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TAKE A LOOK AT MAINE BOATS & HARBORS
By Robert Hale
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December 15, 2004. Maine Boats & Harbors is a 5-times-a-year magazine I've been enjoying for more than 10 issues now, and I got to thinking visitors to this web site might like it, too. Unlike most other boating magazines, Maine Boats & Harbors contains stories about lobster boats and lobster-inspired cruising boats, together with sweet looking pulling boats and some of the prettiest sailing boats you've ever seen. The ads are more of the same: page upon page of truly handsome boats and the interesting people who build, sell and service them. Editorial or ads, it's a visual feast.
Peter Spectre is the editor, and if you've ever read his stuff, you know the quality he brings to the printed page. His "In the Lee of the Boathouse" column is a reporting and writing treat, as is the Letters department. Ordinary people just don't write letters that well. Spectre must have edited them into their marvels of clarity.
Good editors attract good contributors. Among the most entertaining is Robb White, who this month tells us about living and swimming with alligators along the Georgia/Florida line. The piece opens with the longest one-sentence paragraph I've read in a quite a while. The sentence has only three commas in it, lonely commas, widely separated. In the May, 2004 issue White told us about the Aladdin oil lamp. He did it in terms so attractive that I almost ordered one. The current issue contains a letter from a reader taking issue with White on the subject of Aladdin lamps (he left the lamp unattended for a couple minutes and it set the ceiling on fire), so even without owning an Aladdin lamp I feel educated.
There's a cooking column, better written than most. Then a surprise: Architecture. Some Real Money exists back in New England, Old Money, too. A certain portion of that wealth is spent on houses that make a person drool with envy. Combine elegant land-based buildings with gorgeous boats and fascinating people, put it all in one magazine, and the result is something worth considering. Subscriptions are $19.95/year (5 issues). Check it out at www.maineboats.com.
Disclaimer: I have absolutely no interest in Maine Boats & Harbors other than stopping everything when a new issue arrives in the mail and going through it from cover to cover.v
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