Learn the basics of coastal navigation using local charts, parallel rulers, and dividers. Learn what the symbols mean, how to determine safe and dangerous routes, create courses, learn the rules of the “road,” what aids to navigation look like and do, plan for emergencies, and more. For kayakers, sailors, powerboaters, and future Registered Maine Guides. Students will need access to either a Casco Bay Chart or Penobscot Bay Chart, parallel ruler and dividers. Students must have an audio- and video-enabled laptop, desktop, or tablet with reliable internet to participate in class. We do not recommend using a smartphone.

Hike, snowshoe, geocache, hunt, and enjoy the woods and fields of Maine with confidence that you can read a topographic map, understand the symbols, know which way a river flows, plot a course bearing, use online resources, and how to get to safety. 

Familiarization with using a compass and map outdoors included. Students must have a DeLorme Maine Gazetteer, and a 2-degree baseplate compass. Students must have an audio- and video-enabled laptop, desktop, or tablet with reliable internet to participate in class. We do not recommend using a smartphone.

There is still a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation about Maine's compassionate end-of-life care option. Many providers and patients in Maine are still not familiar with Maine's Death with Dignity Act. In effect since September 2019, the law permits physicians to practice medical aid-in-dying under specific circumstances. Know the facts and, if qualified, the right to access medical aid in dying if they choose. Join this class to get fact-based information and all the details you need to know about Maine's law, how to have the conversation with your physician, and how to qualify for the law or support your loved one who may be qualifying. (No materials/supplies required). You will recieve a link to login online for this class.

This three-hour course is NOT about installing an alarm system. It is about adjusting your awareness around you as you move through your day and your home. It is about doing mental exercises to handle the “what if’s” to keep you and your loved ones safe. Learn situational awareness, conflict avoidance, and how to access your home’s defense. Part 1 of a 3-part series but can be taken separately. Students must have an audio- and video-enabled laptop, desktop, or tablet with reliable internet to participate in class. We do not recommend using a smartphone.

We’re spending more time outside and that is good. Learn how to integrate weather forecasts and your own reading of the weather signs to plan ahead and to best manage your outdoor activities - walking, biking, hiking, camping, paddling, boating, playing and exercising. Learn from a Master Maine Guide & Total Weather Spotter. Course is presented on Zoom.  Students must have an audio- and video-enabled laptop, desktop, or tablet with reliable internet to participate in class. We do not recommend using a smartphone.

Your instructor, Chris Toy is the author of 6 popular cookbooks, a private chef, and has taught Asian-fusion cooking for several Maine community education programs. Cooking students will learn how to prepare a variety of recipes from Asia, Europe, and the Americas incorporating traditional and local ingredients. Each meal will actively engage cooks with the tools, techniques, and stories behind the dishes being created.

Escape to a Grand Victorian Inn, the Harbor View House in Prospect Harbor on the coast of Maine, with an intimate group of artists, cooks, and creatives! All meals are included in the workshop fee plus special activities to extend your learning from the day’s workshops, including a private house concert by Grammy balloted singer-songwriter, storyteller, and author Gordon Ward. 

Day students are welcome. For more information about the workshop, call Mary at 207-632-2251. To book your stay at the inn call 207-963-9122 or visit https://harborviewhousellc.com/  

Feedback from recent participants:  “I learned so much from Chris that I can use immediately at home in my own kitchen.”  “Great kitchen hints!”

Your instructor, Mary Laury is an accomplished watercolorist and highly esteemed teacher. She encourages all her students to believe they can be successful. Painting is an exciting medium; it flows and moves and does beautiful things. If you have never painted in watercolors, we will start at the beginning. If you have painted before, you will pick up some new tips and tricks as well. We all learn together!

Painting Flower Portraits in Watercolor is the focus of this retreat.  

Paint flower portraits realistically. You will paint pictures of flowers in detail, but more painterly than a scientific illustration. We won’t count veins, but we will count petals! Painting flowers is a wonderful exercise in observation.

Learn brush stroke and value

White on white flowers

Leaves, long and short

Iris, narcissus, orchids, tulips, and other spring flowers.

Materials list:

We will paint on smooth paper; Strathmore Series 500, one hundred percent cotton paper, either plate or vellum. This paper can be bought at Artist and Craftsman in Portland in large sheets, which we will cut up.

Bring a #2 round brush and a #6 round brush, pencil, palette, tube watercolors in the 3 primary colors and perhaps a green. Paper towels and water container. And bring a plant or flower specimen with no more than 9 petals. This is a slow and careful process and 9 petals and some leaves is enough happiness for us all.

Escape to a Grand Victorian Inn, the Harbor View House in Prospect Harbor on the coast of Maine, with an intimate group of artist, cooks and creatives! All meals are included in the workshop fee plus special activities to extend your learning from the day’s workshops, including a private house concert by Grammy balloted sing-songwriter, storyteller, and author Gordon Ward. Day students are welcome.

For more information about the workshop, call Mary at 207-632-2251. To book your stay at the inn call 207-963-9122 or visit https://harborviewhousellc.com/.  

Feedback from recent participants: 

“Great instructor!-Mary acts as a guide to develop our own style.“ “Easy no stress instruction.”

This is a one-day on-the-water workshop for canoeing and stand-up paddleboard (SUP) skills that everyone ought to know but don’t. Learn how to transport canoes and SUPs properly, how to launch and recover, strokes for tandem and solo canoe paddling & SUP’ing. Learn rescues especially after capsizing. You will go swimming so you are required to wear a wetsuit or drysuit to participate. You will bring your own lunch, canoe, paddle, life jacket, and enthusiasm. SUPs will be provided. Limited rentals are available for canoes with advance notice.