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Bobby and I left on Monday to spend a few days on the coast of Maine. It was his agreement, when we moved here, that he would take his Elven wife at least once per year to see the ocean. In reality, we are not any farther from the sea than when we lived in Maryland, and the drive is a good bit shorter, because Maryland traffic.
This will mostly be a picture post because we didn't do a whole lot that was exciting. (I lied. I wrote more than expected. Oops.) We ate some wonderful seafood and spent a lot of time on the beach. We took the Goldens with us, but I want to round up a bunch of Golden photos and do a separate post for Rhapsody. <3
We happened to be traveling again during another heatwave at home, just like when we went to Denmark, although this one was shorter. The coast was, of course, boiling. We arrived early afternoon Monday, grabbed lunch at the microbrewery in Saco, and took the Wilds to the beach and stayed late. Just like Willoughby has been swimmably warm this year, so was the ocean. It is normally painfully cold, but it was also swimmable. (I did not take my swim stuff because of a reported great white shark off the coast, although I could have easily swam close in to shore; there were barely any waves at all. So I got in the water but that amazing length of calm sea along the shore just taunted me the whole time to come swim the length of the beach. And then maybe back. Bobby didn't help: There is a little island about a mile off the coast, and he kept saying, "I bet you could swim to that island." Next time! We'll bring a kayak and he'll accompany me out to the island and back.)
Monday night, we got Mexican food in Biddeford. I know, I know! We should have had some kind of fresh-caught something but since the mediocre Mexican restaurant in St. J's closed, we are left with America's Taco Shop as our sole "out" option for Mexican (short of driving to Burlington), and America's is very ... basic. We go there for lunch from time to time, but it just does not scratch the itch that even mediocre out Mexican does. So we were both in bliss.
Tuesday was scorching hot (well, for us ... I don't even want to say what "scorching hot" was since those of you south of us, which would be nearly everyone, will probably throw rotten fruit at me). We went to Ogunquit for the morning, which is a cute little town south of where we were staying in Saco. Cute but posh. Bobby and I are like a pair of clodhoppers there: My collarbones are not sharp enough, and he is far too hirsute. But it has one of my favoritest walks anywhere in the world: the Marginal Way.
(I just looked it up and the Marginal Way is a mile long. After walking it, Bobby and I both swore it was not that long! It seemed shorter than we remembered it but this is probably because we have become so familiar with it because we refuse to pay the parking fees at the top of the road, so the Marginal Way becomes our chief way of getting about in Ogunquit. So we've walked it twenty times if we've walked it once.)
At the far end of the Marginal Way is a little dive called the Lobster Shack, where we always go to eat. Thankfully, it had air conditioning and also has really great iced tea. I didn't care how hot it was; I was having a cup of chowder and my usual tuna roll. (I am squeamish about any food that is alive when I order it, and their tuna rolls are fab.) Bobby had the special: a lobster roll (butter, no mayo!) and a cup of chowder. By the time we left to hoof back down the I-swear-it's not-really-a-mile mile-long walk back to the car, we were good and cool. By the time we got to the end, we were ... less so. It was dripping hot by that point. I got a nice mix of sweat and sunscreen in my eye, so I'm pretty sure I gave a good look at my bra to the people sitting behind their fences on their posh hotel lawns (which makes zero sense to me as a way to spend a hot day--sitting on a lawn? in sight of the sea but nowhere near it?--so it must be the fence) when I was using my shirt to save my burning eye. Heee. Oops.
We spent the afternoon at the beach before getting run in by a thunderstorm. We tried a new seafood restaurant that night, right at the inlet of the sea and the Saco River. Because the storm came before we could get the Goldens to the beach during the cooler, calmer part of the day, then we took them for a walk along the Saco-Biddeford River Walk.
