Gone Fishing (Holy Mackerel!)

A friend and partner in business invited us to come along on his boat to take some video shots. He is one of two whale watch tour operators on Campobello. So at 6:00pm we were ready at the North Wharf for a new adventure. We were going along the stunning rocky coast, which is only broken by a few small sandy beaches. Houses and small cabins were gliding by, the owners sitting outside in the warm sea air, waiting for one of the great sunsets we usually have out here. Finally we were reaching the northern part of Campobello and in the golden sun – there was the stately Head Harbour Light Station, perched majestically of the rocks, gleaming in the golden evening sun.                             The boat                   Head Harbour Light Station             Bald Eagle perched high Our shipper was standing at the wheel and just seemed to enjoy the scenery and the fact that his guests had a lot of fun. Bea saw a Minke Whale, but the animal disappeared again. Seals were lounging on the rocky outcrops of an uninhabited island, and were looking curiously at our boat. We were filming and taking still pics like never before. On our return our shipper broke out the fishing rods. Soon most of us were holding a rod dipping and heaving away. It didn’t take many minutes, before the first one had 3 mackerels on the hooks. Over the following few minutes we caught at least 15 more fish. Alright, they were small and we let the smallest go back into the water, but at the end of the day we were looking at 8-9 nice-size fish which I could already see ending up in on our BBQ. The sun was now way down and we were racing back to North Wharf. The boat is powered by a 130hk Honda outboarder which sure made this boat go faster than fast. Back home I fired up the BBQ and put the fish right on. Meanwhile Bea was cooking carrots and potatoes, and even if this meal was taken somewhat late, we sure enjoyed the delicious fish and even have a nice portion left for tomorrow. Thanks for stopping by!

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Insurance

It all began with a good thought – everybody pays a little bit and when disaster strikes our expenses are covered, a socially responsible idea which has prevented families from getting ruined by medical expenses, and it has worked in many places. But is that still the case or has something changed? I think somewhere along the way something went terribly wrong. Insurance companies started to be powerful and were looking to increase their business. In their  efforts, they found a lot of help from the legal profession. When lawyers discovered that they could make a good living by persuading people to sue their doctors and hospitals thus offering an enticing possibility to strike it rich, everybody who thought their doctor had treated him/her wrongly jumped on the bandwagon.  Of course the lawyers couldn’t have pulled it off without a lot of help from their brothers – the judges. First the judges made it possible to successfully sue a doctor out of his job by awarding 2 million Dollars for a broken self-esteem of a patient. Poor doctors! All of a sudden every doctor and every hospital was looking frantically for – INSURANCE.  Soon the verdicts were reaching millions. Millions of cases and millions of dollars. Wow – now we can increase our premiums, said the insurance industry.  With sky-high premiums doctors and medical facilities had to increase their charges to their patients and their health insurance companies. The endless spiral of ever increasing health costs was on. The fact that the insurance companies were serving both the patients and the doctors turned out to be very lucrative for them. The downside, of course, is that health insurance premiums got completely out of control. In fact many people (about 30% in the U.S.) cannot afford to pay these premiums and had to choose to live without such insurance. Back to the pre-insurance times? A couple of days ago I met a couple from New Hampshire. He had retired from the State but his wife was working. Why was she working? Well, their monthly health insurance premiums were 1,200.00 Dollars and was eating up his monthly pension check he got from the State. His entire work life was rewarded by taking his monthly pension to pay for his health insurance. So, in order to live a decent life his wife had to work. It is kind of hard to find any sympathy for a system which has so completely gotten out of hand. Over here in Canada we know that our health system might not be the best in the world, but at least we are not getting ruined by an insurance system whose first and main purpose should be to PROTECT its customers from getting ruined. My Dad always said that insurance companies were legalized criminals. Trouble is, we seem not to be able to live without them either. Have a great 2. half of the week!

Lubec, Maine

Campobello Island is “missing” one thing – a town. The two small villages, Welshpool and Wilsons Beach transmit a character of sleepy tranquility and if one reads visitor reviews on trip advisor or such site, some people complain about the “lack of services”. It is true that Campobello has no big hotels and fancy restaurants. The island is much more focused on relaxed country living, where the visitor can do long hikes along the beach and over quiet paths in the woods. But that doesn’t mean that we have no access to a more huzzle-buzzle-style of town living with a bigger choice of restaurants and more stores. The only thing we need to do is driving across the International bridge right into Lubec,ME. No, Lubec is not a big place either, but it is “a town”, with a Main Street where traffic evolves along the waterfront. As you already know I like to have a look into the past and here is what I found about Lubec: Located on a peninsula overlooking an excellent ice-free harbor, the town was first settled about 1775. Originally part of Eastport, it was set off and incorporated on June 21, 1811 and named for Lübeck, Germany. Following the War of 1812, Lubec was site of considerable smuggling trade in gypsum, although principal industries remained agriculture and fisheries. By 1859, there was a tannery, three gristmills and nine sawmills; by 1886, there were also two shipyards, three boatbuilders and three sailmakers. From 1897 to 1898, the town was the site of a swindle in the sale of stock in the Electrolytic Marine Salts Company, the brainchild of Reverend Prescott Jernegan and Charles Fisher of Martha's Vineyard. Jernegan claimed to have developed a method of using "accumulators" to get gold from sea water, and bought an old grist mill to turn it into a factory. The scheme attracted an abundance of investors, who were all too eager to funnel money into the company after being promised astronomical returns. In the summer of 1898, work was suspended without explanation at the factory. Jernegan and Smith vanished, and the fraud was gleefully exposed by newspapers across New England. Jacqueline and Robert Norton, two retirees from Lubec, were passengers on the ill-fated American Airlines Flight 11 which was crashed into the World Trade Center in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. It was allegedly Mr. and Mrs. Norton's first flight on a commercial aircraft. Robert Norton, 85, was the oldest person to die that day directly as a result of the attacks. We like Lubec as it is a typical small-town-USA kind of place. People are very friendly and happy about an increasing number of summer visitors, some of them showing a keen interest in buying an old house and restoring it to its old glory. As the town is mainly built over the top of a hill it has a few steep-grade streets leading up from the Water Street. The residential areas consist of fine wooden buildings, many of them white painted and with ornate decorations. If architecture means anything to you, you’d enjoy a walk in town. Front lawns are shaded by huge old trees and white picket fences are lined up along the old curbsides.   Thanks for coming along!

Breathtaking Video Link

Instead of a posting of my own I will post a video link (I tried the video itself but it wouldn't download) for you to see. It is a bit long, but it is worth to wait for. It is about the Northern Lights in Norway.

http://www.vancouversun.com/news/regional-news/Breathtaking+video+Norway+Aurora+Borealis+this+winter/6331356/story.html.