September 28, 2017. Lobster and Provincial Taste.

September 28, 2017.  Lobster and Provincial Taste.  Over 5 million lobsters are eaten in Bar Harbor every year.  About 90 percent of the nation's lobster supply comes from Maine.  If you are in Maine, you should eat a lobster, I've been told.  

In the 1970s I attended a seminar in Miami Beach.  At the end of the classes, one of my partners suggested we dine at a local landmark seafood restaurant, Joe's Stone Crab.  I wasn't a seafood fan but I agreed to go along.  

Once seated, all those at the table ordered crab, or lobster, or some other saltwater fare.  When the waiter got to me, I ordered a Kansas City strip steak.  That same partner remarked about my "provincial" taste.  I wasn't sure what he meant so I just laughed along with everyone else.  Then, I enjoyed my steak.  

When I had a chance, I looked up the word.  I wasn't happy with the definition:  provincial is something related to a specific country or geographic area or someone or something that is small-minded and unsophisticated.

I had the word in mind yesterday when we were early arrivers at the Chart House Restaurant.  So, when I saw lobster, I ordered it.  Shelby, our server, promised she would show me how to crack the shell and remove the meat.  Later, she was good to her word.  She draped a plastic bib on me and handed me a nutcracker.  

I first broke the claws and gouged out the meat.  Next, I went to work on the tail.  All the time, water and juice was dripping from my chin and onto the bib.  Last, I cracked open the torso and scraped away the scant layer of meat concealed within.  After all that work, I figure I ingested about three ounces of lobster meat.  My take on the whole deal was that the food wasn't worth the effort.  Next time, I'll order a lobster sandwich and let someone else do the work.  Better yet, I'll order the bacon burger.  Forty years later, provincial I still am.  

The Chart House was our first top on yesterday's circumnavigation of Mount Desert (pronounced "de-zert" - you know, like ice cream and cake) Island.  Before leaving, I snapped a couple of pictures of the bay, the dock and several lobster traps.  The second stop was the town of Bar Harbor.  We sat on a bench in a park overlooking the pier.  The outer edges of some trees are beginning to turn colors.  The next couple of weeks in New England should be beautiful.   

We drove around the island past Otter Cove, Seal Harbor and Southeast Harbor.  We saw quaint villages and sand beaches.  Before returning to the cabin, we passed through Somesville where we found the arched walking bridge over a pond leading to the first structure constructed in the area in the mid-1700s.

The final stop was a lobster shack near our cabin.  The shack was surrounded by lobster traps and the outer walls covered with buoys which, presumably, are used to mark the traps.  I stopped because of the colorful design created by the buoys, not because I wanted lobster.  I'd rather have a Kansas City strip.  

Goodnight.  

September 27, 2017. Campobello, FDR's Beloved Island Summer Home.

September 27, 2017.  Campobello, FDR's Beloved Island Summer Home.  We are staying in a two-bedroom cabin on Hamilton Pond, seen shrouded in fog above, about five miles north of Bar Harbor.  The cabin appears to be an old New England saltbox structure which was constructed four years ago.  Wildlife is omnipresent.  Turkey and deer crossed the yard last night and this morning.

We left early this foggy morning for the 80-mile drive to the Canadian island of Campobello.  We met Ms. Moose on the road.  She looked a little confused as she would first turn toward the road, then the woods.  She acted as if she wanted to cross the road, but was frightened by the oncoming traffic, including us.

Campobello was the summer home to many of the wealthy citizens living in the northeast, including the parents of Franklin Roosevelt.  FDR was one when he first visited the island.  He spent the summers of his youth there, sailing, hiking and frolicking.  It was the perfect location for a growing boy.

After Franklin married his distant cousin, Eleanor, in 1905, his mother, Sara, gave him a "cottage" next door to her home on the island.  The cottage consists of 34 rooms, large enough for FDR, Eleanor and their six children.  It was there that FDR was stricken with polio in 1921 when he was 39 years old.  The cottage and surrounding acreage is jointly maintained and operated by the United States and Canada.  As you can see, the flowers and gardens are magnificent.