The next day, we went to Portland for the first time. It was startingly close--all this time and we never knew! Two years ago, I acquired a lighthouse passport--you get a stamp for each lighthouse you see with the proceeds supporting preservation of historic lights--so we spent the morning lighthouse-hunting on the way up to Portland. I added five stamps to my passport ... well, really, I added six because I accepted one that I haven't seen yet because the stamp location is nowhere near the lighthouse, and I knew it'd be a pain in the neck to get back there once I've seen it. I'm already plotting how to see that one next time so that I can make my passport honest.
First was the Cape Elizabeth Light. There's supposed to be two--one is no longer active and can be seen from the state park--but they seem to be the Ambarussa of lighthouses and count as one? This is weird since there are lighthouses much closer to each other that still count separately. Anyway, this is the active, eastern one.
Next was the Portland Head Light, in the Fort Williams Park, which had to be one of the most exciting places we discovered on this trip, since the park was large with walking paths and ruins and lots of fun stuff to explore, and it was dog-friendly, so we can bring the Wilds next time and spend a few hours. The light is one that features regularly in photos of New England lighthouses since it is 1) beautiful in a very quintessential New-England-lighthouse way and 2) the surroundings are remote (considering that it is a stone's throw outside of Maine's most populated city) and very dramatic: those craggy black rocks that throw spray high into the air with the least bit of wind.
If you look along the horizon to the right of the Portland Head Light, you will see a tiny little tower: the Ram Island Ledge Light, which is on an island out to sea. (Lighthouses on islands out to sea are my absolute favorite. There is something so romantic about them to me, like the towers seen at a distance that Tolkien wrote about in his letters. The stamp I collected for the unseen lighthouse is one of these.)
Yes, I am overusing those seaside roses in the foregrounds of my photographs.
This is Casco Bay. You can see the Ram Island Ledge Light all the way to the right.
And again to the right of the foghorn warning sign. (I want to hear the foghorn so bad.)
This commemoration of a shipwreck in the area is a reminder that the harsh beauty of the coastline can be fatal. But isn't this part of the attraction of the sea? It certainly is for me, and I wonder if the Elvish sea-longing (which is something I have always understood, experiencing it myself as a physical sensation at times) isn't rooted in this, like an embodiment of thanatos to a species denied death. (No, I have not become a Freudian, gods help us. See what the ocean does to me.)
Next was the Bug Light, in view of Portland. It is the only lighthouse of its kind in the world because it was adorned with Classical architectural features. (Or, as I put it to Bobby when we were there, if you made a lighthouse cake, you would decorate it like this. It was remarkably ornate for its stern, utilitarian purpose.)
Spittin distance from the Bug Light is the Spring Point Light.
And that is All The Lighthouses. For now anyway.
We got lunch afterward in Portland. I honestly could have skipped this. It took forever to find parking along the waterfront and was clogged with tourists. I would have rather gone back into Old Orchard Beach/Saco and eaten there and spent more time at the beach.
That afternoon/evening was a phenomenal time at the beach. The storm the night before had taken some of the heat away, so it was much more comfortable, and Guinevere discovered that she enjoys the ocean. I will post pictures of her and Lancie in my forthcoming Goldens Post.
For our last night, we had reservations at Joseph's by the Sea, an excellent Italian restaurant in Old Orchard. Bobby always makes the reservation weeks in advance online so that we get a table overlooking the ocean. Last time we went, a full moon rose over the sea while we ate; we weren't so lucky this time, but the food was excellent and the view was amazing. We had planned to go into Old Orchard and do Boardwalk stuff, but it started to rain and thunder near the end of our meal, so we had a nightcap on the way home and went to bed early.
Aaand today we came home. :(
I owe a Goldens post and some stuff going on around the ol' homestead and a f-locked family-related update, but all in good time.
We happened to be traveling again during another heatwave at home, just like when we went to Denmark, although this one was shorter. The coast was, of course, boiling. We arrived early afternoon Monday, grabbed lunch at the microbrewery in Saco, and took the Wilds to the beach and stayed late. Just like Willoughby has been swimmably warm this year, so was the ocean. It is normally painfully cold, but it was also swimmable. (I did not take my swim stuff because of a reported great white shark off the coast, although I could have easily swam close in to shore; there were barely any waves at all. So I got in the water but that amazing length of calm sea along the shore just taunted me the whole time to come swim the length of the beach. And then maybe back. Bobby didn't help: There is a little island about a mile off the coast, and he kept saying, "I bet you could swim to that island." Next time! We'll bring a kayak and he'll accompany me out to the island and back.)
