses the engines and both thrusters to hold our locked position within inches. This will really come in handy when we have to hold for the Dockmaster in a tight Marina. It will also give Mrs. Horne comfort in the unlikely case of Captain Down!
The Final Cocktail Party
When we met Rick and Jen at the season-ending party, Rick asked us to tour Amazing Grace before the end of the season. And of course, you can’t have a decent boat tour without a cocktail party, so we did.
After the party we decide to check out the new Anêjo in Plymouth for dinner.
Anêjo Plymouth
We’ve lived in California for half the last 35 years, so we know authentic Mexican cuisine. Anêjo in Falmouth is one of the best Mexican restaurants we’ve ever eaten in, so we were excited to see them open up in the old home of Sam Diegos on Main.
Although we never ate at Sam’s, it did have decent ratings, so opening another Mexican restaurant in the same venue was a bold move.
It was in the 60s Wednesday night, but the alfresco dining area was packed.
The interior is impressive…
As is the massive side bar…
The Food
We were hoping the food would be as good as it is in Falmouth.
Mexican rice, pico de gallo, sour cream,
pinto beans, large flour tortilla,
Oaxaca-jack cheese with sauce verde
combination of Añejo favorites:
Carne Asada, Carnitas and Tinga
Queso Oaxaca-jack cheese,
fire roasted tomato, black bean,
sour cream & pico de gallo
one pork verde, one chicken mole and one beef
roja enchilada with Oaxaca-jack cheese, sour cream
sauteed shrimp, mole verde, coconut rice, cabbage, mango black bean pico, scallion, toasted coconut
hand-crafted fried corn tortillas layered with melted Oaxaca-jack cheese, refried pinto beans, pickled jalapeño, shredded lettuce, cotija cheese, picante crema, pico de gallo
I’m happy to report that Anêjo Plymouth lived up to the very high standards of their Falmouth location.
Good To The Last Drop!
We finished the season in Mattapoisett with visits from both Peter and Mrs. Horne’s sister Paula.
Keeping with tradition, we finished our final night with steamers, fried scallops, and fried clams at Turks.
We thoroughly enjoyed three dishes we won’t be having for the next six months!
We took off from Boston at 7:00 AM, and I caught a beautiful video of the sun rising over the tip of Provincetown.
POSTSCRIPT: 2024 Takeaways
I want to jot down some takeaways while the season is fresh in my mind.
- Sleeping on the boat in Onset the night before our cruise is a real treat. We also did one night upon our return to Plymouth, and that, too, was a great time.
- Safe Harbor Marina Bay is one of the best benefits of our SH membership. It always seems to have space; it’s under three hours from Maine, and in a blow, we can always make a day trip to the Encore Casino.
- Although we had a wonderful time doing seven ports in eight days with Jake and Peggy, I prefer two to three nights in each Marina. We get a lazy morning (or two) and time for a bike ride.
- We have several guests who fly into Boston for a cruise, and next year, we’ll greet them on the boat there and share some of our northern ports.
- We discovered some great new spots that we’ll be revisiting in 2025.
- Kennebunkport
- Mystic
- Sag Harbor
- Wickford Cove
- Newport Harbor Island Resort
- Not only did we find a perfect Marina for the NIBS, but the Newport Harbor Island Resort also provides us with a venue to host larger groups of guests. We can accommodate up to a dozen guests on the cruise to Newport, accommodate them for events on Amazing Grace during the day, and they can stay at the resort at night. The best thing is everyone can just drive there if the seas are rough!
I’ll be sharing my 2024 video collection with all of you on Christmas Eve and likely doing an off-season report or two.
For our flotilla friends, it’s not too early to mark your calendars for a few get-togethers—Nantucket before Father’s Day and The Progressive in late July.
In the meantime, have a great winter wherever your travels take you!
Columbus Day Weekend is also our weekend for wrapping up the boating season and is when we pull the little Whaler out of the water. The bigger boat has usually already been hauled on an earlier weekend. It’s funny what you said about your dad cooking lobsters as a reward for hard work because we also try to tie in a good meal at the house to celebrate the official end of the season. This year, my wife was travelling for work, so my daughter and I switched things up and did a final dinner at the Chart Room on closing weekend.
I also was interested in your report of the Deer Isle Steamers from Turks. Were they good? In another life, I dated a girl from Blue Hill (ME) and her dad and I re-shingled a roof on a house there one November weekend years ago. If you ever make it that far north in Amazing Grace, a pass through Eggemoggin Reach is a must. I’ve only looked down on it while driving over the rickety old bridge crossing it on the way to / from Deer Isle.
Love the blog and safe travels out west.