After our tour of Campobello was complete, the first town we encountered was Lubec, ME, the easternmost community in the United States.  In route to our temporary home on Mount Desert Island, we stopped at a nice mom-and-pop restaurant in Machias, ME.  Seated in a booth behind me were four people.  Two were apparently married and the other two were a mother and her daughter.  The daughter had a hearing impairment.  The married couple appeared to be in their 60s, mom was in her 70s or 80s.

Their table conversation was distractingly loud.  The daugher with the hearing impairment was without her hearing aids.  Sometime after the table was cleared, the mother went outside for a smoke.  The wife spoke loudly to the daughter, "I wish you had your hearing aids so you could have participated more in our conversation."

The daughter yelled, "I can't hear you.  I don't have my hearing aids.  My doctor sent them for repairs to Bangor."  Everyone in the restaurant could hear the conversation.  Most were stifling laughter.

The wife yelled back, "Keith and I are going to the bathroom.  Tell your mom we'll be out in a moment."

"What?!?  I can't hear you.  I don't have my hearing aids."

By now, Keith and the wife were standing.  The wife leaned over, her mouth inches from the daughter's ear, she repeated, even more loudly, "Keith and I are going to the bathroom.  Tell your mother we'll be out in a minute."

The daugher, obviously confused, "Is that in Portland?"

The wife mumbled something to Keith and he got up and shuffled toward the men's room.  He was bent at the waist and his body was shaking as he tried to choke back the laughter.  I am pretty sure he exploded once the bathroom door closed.  The wife then got up and ushered the daughter from the restaurant.

One of the joys of travel is the opportunity to observe interesting sites and interesting people.  So, that was our day.  I hope you had a good day, too.  Goodnight. 

September 26, 2017. Portland, Mount Desert Island, Acadia National Park, ME.

September 26, 2017.  Tourtillotts in Portland, Mount Desert Island, Acadia National Park, ME.  We finished the 1600-mile drive from home to Portland in three days.  We arrived Thursday and used Friday to scout the lighthouses near Portland.  There are 6 within a 20-mile stretch.  

The Tourtillotts arrived on the Norwegian Dawn early Saturday morning.  We drove to Fort Allen Park where we saw Fort Gorges in Casco Bay and our first two lighthouses, one of which is called "The Bug."  Fort Gorges, built from 1858 to 1864, was never put into service and no troops were ever stationed there. According to the signs posted in the park, advancing military technology, including iron clad ships and long range guns, made the fort obsolete before it could be used.  The bandstand pictured above was built in the 1890s.  It has been extremely well maintained.  I saw somewhere that there would be a concert in the park next week.  I assume the bandstand will be used then.  
   We then cruised the cobblestone streets of old Portland before driving to Fort Williams where Portland Head Light is located.  Portland Head was commissioned by President George Washington in the early 1790s, making it one of the oldest lighthouses in the US and one of the first commissioned by the new federal government.  Prior to ratification of the Constitution, lighthouses were built by the individual colonies or states.  Locals refer to Portland Head as the mother of lighthouses in New England.  It is extremely well maintained.  Local lore has it that Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, a native of Portland was inspired to write his poem, The Lighthouse, on one of his frequent walks from town to the lighthouse.  The stone monument has a portion of the poem:

"Sail on!" it says, "sail on, ye stately ships!
  And with your floating bridge the ocean span;
Be mine to guard this light from all eclipse,
  Be yours to bring man nearer unto man!"

Longfellow's home is preserved as a museum in Portland.  We didn't visit the home though we were close to it.

When Annie and I visited the lighthouse on Friday, the Hurricane Jose-driven waves were crashing into the rocky shore, sending geysers of foamy white water more than ten feet into the air.  It was an impressive display of nature at her most active.  By Saturday, Jose had moved east into the open Atlantic, leaving little evidence of his power and force at the lighthouse.  

