Rainy weather takes a toll on business

loading...

BAR HARBOR – The heavy rains and high winds that continue to pummel the coast from a spring nor’easter are taking a toll on seasonal businesses preparing for the Memorial Day holiday and on lobstermen who can’t get out to check their traps.

“It’s the worst string of storms like this I can ever remember happening in the past 19 years,” Larry Nuesslein, captain of the whale watching vessel Friendship V, said Thursday. “We were scheduled to start Monday, but it’s way too rough out.”

Nuesslein said his whale watching boat did have some customer reservations but not as many as in sunnier years.

“Obviously, I think business would be way down, because people aren’t in town right now the way they normally would be,” the captain said.

Land-based companies also are feeling the pinch from wet springtime weather. Heavy rain has forced the temporary closing of Pirate’s Cove Adventure miniature golf course.

“We are experiencing flooding like everybody else,” said course manager Dan Herrick. “Business is not very good when you’re not open.”

Herrick said Memorial Day weekend, the traditional start of the summer tourism season, is an important time for the golf course.

“We intend on being open,” he said. “Even if we have showers, we’ll be open. I think people are getting a little bit antsy to get out and do something.”

That thought was echoed by Costas Christ, executive director of the Bar Harbor Chamber of Commerce.

“You would think that [the rain] would be a disaster for tourism,” he said. “But as of yesterday, which started our Warblers and Wildflowers Festival, it is just the opposite. We are packed.”

Christ said he was surprised by the number of people who have turned out for the festival.

“Mainers are a pretty tough lot,” he said. “They’re not going to be put off. … I think the assumption is that this [weather] is going to break. Sooner or later.”

Many lobstermen have been pinned at home ports because of high winds that make it too dangerous to check traps.

Jimmy Dow of Bass Harbor, a lobsterman with a string of 650 traps, said he has been stuck in port for eight days.

“It’s costing me a lot of money because I can’t get to my traps,” he said.

Dow said the eight-day break has eaten into the short, five-week spring fishing season.

“We lost a week and a half of that, so it’ll definitely affect us,” he said. “This weather really takes it away from us.”

The weather has even limited the work he can do at home.

“I can do a little bit of shop work,” he said. “Everything’s wet, and there’s not a lot you can do. It’s just a waiting game.”

Some hardy tourists have managed to make their way to the Stone Soup gift shop, store manager Catherine Higgins said.

“I imagine there are probably fewer people on the streets,” she said. “People like to stroll, and it’s not great strolling weather.”

Higgins said she was remaining hopeful the skies would clear for the holiday weekend.

“I’m going to try to believe the weather forecasters who are saying ‘chance of showers,'” she joked.

Some businesses have found the silver lining to the seemingly endless bank of gray clouds that cover the state.

“I’m hearing people saying that they’re coming in for their sun fix,” said Linda Abbott of Renee’s Hair Designs, an Ellsworth tanning parlor.

“I guess we are a little busier than usual.”

Nina Zeldin, owner of All Fired Up, a Bar Harbor paint-your-own pottery and mosaic store, said business has been brisk lately.

“It’s a good thing to do on a sunny day and on a rainy day,” she said. “It’s been a very busy week.”

Zeldin said she was looking forward to a break in the weather.

“It’s got to end sometime” she said. “I would like a hamburger on the grill, too, you know?”