Monday night, we got Mexican food in Biddeford. I know, I know! We should have had some kind of fresh-caught something but since the mediocre Mexican restaurant in St. J's closed, we are left with America's Taco Shop as our sole "out" option for Mexican (short of driving to Burlington), and America's is very ... basic. We go there for lunch from time to time, but it just does not scratch the itch that even mediocre out Mexican does. So we were both in bliss.
Tuesday was scorching hot (well, for us ... I don't even want to say what "scorching hot" was since those of you south of us, which would be nearly everyone, will probably throw rotten fruit at me). We went to Ogunquit for the morning, which is a cute little town south of where we were staying in Saco. Cute but posh. Bobby and I are like a pair of clodhoppers there: My collarbones are not sharp enough, and he is far too hirsute. But it has one of my favoritest walks anywhere in the world: the Marginal Way.
(I just looked it up and the Marginal Way is a mile long. After walking it, Bobby and I both swore it was not that long! It seemed shorter than we remembered it but this is probably because we have become so familiar with it because we refuse to pay the parking fees at the top of the road, so the Marginal Way becomes our chief way of getting about in Ogunquit. So we've walked it twenty times if we've walked it once.)
At the far end of the Marginal Way is a little dive called the Lobster Shack, where we always go to eat. Thankfully, it had air conditioning and also has really great iced tea. I didn't care how hot it was; I was having a cup of chowder and my usual tuna roll. (I am squeamish about any food that is alive when I order it, and their tuna rolls are fab.) Bobby had the special: a lobster roll (butter, no mayo!) and a cup of chowder. By the time we left to hoof back down the I-swear-it's not-really-a-mile mile-long walk back to the car, we were good and cool. By the time we got to the end, we were ... less so. It was dripping hot by that point. I got a nice mix of sweat and sunscreen in my eye, so I'm pretty sure I gave a good look at my bra to the people sitting behind their fences on their posh hotel lawns (which makes zero sense to me as a way to spend a hot day--sitting on a lawn? in sight of the sea but nowhere near it?--so it must be the fence) when I was using my shirt to save my burning eye. Heee. Oops.
We spent the afternoon at the beach before getting run in by a thunderstorm. We tried a new seafood restaurant that night, right at the inlet of the sea and the Saco River. Because the storm came before we could get the Goldens to the beach during the cooler, calmer part of the day, then we took them for a walk along the Saco-Biddeford River Walk.
The next day, we went to Portland for the first time. It was startingly close--all this time and we never knew! Two years ago, I acquired a lighthouse passport--you get a stamp for each lighthouse you see with the proceeds supporting preservation of historic lights--so we spent the morning lighthouse-hunting on the way up to Portland. I added five stamps to my passport ... well, really, I added six because I accepted one that I haven't seen yet because the stamp location is nowhere near the lighthouse, and I knew it'd be a pain in the neck to get back there once I've seen it. I'm already plotting how to see that one next time so that I can make my passport honest.
First was the Cape Elizabeth Light. There's supposed to be two--one is no longer active and can be seen from the state park--but they seem to be the Ambarussa of lighthouses and count as one? This is weird since there are lighthouses much closer to each other that still count separately. Anyway, this is the active, eastern one.
Next was the Portland Head Light, in the Fort Williams Park, which had to be one of the most exciting places we discovered on this trip, since the park was large with walking paths and ruins and lots of fun stuff to explore, and it was dog-friendly, so we can bring the Wilds next time and spend a few hours. The light is one that features regularly in photos of New England lighthouses since it is 1) beautiful in a very quintessential New-England-lighthouse way and 2) the surroundings are remote (considering that it is a stone's throw outside of Maine's most populated city) and very dramatic: those craggy black rocks that throw spray high into the air with the least bit of wind.
