Where pine trees meet the sea

Our first weekend adventure in Maine was a road trip up the coast. We've decided to make the most of the first month or two where I have relatively little to do for school and Kurt is unemployed. So this post will be the first of many summarizing our first Maine adventures.

We were pleasantly surprised that it only takes an hour to go from our front door to the Atlantic Ocean. It took me a while to pin point what it smells like in Maine, but now that I've got it I'll never forget it: a mixture of pine trees, maple syrup, and honeysuckle. When we're along the coast it also smells like salty sea air and pine trees. It's a very distinctive and comforting smell and it will forever be the 'Maine smell.' We started our trip by visiting Schoodic Point, a part of Acadia National Park.

Wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. I took detailed notes of our first couple of weeks here because it just seemed so fun to me. So in that first week (before the weekend adventure I started to tell you about) we found a great Thai place in Orono (we actually visited this thai place when we came to visit the university in April, Kurt got a fortune in his fortune cookie that said "your life will become more of an adventure." I won't lie that helped us decide to throw caution to the wind and move to the land of lumberjacks.), we also found an awesome used bookstore in Bangor and we planted flowers, fresh herbs, and a tomato plant in our yard. It wasn't long before we started calling the Orono apartment "home."

I also had my first week of field research! I went out on several lakes, heard my first loon and saw a huge snapping turtle. The lakes in Maine are beautiful, sunrise as the fog is lifting and the loons are calling is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Little cabins are tucked into all the pine trees around the lake, each with smoke coming from the chimney (yes, even in the end of June it is still cold enough at night for fires in the fireplace).

Every day after I came home from being out on the lakes, Kurt and I would go on a local adventure to feel out our surroundings. This week we went for a walk at the Orono bog boardwalk, such an amazing environment. We were a little on edge because a momma bear and 2 cubs were seen just that week, and here like most places in Maine there was no one around but us. Well when we first started our walk we ran into a small family...the dad showed us the gun he had hid in the stroller just in case he came across the bear...hmmmm.

And just when you thought our week was jam packed enough, we also went for a 6 mile bike ride into Old Town! I brought my brother's old mountain bike from home which is rusted and falling apart and Kurt found an old Walmart mountain bike left for garbage in the back of a vacant apartment down from us. So on our fine pieces of equipment, we started off (and stopped frequently to fill Kurt's leaky tires with air). We made it to the dam on the Penobscot and laughed, got great exercise and vowed to never do it again.

The last (and most important) thing we did before we set off for the coast was to go to the Canoe Hullabaloo!!! That's right ladies and gentlemen, Old Town's fifth annual riverfront festival. Kurt ate his first red hotdog! I don't know what the big deal is, but it's a Maine thing. We also had whoopie pies (a Maine trademark) and doughboys! A doughboy is like a funnel cake, but instead of being a bunch of strings of dough it is one big piece, kind of like a pizza with cinnamon and sugar on top. They're delightful. But let me tell you the best part, we got to experience the greatest Elvis tribute artist, EVER. Joey Loring does not attempt to be Elvis, he just pays tribute to the King. It was so great, because he's a local town guy and to hear all the Mainers sitting around us saying "Oh yeah, Joey looks good this year, he's got a blue suit." Man, I have never laughed so hard. Best thing is we got a picture with Joey:

Ok, so now we're ready to get back to the coast: Schoodic was b-e-a-utiful. We did a driving loop around the peninsula and a small hike to the highest point to get a good look at the coast. A rocky coast lined with evergreens is unbeatable in terms of beauty. And the tops of the highest ground are all bald because of the winds coming off the coast. So you see the beautiful almost pink colored granite. And all day the fog kept rolling in and out; you would turn around and in a matter of minutes you could see islands and fishing boats you couldn't see just a second ago because of the fog. And there was a constant chorus of fog horns, bell buoys, gulls and loons. It's quite a magical place.

On our way out to the point, we stopped in Winter Harbor at a smoked seafood place called the Grindstone Neck of Maine Gourmet. The owner was the friendliest guy, he ended up loaning us a cooler and ice packs to keep our food cold with the faith we would bring it back 2 days later. And he introduced us to the tastiness that is honey cured salmon candy. I will have cravings of this now for the rest of my life. Our experience with Mainers has been nothing short of amazing. I have met some of the most friendly people up here, they will talk to you like they've known you for years and go out of their way to help you out.

From Schoodic, we headed north along the coast to Jonesport, the most quintessential Maine fishing village (picture at left). We also went through Machias, where we had lunch at the whole life natural market and cafe, best black bean burrito I ever had. In the afternoon we stopped at Quoddy Head State Park and lighhouse (eastern most point in the US) where we saw a porcupine and seals! We also grabbed a couple beautiful sea stones to put in our office to remember our trip. Kurt jumped on the opportunity to climb the huge rocks along the coast.

Then we arrived at our home for the night, the Home Port Inn in Lubec, ME. Dave and Suzannah, the owners of the Inn, were such sweet people (and quite the travelers!). We had dinner in the Inn, and what an amazing dinner it turned out to be! We had haddoc, halibut and fresh blueberry pie! Not to mention a wonderful red wine, Sangre de Toro. We realized during dinner it was actually our 9 month anniversary! After a wonderful night sleep, we woke up to fog horns and gulls. After an out-of-this-world breakfast, we jumped the border into New Brunswick!

Side-note: One other thing I love about Maine, every restaurant uses items that are bought locally. Awesome.

So it was a 10 minute drive to hop onto Campobello Island (good thing we brought our passports!). We visited Roosevelt Campobello International Park. President Franklin Roosevelt had a vacation home on Campobello Island and it is not open to public tours (middle picture below). Kurt and I were the only ones there! The house was beautiful. We also went to see the East Quoddy lighthouse (across the bay from the West Quoddy we visited the previous afternoon). Although it was too foggy to see it from only a couple hundred feet away, we could hear the fog horn going all day. We grabbed lunch at the Family Fisheries Restaurant (picture of Kurt trying to blend in with the Canucks below along with me about to do work on a lobster roll) where it was obvious we were 'from away' compared to the french speaking locals. We had our second lobster rolls ever (the first was on Friday evening at the Sea Dog Brewery in Bangor)! These were better than the brewery, but not the best we ever had....more on that to come. After lunch we began the trip home, stopping to return the cooler and to pick up some glass art. Glass art is a touristy Maine thing, but we had to do it anyway.

And that my friends, is the story of our first Maine adventure. Oh yeah, side-note #2: I love lupine. It grows everywhere in Maine in the spring and makes me happy. What better note to end on than a flowery one.