Beach Day

I think Sir Seagull is a good title for him.

On my day off the other day I took a little trip to Ogunquit with my Mom to go to the beach there. Within an hour of setting up it started raining, but we still had a good day walking along the beach and checking out little shops, and best of all... no sunburns!

Oh ocean, how I miss you

Growing up in a two hundred year old house perched on a hill overlooking the dock in Southwest Harbor, I was never too far from the ocean. Climbing up to the third story, we could look out to see it snowing in the harbor, or a lobster man unloading his catch. The best though was sitting on the back porch on an early summer morning and smelling the ocean as the breeze wafted up from the water. Smell always carries such strong memories with it and the smell of the ocean is no different for me. Since I now live inland I miss out on that crisp, salty scent every morning and I relish it whenever I get to be near it again. As someone who grew up so close to the sea (and often in it as well) I am always dumbfounded when I find out that a friend or acquaintance of mine has never dipped a toe in the Atlantic, or even seen it! I guess all my time spent looking out at the ocean should help make up for all the poor people born inland or in the Midwest who aren't lucky enough to grow up with the ocean in their backyard.

Rhodes Park

Like the earlier picture of the lupine, this photo was taken at Rhodes Park in Southwest Harbor. The garden is maintained primarily by volunteers and also functions as a butterfly refuge. With a gorgeous view of the causeway and huge marble slabs to sit on it makes an ideal picnic spot.

Somesville

Right near where this photo was taken is the site of an iconic MDI image, the little white footbridge that goes over a small pond there. For whatever reason that bridge graces about a third of the postcards that I see from MDI. I find it a little funny that it's so popular because if you turn your back to the bridge you get to see this view instead, which I find to be much more lovely!

A little lupine to start your day

This photo was taken at the Rhodes Park butterfly garden in Southwest Harbor. Lupines forever remind me of one of my favorite children's books (and I've read a lot of them so it's hard to choose!) Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney. The story follows a young girl, Alice, who decides that she wants to do three things in her life 1. travel the world 2. live in a house by the sea and 3. she must do something to make the world a more beautiful place. After travelling to all kinds of exotic locations, working as a librarian (can you see why this book resonates with me?) and retiring in her little house by the sea, she still needs to find something to make the world a more beautiful place. After having to spend a winter in bed due to a back injury, she looks out her window to see lupines that have self started around her house. Inspired by the joy she feels at seeing the flowers she decides to make her town more beautiful by spreading lupine seeds all throughout the town and she becomes "the Lupine Lady." The story ends with Alice telling a young child that they too must do something to make the world a more beautiful place. Does it get better than that for children's books?

Sunday in the garden or at the beach

A beautiful window box at an estate that my mom, older sister and I used to do gardening and landscaping for.

Fitting for a beautiful spring day in Maine... a trip to the beach and a beautiful window basket. Does it matter that it's still WAY too cold in the ocean? Or that this window box is a mid-summer photo? No, of course it doesn't matter, gives us something to look forward to! Now I must go and enjoy this beautiful weather by going for a run (before I lose motivation and decide to enjoy the weather by lounging outside).

Photo from Bass Harbor.

Lighthouse Friday anyone?

Happy Friday! This is the Bass Harbor Head light, the picture from yesterday shows the cliffs that it overlooks. Growing up we had some wonderful neighbors including an older woman named Ginny who would let my sister and I come over and just sit and eat candy with her. My father even built a little bridge to go over the creek between the two houses because of how often I would toddle over there. I also apparently used to just sit and chatter away to her husband Al while he harvested dandelion greens (my father teases me saying he was the only person who could stand all my talking since he was almost completely deaf). I'm remembering Ginny in this post however because when she was a little girl her family was stationed on one of the small island lighthouses. Unlike some of the beacons that are on the coast and accessible all year round, she and her sisters grew up on an island the size of a large house that would become very treacherous to reach during the winter and storms. Sitting and listening to her stories my eyes would get wide and I would be so caught up in the narrative that I would even forget whatever sweet was in my hand.

MDI is being brought to you a day early!

