At 8 am we left Westport, located on the Westport River in Massachusetts. We had made for the harbor to have dinner with an old college friend of Jeff’s. A ribbon of green trees and marsh grass separated the blue of the sky from the blue of the water. The current was running fast by our boat. There wasn’t much wind when we dropped the mooring and headed out. The morning was quiet, hearing only a small fishing boat coming in and the gentle rumble of our engine as we made way.
The river was tricky to navigate with hairpin turns, not much clearance on either side, a racing current and the promise of running aground if we strayed off course. While I had Jeff steer us in, I felt confident enough to take her back out. Herons sailed on the air near us, into the cattails that lined the sides of the river. Water encroached on the land in various places, creating ponds and marshes that were stunning to look at. With the sun shining brightly in the sky, the greens looked more vibrant, the blues of the water more nuanced and mirrored reflections from the land stared back at me from below.
The entrance was fairly short and soon Sirius emerged into the widest point of the river. Suddenly, I lost my bearings as the fog rolled in. With very limited visibility, I slowed down. By using my chart plotter I could negotiate marks, avoid rocks and stay out of shallow water but I was worried about hitting small fishing boats. Jeff promptly turned on the radar, though it was difficult to read the radar images. Radar doesn’t tell you that this is a boat or this is just some visual static.
Once we were out of the river, the water depth quickly climbed to 65 feet. I could settle down some because now there was nothing to negotiate except other boats. Bigger boats appeared on my AIS, clearly showing the boat, its speed and direction on my chart plotter. No worries there. But there were many boats not on my AIS. Jeff said we needed to sound a horn every 2 minutes. The first blast came from our signal horn. It was so loud, I was positive that I would go deaf if it were sounded every 2 minutes. I told Jeff we had to find something else. And he did. We ended up using the admiral horn Jeff had found on the boat, after he cleaned out the wasp nest, of course.
It was much kinder to my hearing. Jeff went forward on the bow and blew our horn at the appointed times. He wasn’t making enough noise, so I told him to blow harder. He was also my scout who would look for lobster traps and various other things that float on the water. Going only 2 knots, I watched as waves seem to come out of the fog towards me. It was almost like the fog was creating them and sending them my way. They crept out under the fog curtain and sped toward Sirius. They were small waves, not too concerning, but I was mesmerized by their sudden appearance. I looked around and all the colors of the morning had gone, melted into a gray tinged whiteness that surrounded Sirius. Even the water around our boat lost its color. The sky was gone. We were cocooned. I imagined all the other boats in the water that day traveling around in their own cocoons, small bubbles of clarity in the immense fog bank.
Up ahead I saw something in the water. Jeff was below at this point, refining our route. I swerved to avoid it. On my starboard side as we slid past it, I saw it was a cormorant swimming, unconcerned about our presence. Its head promptly disappeared in the water as he continued to fish.
As I kept watch, off the port side, I started to notice out toward the sea, that I could see farther than before. In the distance, a ghostly ship made itself known. We were on separate headings and wouldn’t collide, but it made me shudder wondering what lurked in front of our bow.
Then the fog was gone. It lifted as easily as it had come, silently, with no fanfare. Now I could see colors again. The horizon was tinged a salmon color with streaks of soft pinks interspersed. Looking ashore, I saw white puffy clouds above green trees and grand houses. There was a point of land coming up and there sat a large lighthouse, its brilliant white color made it easily distinguishable from the rest of the landscape. In a light fog, at least, I could easily spot the structure and now knew why lighthouses are often painted white.
We were heading to Newport that day, riding along the coast but keeping it comfortably distant when again the fog descended. Ocean swells gently rocked Sirius. The water was a different texture this time, the glassy surface rising with the swells beneath it and then settling back down. With limited visibility I started to notice that even though the colors were gone, there were an infinite number of gray variations in front of me. The light gray of the fog was fairly consistent. It only got darker when something, like a boat or a marker started to become visible. But the water, it reacted to currents and wind, which was now blowing at 13 knots. I would look left and the water was glassy. I’d look right just forward of our bow, and the water was speckled in places as if a million fish were kissing the surface.
Throughout our trip, the fog came and went. By the time we got to Newport, it was a bright, sunny day again. In the end, the fog wasn’t so bad. I liked the eerie feeling when Sirius was slowly motoring through the whiteness.