Grabbing the Grail:
Circumnavigating Great Wass Island in Downeast Maine (Dec. 28, 2003)

Click to open Great Wass map.

My carbon kevlar kayak had just run aground in the mud. The temperature was 18 degrees F and a stiff quartering wind had been trying to push me off course with each stroke. It was only 7:45 AM, and I had been up for more than 3 hours, 2 of which had been spent driving 100 miles to Jonesport Maine for the launch. That was when I looked down on my deck to see that the waterproof chart spread in front of me was not for the Great Wass Archipelago but for the Deer Isle Archipelago, fifty miles south.

Every ambitious trip has its moment of doubt, when basic faith in the enterprise collapses. On this trip, that moment came in the first half hour, and after that things began to go more smoothly. It happened that I had a second chart in my forward compartment. This one, too, proved to be of the Stonington Archipelago. (Isn't redundancy wonderful?) However, I decided it was still safe to continue the trip on several counts: (1) the plan for the day was a 16 mile circumnavigation of Great Wass island -- no crossings would be necessary (2) the final one-third of the trip involved a route that was already familiar to me (3) visibility was unlimited and was expected to remain that way (4) the new GPS I had along would partly make up for the lack of a chart.

I reversed direction out of the mud flats, wincing as my hull scraped over muscle beds, and detoured west, upwind around several more sets of islands, before I could find passage to the south.

During my life as a sea paddler, there has always been a trip that has served as a Holy Grail, a trip far enough out of reach to make it not immediately attainable but not so far out of reach as to be unrealistic. That Grail has gradually shifted to be located in progressively more remote and challenging destinations. For the past 18 months, Great Wass Island, a largely wild Nature Conservancy island in far downeast Maine had served as my Grail. Frequent fog, cold water, 12 foot tides, a remote sparsely populated location, and rocky headlands with open exposure to the south all add to the difficulty factor for this trip. (In the big scheme of things, this was still a very moderate endeavor, but as most paddlers with families can attest, having two young children at home, a full time job plus a part time business, can all contribute to the difficulty level of trips.)

I had paddled part way around Great Wass island on a couple of times during the previous summer, but each time either fog, big seas, or less ambitious paddling companions had prohibited any serious thought of making it around the island. It seemed ironic that -- if the forecast of 40 degree temperatures, light northwest winds, and clear skies held true, this late December trip would prove easier than previous attempts.

I launched at dawn, about an hour before low tide, from the little fishing-gear-strewn beach near the bridge to Beals Island in Jonesport. I had decided to paddle the island in a counterclockwise direction, figuring the eastern shore would put me in the lee of the winds for my return trip. This, however, did mean paddling against the current under the Beals Island bridge, and against the wind during the first cold 45 minutes of the trip.

Once I got out of the mud flats, I continued west northwest along Moosabec Reach, past Norton Island and Pomp Island, and finally swung to the south and then southeast to point my bow back toward the now somewhat distant shores of Great Wass. With the wind at my back, I made good time past the Norton ledges -- where I sighted several seals and quite a few loons -- and then over to Ram island, where I threaded between Ram and Outer Ram before heading south again to Browney Island, Fisherman Island, and Crumple Island.

As the sun climbed a bit higher, my spirits warmed. I slid my pogies to the center of my paddle shaft and paddled with bare hands, although the air temp. lingered at 30 degrees. Fisherman Island is long low and relatively treeless. I contemplated going ashore for a break, but was lured onward by the hill on rocky Crumple Island just ahead. Crumple made for a difficult landing, surrounded as it is by jumbled rocks and a thick skirt of seaweed. The 1 foot chop made it difficult to get the kayak ashore without leaving patches of white gelcoat (or worse) on the rocks.

Once ashore on Crumple, I carried my kayak as far up the seaweed zone as I could, weighing the risks of leaving the kayak exposed to the now rising tide and increasing waves versus the danger of falling on the seaweed thereby smashing my kayak on the rocks (that was one call to the Coast Guard I really did not want to make).

The scramble up the hill on Crumple (elevation 66) provided for a magnificent, if wind-chilled view of Pond Point on Great Wass, the islands of the archipelago stretching away to the west and northwest, and to the mighty Atlantic to the south. I lingered long enough to snap a few photos and then headed back down the hill to get some protection from the wind.

From Crumple, I made the crossing to Pond Point and then swung north into a large indentation into the coast that I believed to be Great Pond. (The GPS screen did not provide adequate detail here.) Great Pond was one of the features of the trip that had sparked my interest: with exposure to the south and red granite cliffs on both sides, the pond is a large inlet that becomes land locked at low tide.

The tide, just 2 hours after low, was not yet high enough to permit entering the pond via boat. I pulled ashore on the seaweed beds, walked "upstream" against the current to get closer to the "The Pond" and imagined what it would be like to spend a summer afternoon there along its quiet shores, with swells from the Atlantic booming just a few hundred yards away.

Leaving the pond, I rounded Red Head, chasing rafts of Scoters and Oldsquaw off in front of me. Sea conditions here were very calm, as I was now in the lee of the wind. It was an ideal day to be there, with the sun warming the air along the red cliffs and the nearly flat sea conditions that allowed me to paddle close alongside.

The cliffs are punctuated by a number of long narrow chasms. I was able to explore several of them, and stopped in one to pull my boat up onto the rocks -- quite a trick with the mild swell that pushed in every few seconds. I climbed deeper, back into the chasm and up to get a grand view of the shoreline and open water to the south. Then climbed back down to stand in the sunshine near my kayak (the rock was too cold to sit on) and eat my lunch of boiled eggs and bagels.

The gorgeous stretch of coast between Pond Point and Pond Head was a highlight of the trip. As I rounded Pond Head, I considered extending the trip by heading northwest to Mistake Island. But the prospect of increased exposure to the wind plus shoulders sore from a 2 hour stint with a maul (taking down an old garage) a couple of days previously weighed against it.

Instead, I tucked along the shore of Popplestone Cove, enjoying the antics of the scoters. An eagle flew up from behind a ledge and then quickly flashed down out of sight again. Several seals shadowed me for a short distance. I passed dramatic Little Cape Point, which one the three previous times I had reached there (from the north) was a wild zone of pounding surf.

The rising tide eased me along past Mud Hole Point. My shoulders were sore, the waters were calmer, the day was finally warmer. I was soon paddling a shoreline that was again interspersed with houses. It became clear that the biggest challenges of the day were well behind me. The return trip along Great Wass, through the channel inside Pig Island, over to French House Island, and then across the Moosabec Reach to my launch site went without incident. As I paddled, I had spent a good portion of my time looking east, toward the Lighthouse on Mistake Island as well as the deep harbor between Steele Harbor Island and Head Harbor Island. I had read somewhere the harbor there was of distinctive beauty . . . and somewhere deep inside me, the vision of another trip was already being born.