Photo taken on the "Quiet side" of the Island at Bass Harbor lighthouse, taken in the summer of 2002.

I got up early this morning to take my Mom to the airport (she is going to Greece by way of Vienna and yes, I am burning with jealousy!) and decided that since my schedule of upcoming events is completely arbitrary I am going to start the Mount Desert Island goodness early.

For a little background information on the island...

My family and I moved to MDI when I was two and lived in Southwest Harbor which is in the "Quiet side" of the island. During high school my Mom and I moved to southern Maine at the same time that my older sister went to college. The pictures I'll be sharing on the blog were taken during my junior year of high school when I drove back to the island to do a photography assignment.

Now to set some things straight:

1. While it is spelt D-e-s-e-r-t it is pronounced like D-e-s-s-e-r-t (visitors who try to correct natives on how it is pronounced will not be well received!)

2. The national park that has a great deal of land on the island is Acadia, not Arcadia

3. If you are visiting Mount Desert Island, know that's where you are going (you would be surprised the number of times people have told me that they have not visited the island but they have stayed in Bar Harbor, since Bar Harbor happens to be ON Mount Desert Island this just makes them sound a little ignorant)

4. Under no circumstances should you attempt to speak in a horrendous Maine accent, nor should you insist on calling it "Bah Hahbah" (no one will find this amusing, except for perhaps you and it is guaranteed to get you bad service and icy looks wherever you go)

5. If you make it to MDI, enjoy it because you will be in one of the most beautiful places in America!!

Goodbye Peaks!

Photo credit goes to my grandfather, Boppo, who took this picture from the deck of Jones' Landing where Mom and Tom had their wedding reception.
Every year we have to say goodbye to Peaks, pack up all our stuff, load up the truck, and drive down to the dock (getting the truck there nice and early so it's in line to make it on the ferry). While we wait we may take one last bike ride around the island, get one last milkshake or hot dog, or just go stand on the dock for one last time that summer. While other travel makes me happy to go back home, Peaks already feels like home except much more carefree and relaxing; having to leave such a beautiful place is always difficult, but luckily we keep going back each year.

How we pack...

Tom in the truck all loaded up to go out to Peaks. Last year we also had to pack formal wear for the weddin reception!

Peaks is a big excursion for us, and it requires a level of planning akin to landing a space shuttle on the moon. The truck is loaded up the night before with luggage, bikes, outdoor games and other essentials. The morning of we load up the cat and all her food and items (this year will be a little more difficult since we also now have a dog to bring, she at least can walk on the ferry with one of my sisters). Once the truck is loaded with household and recreational items, an advance team is sent out to the grocery store (the store on Peaks is small so we bring our groceries for the week out with us) and the struggles to find room for the food among the crab trap and lawn chairs. The whole group reconvenes at the ferry terminal where the truck is waiting in line. After an enjoyable ride out to the island, the truck drives to the top of the hill and we get out bikes so that everyone who doesn't fit in the truck (which is all but one or two people) can bike up to the house. Once everything is unloaded, the lawn chairs are set up in the back of the truck as seating and the rest of the week is spent with people riding in the back of the truck or biking anywhere they need to go.

A Peaks state of mind

So no story for you this morning. I'm just going to let you sit and enjoy this picture, that's probably the best way to experience Peaks without getting to go there. Happy Monday!

One... Two... Three... GO!

Me jumping into the ocean last year, I tried to play it casual and cool to coax my cousins to take the plunge!

Jumping off the dock has become a ritual for us and a right of passage for any new friends or family we bring along (if they're really nervous we bring them down at high tide when it's less of a drop). While I am proud to say I have done the leap many times, even some at a level approximating low tide, I am Captain Wussy Pants compared to some of the younger Peaks residents. Our first year on the island we were just lounging in the sun on the floating dock when we suddenly saw a whole mass of teenagers and pre-teens race down the hill to the ferry terminal and start to swarm around. As quickly as they had come, they began climbing and leaping off any tall surface they could get to; the wooden pilings, the shed on the dock, and some even climbed up to the top of the Peaks Island sign (see my first Peaks post) and as we screamed in shock they seemed to float down to the frigid water before popping back up with a triumphant yelp (or a "Good god this water is freeeeezing" yelp, they often sound the same). With as much frantic momentum as they arrived they would soon depart to avoid getting in trouble with the one police officer stationed on the island during the day. Whether it's your first jump and your heart is pounding in your chest, or you're a veteran who casually leaps in to cool off, or you're a thrill seeker who raises their nose at the pitiful distance of a 20 foot jump at low tide, the dock has something to thrill, excite, (and sometimes scare) everyone.

