Last night we managed to catch the fireworks display out on Meredith Bay on Lake Winnipesaukee despite the rain that fell on and off all day yesterday and into the early evening. The sun had popped out a few times during the day, giving us false hope the evening would have similar weather – broken clouds and no rain.
We were wrong.
Rain started falling again late afternoon/early evening, dashing any hopes there were be no further rain. Despite the rain, and then drizzle, Katy, BeezleBub, and I headed down to the Official Weekend Pundit Lake Winnipesaukee Runabout, meeting up with two of BeezleBub’s friends – Alex and Lauren – loading the boat, and heading out onto the lake and to Meredith Bay.
As we exited the cove where I dock the boat, it was drizzling quite a bit. I could see there was a ‘hard’ line in the lower cloud layer to the north, exposing the peaks of the mountains in that direction. There were also breaks in the upper cloud deck even further to the north. This filled us with hope that the weather would cooperate and the fireworks show would go on.
There were very few other boats out on the lake though those we saw were heading in the same direction as we were, telling us that we weren’t the only ones crazy enough to head out in rainy weather for fireworks. The closer we got to the bay, the less drizzle there was, another promising sign.
As we entered Meredith Harbor we could see the flashing blue lights of a couple of Marine Patrol boats and the flashing red lights of a fire boat. There were already a few boats anchored around the harbor and we joined them, dropping anchor within 150 yards or so of the fireworks barge. At the time we dropped anchor there were about 45 minutes before the show was supposed to start, so we were able relax a bit, despite the very light drizzle still falling.
More boats arrived over that 45 minute wait, with maybe another 50 dropping anchor. Normally one could expect 200+ boats to be anchored in the harbor, but the iffy weather obviously cut back the number, but the weather didn’t seem to attenuate the number of people along the shoreline.
I won’t go into the details of the fireworks show, but I can say it was spectacular! It was worth braving the damp weather.
After the show’s finale we waited a while before raising anchor and heading back down the bay, allowing time for most of the other boats to leave and for their wakes to fade away. We took our time heading home.
Looking up at the sky on the way home we found we could see the stars, meaning the upper cloud deck had cleared away while we were watching the fireworks.
We pulled in to at our dock just before 11PM, and Katy and I departed as BeezleBub said he’d button everything up on the boat, and got back to The Gulch 10 minutes later. About a half-hour later Katy, the WP Mom, the WP feline contingent, and I were in our beds and asleep. It had been a long day.
Katy departed for home late this morning, a 4-hour drive back to Connecticut ahead of her. She took some baked goods from our local farm stand with her as well as some items she picked up at a craft fair this weekend. She had experienced her first fireworks show from a boat, got to sample some of the best marinated steak tips ever, and found someone to make her some custom side tables at the craft fair.
All in all, she said she had a great weekend, the rainy weather notwithstanding.
