Mainly Maine!

It seems like we've been in Maine a long time! We entered the Pine State over three weeks ago after we left Franconia Notch, New Hampshire, (Robert Frost country), and planned our entrance into Canada and the Maritime provinces. That adventure behind us, we re-entered the US last Sunday, September 6, and have spent a lovely, lower key (read: less driving!) week here in coastal Maine. The week couldn't have had a better start: Acadia National Park.

MILEAGE:

Buster: St. John, New Brunswick, to Bar Harbor, Camden, Boothbay Harbor, and Old Orchard Beach, Maine: 405 miles

Bella: 577

Weekly Total: 982 miles

Total for League's Excellent Adventure: 7687 miles

State count: I think we're still at 11 (a new one tomorrow!)

Monday, September 7

Liz was thrilled because Narrows, Too Campground (where we stayed near Bar Harbor), was still heating their swimming pool through Labor Day. Even though we are beginning to feel the nip in the air up here, the pool was warm. This is always her first question about where we are going to stay. During the summer, many campgrounds did have a pool. I think we are going to find this amenity quite scarce as we head into the fall and winter, even as we are going south!

Our first stop was the Acadia National Park visitor center where we were able to make our plan for the day. We learned that many/most visitors take the 26 mile Park Loop Road which takes you along gorgeous coastal scenery as well as up Cadillac Mountain for the 360 degree view from the highest peak on the Atlantic coast. We subsequently found other "mountains" (1300+ feet tall) that made the same claim, but they had to qualify their claim as a "mountain on the mainland coast"; Cadillac Mountain at 1500+ feet is on Mt. Desert ISLAND. (We also splurged while at the Visitor Center and got a National Parks Monopoly game which you can personalize with your favorite national parks; it is really fun!)

Of course, we had to fortify ourselves for the drive. We drove into Bar Harbor in Bella, and continued our search for delicious lobster, this time at the Lobster Pound in the Harbor. I had a lobster cobb salad (a very nice way to go), and Gary had the classic boiled dinner with the whole lobster, mussels, corn on the cob, etc. He has concluded that taking apart the intact lobster is a little too much work meal after meal, so has taken to ordering sauteed lobster, where a little bowl of delectable meat comes drenched in butter! We had this sea gull visitor right outside our table's window.

Gary needed a little "down" time after that big lunch!

The pictures tell the whole story of Acadia; it is iconically beautiful. We bought the CD guide to play in the car while we drove, got out lots and walked around, and thoroughly enjoyed spending about 3 1/2 hours going about 26 miles!

Many of you know that Acadia was the first national park to be created east of the Mississippi River, and the first to be comprised of privately donated lands. Mr. Rockefeller (not sure which one!) loved riding in a carriage around Mt. Desert Island and constructed 40+ miles of roads and numerous stone bridges, all done by hand, for horse and carriage riding. They are beautiful, and certainly add to the beauty of the drive.

Liz LOVED scrambling over the rocks.

Liz' Lines: Hi this is Liz sorry I have not been blogging. I hope you guys are having fun in school. A few days ago I climbed 2 miles up a mountain I stumbled. My mom made a good choice for herself of not going .But did miss a great view. Iwent to Tim Hortins and my first time there I got spoiled milk not very fun at all. The date not to drink it was a month later but it was wrong. I promise to write on the next blog bye.

The park also had a lovely (and educational) garden with sample habitats from marshes, bogs, mixed woods, coniferous woods, etc. A scavenger hunt had been planned for kids (and other interested parties!), and Liz (with a little help) found all the items on the 20 item grid. A great biology lesson for a Sunday outing!

We ended the outing with a view from the top of Cadillac Mountain. Being able to actually walk around the top of the mountain, a granite plateau, and see 360 degrees ovet Mt. Desert Island was really beautiful. After our drive, the options were swimming or shopping. Liz picked swimming; Gary was thrilled; and I pouted a bit as it was my turn to supervise the swimming.

Tuesday, September 8

Tuesday was another driving day, but we didn't have to drive too far. We had heard that Camden, Maine, was a nice spot to stop from Carlyn Berghoff, and she was right. It had a lovely harbor, and after we got parked in Camden Hills State Park, we went into town. (It only takes about 15 minutes to get parked: Gary unhooks the car, backs or moves the motorhome into the position he wants that's the most level, works the automatic levelers, puts out the right and left and back slides, and hooks up the water, electric and sometimes sewer connection ... other times he just empties the holding tanks when we leave the campground. It takes about 15 minutes).

We had talked about taking a sail on a beautifully rigged sailing ship, The Appledore, but I thought it might rain. However, when we spoke to the crew, they said Liz could go free (normally $25). It sold us. We quickly ate a bite (this was 5 pm; and we were going to sail at 5:30 ... a sunset cruise!), so Gary was happy to order once again Seafood Stew. I had the best lobster bisque I've had on the trip, and Liz stuck with grilled cheese, which also had the advantage of being entirely portable!

We had a wonderful time. Gary and Liz helped raise the sails, and Gary even captained the ship for a bit. You can see (top pic and below) we had a beautiful sunset. It was a great outing!

The salty dog reports it was a wooden schooner with wooden mast and booms. It was billed as a "tall ship" but Gary was disappointed that it wasn't square-rigged, as he, quite an accomplished sailor in his own right, has yet to sail on a square-rigged ship.

