While on your sail around Penobscot Bay you will have the opportunity to see a variety of different vessels. They are generally divided into two categories: power boats (called stink pots) and sailboats (called rag or blow boats). Sailboats, considered the most beautiful of the water vessels, come in a wide variety of styles and designs. Their evolution from the square rigger to the modern racing sloop follows a progression of sail advancements. You will see WINDJAMMERS which are multi masted, fore and aft rigged large sailboats.
MORNING IN MAINE	Two masted sloops are either a YAWL or a KETCH. MORNING IN MAINE is a fine example of a KETCH. The yawl is a two masted boat with the after mast shorter than the main mast. The mizzenmast, as it is called, is behind the rudder post. You will most likely be able to identiy one if you locate the steering wheel which is most often over the rudder post. In the case of the ketch the mizzenmast is before the rudder post. You can remember this by thinking of yourself at the wheel. If you can "catch" the mast if it fell backwards you are on a Ketch. Sailing or boating on the water is much like driving a car. There are rules that each skipper must obey in order to maintain a safe voyage. When approaching another vessel head on the two skippers should pass each other on their left, port to port side just like cars do in our country. When approaching at right angles the boat to your right front is the privileged vessel. That means that vessels off your starboard side have the right of way.
By far the most common sailboat is the SLOOP. PTEROPOD is a fine example of a full keel sloop. She has a single mast and a triangle mainsail called a marconi rig. The leading edge is the luff, the after edge is the leech and the bottom of the sail is the foot. She has one jib that is connected forward of the main on the forestay. The jib's sides have the same names as the mainsail. These are the fastest of the single hull boats and are used in most types of sailing races. The Americas Cup boats are sloops. Their design is simple but most effective. They are stable in rough seas and very fast for their size.	PTEROPOD
The schooner is a two or three masted boat in which the main mast, the aft mast, is the tallest. The fore mast is shorter and usually supports two to three jibs. Their names are -from the bow aft- flying jib, yankee and the staysail. The jibs are triangles flown from the top of the fore mast to the bow sprit and back to the deck. The main sail of most schooners is almost square with a gaff on the top of the sail and a boom on the bottom. The leading edge follows the mast and is supported by mast hoops. We have one three masted schooner, the Victory Chimes, in Rockland Harbor which is the largest of the schooners. Rockland has thirteen schooners, the largest number of schooners in any harbor. Sailboats when under sail have the right of way over power boats unless the power boat is in the act of dragging a net (fishing). Large vessels like tankers have right of way over all vessels when they are in a close channel and have difficulty in altering their course. A Sailboat is considered a power boat if her engine is running. She is a sailboat only when she is under sail. The channel is marked by red and green buoys. The red "nuns" are marked with an even number and tell the skipper to leave them on his starboard side when returning from sea. The way to remember this is to say RED- RIGHT- AND RETURNING. The green buoys are to be left on the port side when coming from the sea. The reverse is true when going out to sea. Day markers as the one seen on the ledge north and west of Owls Head light is a marker placed on rocks that are exposed at low tide This green marker says to leave it to port when returning from the sea. In the middle of Penobscot Bay is a red and white "skeleton" buoy designated PB. This bell buoy is a mid channel marker used to tell the large tankers that they are in the middle of the bay. The PB means Penobscot Bay. The channel that this is marking is the width of the bay from Rockland to North Haven Island. Penobscot Bay is a wide deep and rock free bay which makes it ideal and very safe for sailing. Light houses dot the points of land along the entire coast. Rockland Harbor light is located at the end of a one mile long breakwater that was built between 1881 - 1899 to protect the harbor. The breakwater is about 30 feet wide at the top and over two hundred feet wide at the bottom. At the light house, it soars some 70 feet above the bottom. All lights are now automated and give a coded signal that allows mariners to safely return to the harbor at night. The lighthouses also have fog horns that sound when the fog is dense enough to be a safety concern. MORNING IN MAINE has a radar unit onboard that allows navigation in the fog with a certain safety. The buoys and light houses appear on the screen as well as the land masses and other boats. We have also located all the navigational markers with the satellite global positioning system GPS which adds additional safety to the voyage. The most important navigational equipment on board are the old fashion compass and good charts. Your skipper knows his chart and uses the compass as the mainstay of his navigation.

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