After visiting the lighthouses, we drove the 30 miles to Kennebunkport. Kennebunkport, you will recall, is where the summer home of President George H. W. Bush is located.  You will also recall that Annie and I have actually been in the home, along with others, as guests of the President and Mrs. Bush.  They could not have been more gracious during our brief visit.  The main house is augmented by six or more other large homes for members of the Bush family.  All are protected by a Secret Service gate and guardhouse.  The entire compound is on a rocky cliff on the Atlantic.  

In late October of 1991, when Mr. Bush was President, the home was severely damaged by a North Atlantic Storm which sent waves three stories high crashing into the structure.  The storm swept away furniture, books, photographs and family memorabilia, leaving ankle-deep mud on the first floor of the home.  The storm was the last gasp of Hurricane Grace and battered the compound with 70-mile per hour winds.  Obviously, the home has been restored.  I could not find an estimate of the cost, but it must have been in six figures.  

After dropping the Tourtillotts back at the pier, we drove to Mount Desert Island on Sunday. We walked along the streets of Bar Harbor before moving into our home for the next week. Monday, we toured Acadia National Park where the last five pictures were taken. 

Acadia was the first national park east of the Mississippi.  Its most prominent feature is Cadillac Mountain.  Cadillac is just over 1500 feet above sea level and it is drivable.  During certain seasons, depending on the earth's orbit around the sun, it is the place where the morning sunlight first touches the United States.  There is a stunning view of the town of Bar Harbor and the many islands which surround it.  

We happened onto a couple, William and Norma, from Yorkshire, England, while walking around the top of Cadillac.  They were a very nice, very talkative couple.  They, of course, spoke with distinctive British accents.  They said that Acadia reminded them of Yorkshire. William offered to take our picture and it appears above.  In the distant background you can see Bar Harbor.  

That's it for today.  In the days ahead, I want to go back to Bar Harbor so I can show you some pictures of the quaint town.  We also want to go two hours north to visit Campobello, the site of Franklin Roosevelt's two-thousand acre summer retreat.  Campobello is actually in Canada, so we'll have to show our passports to see a place owned by one of America's best known and admired - and despised by some - Presidents.

Until then, Gooday.  

September 20, 2017. There is no Harvey here.

  
September 20, 2017.  There is no Harvey here.  We left home yesterday and find ourselves in New Columbia, PA, tonight, roughly 1100 miles into our fall trip.  We are staying in motels.  There is no Harvey here.  He is on the lot of Van City RV Sales in St. Louis.  It is easy to assign a name to a motor home.  It isn't as much fun to name your car.  It simply doesn't have character, you know.  I can tell you that we are driving my no-name MDX.  It does have a collision-avoidance system so maybe we are safer than we were in Harvey.  

I have thought about stopping the blog.  It seems to me that it hasn't been as readable the last several trips.  I think I know why.  I have been writing every night, even when I had nothing to write about.  That makes for a pretty dry read.  

So, I have decided that I will stop the every-day blogging.  I will write when I have something to say that might be of interest to you.  Otherwise, I will be silent.  Deal?  Good.  

We are en route to Bar Harbor, ME.  We will meet Casey and Matt in Portland Saturday morning.  They are taking a cruise and the ship stops in Portland.  We'll sight-see and have lunch somewhere along the coast of Maine.  We will likely take in the Bush Family Compound in Kennebunkport.  The former President once presented me with a Bush 41 golf ball with the Presidential Seal displayed on it. I am pretty proud of that golf ball.  It will never see a golf course.  As I think about it, none of my golf balls see a golf course for very long. They seem to disappear into the weeds or tall grass.  They show a remarkable lack of curiosity about what the rest of the course looks like.  

That's it from Pennsylvania.  I'll talk to you again from Maine.  Goodnight,