mmegaera | Entries tagged with freeport me

I had to make a list to get an accurate number for that second one [g].

The night of the fifth I saw a very strange thing from the LL Bean RV lot. The photo I managed to get of it makes it look more like a cloud, but I swear it looked more like a meteor or a comet when I first saw it, and its movement was visible to the naked eye. Very strange.

I didn’t take much in the way of photos on the sixth, which is why I’m combining the two days. AAMOF, the only photo I took on the sixth was of the Maine state capitol building in Augusta, and that’s just because it was next door to the Maine Museum. It was about an hour’s drive up from Freeport to Augusta, and I spent the morning and early afternoon in the museum before I decided to stop there for the rest of the day. I got a motel room and caught up on stuff, and read, and that sort of thing for the rest of the day.

The museum was great, but I wasn’t allowed to take photos, unfortunately. It covered things by topic rather than chronologically – economic, social, political, and natural history and archaeology, for the most part. The museum itself was older, like the Kentucky state museum was, but it was done very well, and they had a huge collection of artifacts. I particularly loved the working waterwheel that made the little sawmill go.

The bridge itself, which was odd in that it had the tall supporting structure between the lanes, instead of on the outside of them.

This morning I got up and out pretty early for having spent the night in a motel, and headed for Acadia National Park. I’ve been to Acadia before, on my 1997 flying-into-Boston trip. Also, I was pretty sure it was going to be crowded on a sunny August Sunday, and I was right, unfortunately.

That said, I still had fun. Like Yosemite and Zion, Acadia now has shuttle busses (sponsored by LL Bean [g]), which are free, and that made getting around much easier. I parked Merlin in the visitor center parking lot, and rode the bus to Bar Harbor’s village green, where I ate a lobster roll for lunch. You can’t go to Maine without eating at least one lobster roll (unless you’re allergic to lobster like my friend Loralee). I’m pretty sure they’ll ticket you at the very least if you try. A lobster roll is lobster chunks dressed in a little mayonnaise, tucked into a toasted hot dog bun. Yum.

Flower bed at the Bar Harbor village green.

Then I got on another shuttle and rode around the main loop in the park, getting off and back on here and there. My first stop was at Sieur le Monts, where volunteers maintain a wonderful native plant garden. One of the volunteers, a young man in a kilt, with a braid, and a very complicated molecule diagram tattooed on one arm, told me the names of several plants I did not recognize, so now I know what their friends call them.

Harebells. I associate these with late summer at Yellowstone and Mt. Rainier. It can't be late summer yet, though, can it? — Harebells. I associate these with late summer at Yellowstone and Mt. Rainier. It can’t be late summer yet, though, can it?

Hobble-bush, according to the nice young man at the Wild Garden. It's a kind of viburnum. — Hobble-bush, according to the nice young man at the Wild Garden. It’s a kind of viburnum.

My next stop was Thunder Hole. Unfortunately it was low tide, so I didn’t get to hear it actually thunder the way I did the last time I was here, but it was still cool. Basically, what happens is that the waves get forced into this narrow slot in the rock and splash way up high, making this loud booming sound. I took some video of it, just for kicks. One of these days I’ll learn how to upload it — I have the software now, just not the time.

After that, it was getting on in the afternoon, plus the busses were getting crowded, so I decided to go on back to the visitor center, because the one place the busses don’t go is Cadillac Mountain.

Cadillac Mountain is in no way, shape, or form an actual mountain (it’s only 1500 feet high), but it’s the highest point on the U.S. eastern seaboard, and you can see pretty much all the way to the curvature of the earth from the top. I drove up to the summit, and was actually lucky enough to find a parking place, so I walked the half-mile trail around the summit and took lots and lots and lots of photos [g].

And another view from Cadillac Mountain.

And a glacial erratic on top of the "mountain." — And a glacial erratic on top of the “mountain.”

If it hadn’t been so crowded, I probably would have stayed at Acadia for a couple of days, but it was really, really crowded, and campgrounds were problematic, too, so I decided to go on.