Wednesday, September 9 (09/09/09 !!!) was a very quiet day for Liz and me and an exhausting one for Gary. He left at 7 am with the car to drive back up to Houlton, Maine, where he had left his shotgun before entering Canada (see prior blog post of August 22). He also made a stop in Brewer, Maine (near Bangor) to pick up mail again, got the car washed and oil changed, and all in all was gone about 8 hours. Liz and I read, played National Parks Monopoly, had my phone conference with Mayo Women's HealthSource, and hung out until he returned. He was exhausted, and I had learned from the Appledore crew of the night before that Peter Ott's was the place to eat in Camden. So we had a very nice dinner (this time the sauteed lobster which was hot, already out of the shell, and bathed in butter .... perfect!) Then we did some window shopping and in the stationary store, Gary found a "Bert and I ..." CD. He had heard this, then cassette, about 20 years when on a sailing trip, and found the Maine accents and clipped speech manner of telling stories very entertaining. So he spent the rest of the evening listening to Bert and I, while Liz and I watched "Bones." This, I think Fox series, is like CSI (forensic crime investigation), but the characters are much more appealing. It is based on the book of a real forensic pathologist, and the lead character, Dr. Temperance Brennan, alias Bones, is charmingly geeky. We are quite entertained by it, and bought Season 1 at Wal-Mart a few weeks ago.

Thursday, September 10

On to Boothbay Harbor, Maine, but after we pulled out we wanted to still explore Mt. Battie, within Camden Hill State Park. I had hoped I could do a short hiking trail, but the irregularities and up and down was still too challenging for my knees. But Gary and Liz hiked out to Ocean View Point and took some very pretty pictures.

Pic above by Liz!

Then we motored off to Rockland and stopped on the Farnsworth Art Museum. This was a wonderful stop. The Farnsworth houses the Wyeth Center, and while it doesn't have an exhaustive collection of Andrew Wyeth, it does have a number of lovely things, plus also displays the elder Wyeth (N. C., Andrew's father), and his son, Jamie Wyeth. The gift shop has "Three Generations of Wyeth" which is a wonderful book which we now have. There is also some modern sculpture, and other modern art, and it all made for a wonderful afternoon art lesson. Liz wrote a paragraph on what she liked about it. We also took her picture on the very interesting "rock chaise!"

When we arrived in Boothbay Harbor, we did a little reconnaisance to find a hair salon. It has been 8 weeks since we got our hair cut/I got my hair colored, and we settled on Shear Artistry (!) and had appointments the next morning.

Friday, September 11
This will probably be a sober day for the rest of our lives. We were very aware, some 8 years later, of the tragedy we all experienced, but locally in Maine they had services for folks, particularly fire and rescue, that had helped out at ground zero.

At 10 o'clock we went to the hair salon and started our hair process. I thought she was foiling an awful lot, and I would say my hair ended up looking blonde all over vs highlighted, but this is the price one pays on the road. It will grow, and all is remediable. Liz got a darling hair cut. We had a great lunch (Gary had had a clam chowder morning snack in the park while he waited), so he settled for crab dip with pita crackers at lunch. Then we just looked through our mail and watched Hotel for Dogs (Liz' pick for a rainy afternoon), and had chicken with rice for dinner. I had bought a can of Campbell Cream of WILD Mushroom soup in Quebec, and it made a slightly more exotic dish for dinner.

Saturday, September 12

The weather stayed drizzly, and we did a little shopping before we left Boothbay Harbor, heading for our last Maine stop in Old Orchard Beach. We have been trying to find some of the diners profiled in a book our neighbors (Mark Stephenson/Geraldine Sutcliffe ... thank you!), on Road Food (from the prolific Jane and Michael Stern). We saw a line of people along Route 1 in Wiscasset, Maine, and saw they were standing at a lobster take out. Indeed, this was Ray's, profiled in the book. Rather than turning Buster and the attached Bella around, we looked to see if there was anything listed for Freeport, where we planned to stop at L. L. Bean's. Indeed, the Harraseeket Lobster shack was profiled. We pulled into Freeport with scads of Saturday shoppers and traffic, and did not see a good place to try to park the 55 foot unit. So I suggested Gary pull through town, and as we left the first place we found to pull off the road was an old cemetery. There was plenty of room, so we unhooked Bella, and decided to go in search of the Freeport town harbor, and Harraseeket. We turned around, made a right, passed a grocery, asked directions, and made about 3 more turns (and turn arounds) before we found it. The book had said it has a great Lobster Roll, something we hadn't really tried. So we ordered this sandwich (lobster with a little mayo, lettuce, on an open face hot dog bun) for $15.95. It WAS good, but we'd have to say not our favorite presentation of lobster. They had great desserts, however. Here is Liz ordering a coconut cream pie! Yum!

We had the funniest experience after lunch. We were trying to retrace our steps after all these turns and redirections to get to Harrasekket. We made the first right turn, and then were watching for another right turn about 1 1/2 miles down the road. We debated on this one intersection, and decided not to take it. But we kept driving, for longer than I thought we should, and all of a sudden we were approaching this large motor home parked on the left side of the road, in front of a cemetery. For a moment I thought, OMG, somebody else had to park way out of town .... but of course we soon recognized our own Buster. Fortunately, we laughed, these small Maine towns are so small you can't really get lost. You'll circle back sooner or later, even if you don't realize it!

The day ended with a nice time at L. L. Bean. Gary got some new jeans (khaki colored denim) in a SMALLER size .... yeah for him! Liz got some fun stuff, and I bought poly-silk long johns to use for pajamas in the motor home. We've had some chilly nights. We also had fun buying some baby boy coordinated L. L. Bean onesies for Polly and Chris' expected twins. She's on bed rest now, at nearly 31 weeks, and we hope she makes it at least to 35. They should all be fine!

Today we plan to drive to Kennebunkport, and maybe eat at Mabel's, a George and Barbara (Bush) favorite according to Road Food. Then, we get a new state tomorrow ... Massachusetts. We're planning four days in the Boston area and three on Cape Cod. Stay tuned ....

Love,

Julie, Gary and Liz

Very blonde Julie!