A visit to the Maine Wildlife Park

With my good pals Gail and Joe.

We've been camping in their driveway for a few years.

But not anymore we're too big

but it's still fun to get together.

Me and Joe.

I made friends with a moose more or less.

He was being snotty and I was having trouble with

keeping my fingers out of the whole selfie thing.

Thus the face.

A bald eagle snarfing down a snack.

A coyote on the prowl.

Moose decided to be a bit more friendly.

Grrr on the fences though.

and this proud poser.

and totally blossoms.

They are quite snippy critters.

A lynx prowling around.

 

a red fox soaking up the sun.

And yes its red.

And I don't see it either LOL.

a golden eagle.

which looks mostly green

there was a lot of green going on.

A bear in a bush.

You don't see that too often.

Seriously.

It's a really cool refuge and this was

the right time of year to go.

Hardly anyone was there and the animals

were happy to be out.

 

Lighthouses and Ft. McClary Maine

I love lighthouses, who doesn't and I did spare

you 194814851878 pictures of them.

This one in Nubble Lighthouse or otherwise knows as 

Cape Neddick lightstation.

It's a really cool are to hang in, lots of places

to sit and relax with artists painting.

The two lighthouses here are White Island Light Station

 and Whaleback Lighthouse.

I strategically managed to get a really cool

sailboat in the photo to be like

all authentic you know.

It appears its an optical illusion, Whaleback is on

the Piscataqua River and has a foghorn,

and

White Island Light Station is on an island in

New Hampshire.

Constitution Lighthouse actually has several names,

Portsmouth, Fort Point, and New Castle.

There's also a Fort Constitution that

we seemed to miss.

We'll have to go back. 

oh darn.

Ft. McClary presides over Portsmouth Harbor

providing defense for the

southern coast of Kittery Point.

Obviously that bunker wasn't there in the

1700's.

Was a totally beautiful day.

 

Scenes from around Kennebunkport Maine

St. Anne's Episcopol Church built in 1887.

It is so gorgeous.

The inside is just as pretty. 

And the outside altar overlooking the Atlantic City.

The rocky coast.

The Stage Island Monument built in 1825 as a beacon

for vessels entering the harbor.

Wood Island Lighthouse was built in 1807 using wood.

The first lightkeeper earned $225 a year.

The station was rebuilt in 1839 and in 1950

the Coast Guard converted it to a Light Station.

Rumors are its cursed and there's ghosts.

Snug little cove.

Overlooking the Atlantic.

Goat Island Light Station in Cape Porpoise Harbor

was built in 1883.

It had been noted that the secret service used

the lighthouse to keep tabs on

the Bush's at Walker's Point.

Lots of traps and fishing stuff.

The weather was beautiful.

 

Traveler's Notebook update - Maine

This little album is getting quite full and I since we are

heading to our winter home I'd like to 

finish it in this album.

It's gonna be tight because I can't seem to be able to do this

without dimension.

Love my bags and tucking in journaling and since

we stayed 2 weeks in Maine - I decided to condense the journaling

on one tag.

I was quite chatty.

Also using up fun PL cards that I had forever and this

adorable one is from Paper Issues.

It was quite nippy in Maine going down to the 30's

and we were more or less getting over it.

        Because of COVID restrictions (or maybe not) we need to make a reservation to ride up to Cadillac Mountain. Which we did. It was cold up there, lots of wind and not a lot of parking which also may be the cause of reservations.

I also kept the check from "The Traveling Lobster" roadside eatery which was totally delicious. We finally got to go - the crowd was always around the block and it was quite nippy to stand outside and wait. We found that timing is everything and having an early dinner helped. We also took it to go. We were quite bummed because we didn't have a good experience with other restaurants - food just wasn't up to the expensive pricing in a few we did try and because of that experience we didn't eat out much.

Of course we found some lighthouses in our ride about the harbors.

Bass Harbor, Egg Rock and Prospect Harbor.

Love how the embellishment fit into that doily. I do adore doilies and decided that it was simple enough to highlight and trying to avoid dimension - I may go back and splatter some mist around or not.

I did find a tiny scrapbook shop in Bar Harbor inside a fabric store and was really delighted. There wasn't a big selection but I did find this cute Little Yellow Bicycle embellishments. Above is our run from Maine to Pennsylvania. We watch the weather closely and about the time we were leaving Maine - high wind warnings were coming and we wanted to get ahead and not have to drive through them. We hit PA and then headed back to our friends in NJ since high winds and storms were coming down the line. We are now heading back to Florida - taking the long way.  Currently, we are in a lovely camp in South Carolina where were gonna hunker down for about a week and then stroll on into Florida to vote.
 

Two Rockland Lighthouses

First up is the Rockland Breakwater Lighthouse

that is WAAAYY out there.

Not like I was daunted by that distance but.....

the jetty was rocky, uneven, and well it just a lot

of work to get out there that I wasn't

in the mood to do.

I know right.

I usually don't have issues with a lot of work

but my fancy footwork doesn't lend

to a lot of unevenness of rocks and crevices.

Anyway, the lighthouse was built in 1890's and its nearly a mile out.

 It loooked soooo cool and I was also hoping

to get another angle down the road,

but alas, twas not to be.

And don't the sailboats look like they're having a great time?

 My pal Gail enjoying the moment.

 Then on to Owl's head Lighthouse and as we turned the

corner in the park there was this adorable post office.

 And just was we got there the fog rolled in.

The lighthouse was built in 1825 and rebuilt in 1852.

It's 100 feet above mean sea level.

 Even though I hate heights I made it up the

steps just in time for blue skies.

 Looking out over the peninsula was fog, there was a ship

passing by and by the time I focused it disappeared into the fog.

 This granite rock giving a nutshell of the history

of the lighthouse.

Very hard to read by cool all the same.

 An old sea captain haunts the lighthouse.

I didn't see him but that doesn't mean he isn't there.

There was also a dog named Spot, whose job it

was to ring the fog warning bell.

After he passed, he was buried near the bell.

There is also a story of a man, first mate and a fiance

ran aground in the rocks. The lightkeeper

found the captain half frozen, and a couple days

later the captain happened to mention the two other people.

They were eventually found encased in ice and thought to be dead.

Well they slowly thawed them out and the first mate

and fiance had 4 children. The man Roger Elliot did not

make a full recovery.

Seeing the sights in and around Boothbay Maine

Sorry I haven't been around for awhile - we flew

through the midwest states (which means not a lot of photos), 

hung out with the grands

and now visiting with friends, 

hanging out in their driveway that I tended 

to forget the camera and just have fun.

 Tom and Gail at Boothbay harbor.

 Me and Gail.

 Lots of really cool and fun shops.

 These flowers were everywhere and so pretty and vibrant.

 Kitchey but Kool. LOL.

 Love black eyed susies and a bee.

 Hendricks Head Light Station.

Found it was privately owned so this was as close as we could get.

Pretty cool living in a lighthouse.