I’m camped about 40 miles north of Acadia, in a county park in the woods on a point sticking out into Narraguagus Bay. Anyway, it’s beautiful here, even if the mosquitoes are about to carry me off.

Tomorrow will be my last day in the States until I’m almost back to Washington. Here goes…

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.

Which was an interesting juxtaposition…

Anyway. I started my morning by navigating the c/o/w/p/a/t/h/s/narrow, winding, one-way streets of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, trying to find Strawbery Banke. I did, after less travail than I expected, and actually arrived before they opened (I tend to get up with the sun and go to bed with the sun when I’m camping).

Strawbery Banke is another living history site, but this one’s different. Instead of concentrating on one era the way Williamsburg and Mystic Seaport did, it covers almost all of the almost four hundred years Portsmouth (whose original name was Strawbery Banke) has been a community, concentrating on the old neighborhood of Puddle Dock, on which the modern Strawbery Banke now sits. So, from the mid-1600s to the 1950s.

Each building, from the oldest one, built in the early 1700s, to one that had most recently been remodeled just after WWII, represented a different time period and a different level of wealth and social class. And there were gardens! No one (ahem, Beth!) told me there would be gardens! Everything from a Victorian greenhouse and bedding garden to another adorable Colonial dooryard garden to an herb garden. There were stores and craftspeople, too. I got to try my hand at a loom, which was fun, and wander into a WWII-era grocery store, complete with ration points as well as the price marked on each item.

Victorian bedding garden with a greenhouse in the background.

The parlor of the Victorian house that went with the garden. A future governor of Maine lived here.

This wallpaper looks like it was inspired by a kaliedoscope.

I covet this bed. Also, I really want some quilt fabric that looks like that bed curtain fabric (sorry, Loralee [g]).

Another gorgeous cottage garden. I want a garden like that so badly... — Another gorgeous cottage garden. I want a garden like that so badly…

Mrs. Shapiro, a Jewish lady from 19190, talking with some visitors. — Mrs. Shapiro, a Jewish lady from 1910, talking with some visitors.

A shipping jar from 1700-1750. The rope netting is to help minimize breakage.

Food for sale in the WWII era grocery store. Note that Campbell's soup hasn't changed a bit, that Aunt Jemima is seriously politically incorrect, and the ration point numbers next to the prices. Also, my mother had some spice containers that could have been about that vintage. — Food for sale in the WWII era grocery store. Note that Campbell’s soup hasn’t changed a bit, that Aunt Jemima is seriously politically incorrect, and the ration point numbers next to the prices. Also, my mother had some spice containers that could have been about that vintage.

The WWII era Victory Garden, complete with chickens in the coop.

One of the houses was set up so that you could see what it looked like before and during restoration, which was quite amazing.

I spent a good chunk of the day there, and had a wonderful time.

Then I drove on north on I-95, because it was getting late and I wanted to get to my stop for the night – plus I’ve been to this part of Maine before, and I want to spend most of my time that I’ll be on the coast northeast of Acadia since I’ve never been to that part of the state before.

My destination for the night was Freeport, which is basically a factory outlet town surrounding the original LL Bean store. Not that I’m a huge fan of factory outlets, but LL Bean has a free overnight parking area for RVers (which I count as, since I don’t pitch a tent or anything). It was nice and shady and cool(!), and I ended up parked across from someone from the Tri-Cities (southeastern Washington) of all places, which was kind of hilarious.

So that’s where I am tonight. Tomorrow I’m going to Augusta, the state capitol, to visit the Maine State Museum, and then it’s on to Acadia National Park and Down East to Canada (yes, that’s the local turn of phrase, and no, that doesn’t sound right to me, either).

Starting to worry about Canada, for some reason, not sure why. It’s not like I haven’t crossed the border before. But I’ll never have spent that much time there before, either. And Quebec’s got me just a tad freaked out because of the language thing, too. Oh, well. ‘S good for me. Builds character.

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.

A Professional Dilettante

Entries tagged with freeport me

August 6-7: My third state history museum and my 27th national park/historic site

August 5: Strawbery Banke and LL Bean

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