If you look along the horizon to the right of the Portland Head Light, you will see a tiny little tower: the Ram Island Ledge Light, which is on an island out to sea. (Lighthouses on islands out to sea are my absolute favorite. There is something so romantic about them to me, like the towers seen at a distance that Tolkien wrote about in his letters. The stamp I collected for the unseen lighthouse is one of these.)
Yes, I am overusing those seaside roses in the foregrounds of my photographs.
This is Casco Bay. You can see the Ram Island Ledge Light all the way to the right.
And again to the right of the foghorn warning sign. (I want to hear the foghorn so bad.)
This commemoration of a shipwreck in the area is a reminder that the harsh beauty of the coastline can be fatal. But isn't this part of the attraction of the sea? It certainly is for me, and I wonder if the Elvish sea-longing (which is something I have always understood, experiencing it myself as a physical sensation at times) isn't rooted in this, like an embodiment of thanatos to a species denied death. (No, I have not become a Freudian, gods help us. See what the ocean does to me.)
Next was the Bug Light, in view of Portland. It is the only lighthouse of its kind in the world because it was adorned with Classical architectural features. (Or, as I put it to Bobby when we were there, if you made a lighthouse cake, you would decorate it like this. It was remarkably ornate for its stern, utilitarian purpose.)
Spittin distance from the Bug Light is the Spring Point Light.
And that is All The Lighthouses. For now anyway.
We got lunch afterward in Portland. I honestly could have skipped this. It took forever to find parking along the waterfront and was clogged with tourists. I would have rather gone back into Old Orchard Beach/Saco and eaten there and spent more time at the beach.
That afternoon/evening was a phenomenal time at the beach. The storm the night before had taken some of the heat away, so it was much more comfortable, and Guinevere discovered that she enjoys the ocean. I will post pictures of her and Lancie in my forthcoming Goldens Post.
For our last night, we had reservations at Joseph's by the Sea, an excellent Italian restaurant in Old Orchard. Bobby always makes the reservation weeks in advance online so that we get a table overlooking the ocean. Last time we went, a full moon rose over the sea while we ate; we weren't so lucky this time, but the food was excellent and the view was amazing. We had planned to go into Old Orchard and do Boardwalk stuff, but it started to rain and thunder near the end of our meal, so we had a nightcap on the way home and went to bed early.
Aaand today we came home. :(
I owe a Goldens post and some stuff going on around the ol' homestead and a f-locked family-related update, but all in good time.
Tags:
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-10 10:00 am (UTC)It's good to go on holidays without doing anything "exciting" every now and then. It'll be more exciting when you do that swim/kayak trip to the island, I'm sure! For now, I just got a relaxed summer vibe off your pics and description, which was perfectly nice.
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-10 10:10 am (UTC)It's too bad there was a Great White in the waters, because it looks excellent for a swim! It seems you managed to enjoy it all the same, and got your ocean fix!
Looking forward to a Golden post. :D
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-10 11:51 am (UTC)Pssst, and a Denmark entry, unless I missed one miraculously... ;)
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-10 12:16 pm (UTC)Sometimes I wonder if I just grew up on the wrong type of beach, because acres of sand doesn't do anything for me but rocky shores do. Or maybe it's that I find sand beaches boring because they were commonplace. On the other hand, I don't have sea-longing. Mountain-longing, definitely.
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-10 03:25 pm (UTC)I don't know that I'm prone to sea-longing as such, but I do get antsy if I'm too far from the ocean too long.
people sitting behind their fences on their posh hotel lawns
This is a thing people do? Who goes to the shore to sit on the lawn? I am so confused by this concept.
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-10 09:12 pm (UTC)PS. Love the idea of a lighthouse passport -- very cool! :)
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-11 01:49 pm (UTC)It's been hot here too, we've been for a walk down by Lake Ontario were it usually provides some respite but it was almost as warm there as in the middle of town. Yeesh.
(no subject)
Date: 2018-08-12 03:36 pm (UTC)