Is there anything prettier?

While the view from Peaks is gorgeous in all different directions, I love watching the tide come in by the Cairn Beach and seeing the waves crash up. Also wonderful is the beach that's through the woods behind our house. Getting there requires a trek through poison ivy (which I am either immune to like my two sisters, or have managed to avoid thus far). During one amusing trip last summer to the beach to see the starfish pools we decided it would be best to get back to the house a different way rather than to risk going past poison ivy again. In the group was my mother and Tom, my uncle and aunt and their two children, and my older sister. Everything started off well with a little light bouldering and climbing, however we soon came to a spot that looked a little precarious, especially when you consider that two of the people in our group had much shorter legs and patience than the rest of us. My uncle and I started planning out a route to cut across a narrow ledge but our hand holds turned out to be full of broken glass. We managed to get all of us through with only minor casualties (a couple of pieces of glass in my hand and some in my cousins as well). From here it was a big jump down, luckily Tom is tall and was able to help us find ways to shimmy down or give us the reassurance that if we jumped there was a good chance he would catch us/break our fall.

It seemed like we had made it past most of the adventure when my cousin lost her flip flop down a crevasse. My mom and I were all set with leaving it since it was fifteen feet down in a narrow tunnel, but somehow my uncle managed to get down to the bottom of it, and throw it out. On we went, now all with shoes on and had a relaxing stroll across the beach before we came to a dock that would bring us back to the road the house was on. We were in the process of climbing up the side of the dock and half of us were on the beach and half were on the dock when we realized there was a hornet nest that we were disturbing with all our climbing and jostling. Those still on the beach climbed up very gingerly and then standing at the opposite end of the dock we sprinted up to the top and to the woods but were not quite fast enough. So in our efforts to avoid possible poison ivy, we encountered very real broken glass and irate hornets, and yet, we all fondly look back at that as one of the best parts of the trip!

Cairns

A favorite pastime during Peak week is to go to "Cairn Beach" (the name is one we've made up but it's an accurate description). Whether we attempt to build massive cairns and then jump out of their way as they come crashing down, or lecture children we don't know about how it is disrespectful and mean to destroy cairns that people have worked hard on (I must get this trait from my mother who has no qualms about parenting other people's children) we can usually be amused here for several hours at a time. Since the beach is on the backside of the island we often bike past it on our way to or from the house when we're taking the long way and it's so touching to see families working on them together or just seeing what new crazy creation someone has attempted. I am proud to say that the cairn pictured is one of the few successful ones I have ever created; Mom is more of a stone maven than me so I usually watch her work with interest rather than making my own.

Welcome to Peaks

For the last three or four years, my family and I have been lucky enough to spend one week each summer on Peaks Island. Located off the coast of Portland, it is an approximately 25 minute ferry ride to get to the small and charming island. We've had a lot of great memories there whether it be spending all day on the dock crab fishing, biking down to the store in the morning to get coffee and the newspaper, jumping off the dock, rock climbing to avoid a path with poison ivy, and most recently the wedding reception for my Mom and Tom.

Both my Mom and Tom are avid runners and they first discovered this picturesque place when they ran a 5K there. The island is only four miles around so longer runs or races take a little creativity. We have as a family ran a very amusing clam shell relay race that takes place on the fourth of July. Going to Peaks is very different than any other vacations or traveling for us since there's no frantic scheduling or sightseeing tours. Each day is spent in a laid back manner with a nice combination of bike riding, swimming, reading, eating, and marshmallow toasting. I think it's the best family tradition we have so far!