In the hour before dinner (and blog time) I sat in the Zen spot, watching clouds make layer cakes, cream-puffs, and Yorkshire pudding; listening to a small surf set the rocks to murmuring about the season to come. A threesome of mergansers worked south to north, dipping their hammerheads below the surface to scan for minnows; and gulls held steadfast to their evening flight patterns up and down the shore. Pax wandered up and down, and back an forth, taking a drink, encouraging the mergansers to move along, then finally then settling down on the big limestone flags alongside my chair, and he often does, giving a sigh, content in his knowledge of the Eightfold Path.

Earlier in the day, actually rather earlier, it was all about sailing. Even before the clock struck eight, Heliotrope was footing out of Mudge bay, on a fine northeast slant to the channel, where the pivot brought her wing-and-wing for a sustained four+ knots all the way from Kittiwake Rock to the big west-end lighted buoy, J19. All the while we watched a squadron of heavy black destroyers move over the mainland to the north. Rain there, but just a some tatters on us. A few miles out, the wind dissipated, leaving a brief calm, before the wind came back, this time from the southwest. But three tacks later we were into and down Gore Bay, where Heliotrope is now well secured on "A" dock, to be hauled on Friday.

So now, the pier is gone, Heliotrope is no longer here, and the weather looks deliciously bad. Sounds like fall, eh?

I remember when Heliotrope made the trip this spring from Gore Bay to Kagawong, and I remember when the pier went in. Wasn't that yesterday?