Ken's Trip To Maine -- August 2011

Just Married: Katie & Chris

Thursday, August 4
I flew out of Pensacola at 11:00 A.M., changed planes in Atlanta and got to Portland at 5:45 P.M. I was in Augusta by 7:30 and visited with my parents until 9:00 when I went over to the Civic Center Inn to check in.

Friday, August 5
A quiet day resting up from all the traveling.

Saturday, August 6
Early in the afternoon we drove to Freeport to meet Carol at the Freeport Inn. On the way we went down Freeport's Main Street. It was jammed with tourists and shoppers. The town really looks nice these days.

We got to the wedding venue 4:30. The weather was perfect, the site was beautiful. The wedding began at 5:00; over at 5:10. Loved that.


The lawn decorated for the wedding at Glisland Farm Audubon Center

Click here for more photos.


Sunday, August 7
It was very rainy in the morning. After we chatted for a while at the hotel with all the family we set out for Augusta. We had breakfast at the Fairground Cafe in Topsham. It's a few miles north of Brunswick and Freeport. Wonderful pancakes.

Monday, August 8
For lunch we had takeout from The Red Barn restaurant on Riverside Drive in Augusta. Great shrimps, fries, fried fish and onion rings.

Early afternoon I headed to Portland to spend the night because I had an early flight in the morning. In Brunswick I got off the Interstate and took little coastal roads through tiny villages.

I originally intended to go to one of Portland's harborside restaurants and have a Maine lobster. After listening to Portland radio traffic reports I was less interested in driving into the downtown area. And back out to the airport during rush hour. There was a lot f traffic congestion in Portland, apparently more than usual.

When I got back to Route 1 just south of Freeport I decided to find a lobster somewhere out of downtown Portland, then drop the car and go directly to my hotel. As I passed the Freeport Inn, where we stayed on Saturday night, I saw the Muddy Rudder seafood restaurant. Perfect. Lobster and corn both cooked just right. And I had an easy drive from there to drop off the car.

Tuesday, August 9
Got up very early to catch the hotel van to the airport for my 7:00 A.M. flight. Huge, slow crowds at airport security, at 5:45 A.M.! Happy to report the flights were all on time and I got to Pensacola at 10:30.

A Coaster Post

The prized coaster I picked up last summer at PWM, Portland International Jetport in Maine, is no more. It was from the resturant Shipyard Brewery runs at the airport.

After a year of heavy use the coaster was a mess. It was dirty, puffy, coffee-stained and moldy -- had to throw it out. I should have stolen several of them when I had the chance.

Also I wonder if there might be a coaster this time of year celebrating their Pumpkinhead Ale?

Ken's Maine Trip -- The Greenest Supermarket

August, 2009

In Augusta, Maine on the site that was Cony High School (yes, my high school is gone), there's a new Hannaford Supermarket. The name, Cony High School, still exists but it's on a new campus a few miles out of town.

Actually the wreckers left the 1930s part of Cony High standing (pictured here), something about it being included on the National Register of Historic Places. It doesn't appear to be in use right now, but it is still there.

To make room for the supermarket they leveled a structure built in 1965. It replaced the 1880s classroom building in use when I attended Cony in the 1950's. The new Hannaford market is right behind the historic building that's still there. By the way, the school itself was founded in 1815 as an academy for orphan girls.

On the bright side the new supermarket is LEED-rated Platinum, the highest level of greeness according to the U.S. Green Building Council. It's all about LEED -- the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design's green building rating system, click here and learn all about it.

Now, you should take this interactive tour of Hannaford's Platinum LEED Certified Store in Augusta, Maine.

Ken's Maine Trip -- Day 6

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Time to head for Florida. I had a very nice visit and it was a sunny day. Late morning I drove south to PWM -- the Portland International Jetport. Here's PWM's Wiki page. My flight was at 2:45. I had to gas up the car and drop it off and get me and my knee through Homeland Security. By the time I was at my gate I needed some lunch and spotted the Shipyard Pub.

As soon as I sat down I saw that it was clearly a branch of Portland's Shipyard Brewery, Maine biggest brewer.

As I looked through the menu I realized this was the brewer who made Maine's favorite fall beverage -- Pumpkinhead Ale. They described it as having "a hint of cinnamon and nutneg." Maybe some other time.

I ordered iced tea and a lobster roll. Why on earth would I think an airport restaurant, even a locally owned one in Portland, Maine could serve an edible lobster roll? I hadn't had one in years ever since getting a rubbery one in Boston at Legal Sea Foods that was so badly overseasoned (lots of tarragon perhaps?) that there was no taste of lobster at all.

At the Shipyard Pub the lobster roll was on the properly toasted and buttered New England-style hot dog bun. On a single lettuce leaf was half a small, undressed lobster, a lemon wedge, and at one end less than a tablespoon of mayonnaise. No celery, no onions, no lobster hidden in a blanket of mayo. Just big pieces of tender, barely cooked lobster. Perhaps the best lobster roll I have ever eaten. The joke is you have to ask for extra mayonnaise.

The flight home on AirTran was easy and we had Sonny's BBQ takeout for supper.

Ken's Maine Trip -- Day 5

Monday, August 31, 2009

The weather had cleared up and it was a sunny day. We drove over to Bangor so I could visit the Bangor Public Library.

I wanted to look at a young woman's journal from 1893. It was in the special collections department and the staff there were very helpful. The library building is old and grand. And well maintained.

I spent a couple of hours taking notes and photographing the last 50 pages of the journal. I used available light and the close up setting on the camera and got nice sharp images. Here's an example -- page 127.


When I was done I found my folks waiting for me in the parking lot across the street.

A big surprise in Bangor is the huge Las Vegas-style casino, Hollywood Slots Hotel & Raceway at the edge of downtown. I don't remember Bangor ever looking so clean and prosperous. Perhaps it's beacuse of all the tax money the casino is paying the city?

Here's a photo of Mother and Dad getting ready for the drive back to Augusta

Ken's Maine Trip -- Day 4

Sunday, August 30, 2009

It was rainy off and on all day and quite warm. My sister and brother-in-law, Carol and Bruce, drove over from Hiram. And my neice Katie, with Chris, and my nephew Jason with Laci, came along too. All we were missing from the immediate family was Carol and Bruce's son Jeremy (my other nephew) and his wife Sara who are in Connecticut.


Katie and Mother


Chris and Jason


Jason and Laci


Father, Carol and Bruce

Ken's Maine Trip -- Day 3

Saturday, August 29, 2009

Today the temperature is up into the mid-70s and it's raining hard. Both the temperature and the rain are thanks to the outer bands of Hurricane Danny, now a tropical storm off the coast of Nova Scotia northeast of us here in Augusta.

Despite the rain we drove up to Waterville, about 18 miles north of Augusta. We ate at a favorite seafood place, the Weathervane. It's a small chain of restaurants in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. The one on the dock in Belfast with sail boats bobbing around is more popular, and more scenic, but with the rain the closest one is the best one. And the food is always wonderful.

If you are ever in Waterville don't miss the Ticonic Footbridge, better known by everybody in town as the Two Cent Bridge. Built in 1903 it's a toll, suspension pedestrian bridge that connected Waterville's mill workers with their jobs in the factories on the Winslow side of the Kennebec River. A hundred years ago there were many of these footbridges throughout the industrial Northeast. Waterville's Two Cent Bridge is the only one still around.
(Photo from Ed's Gallery.)

Waterville is also home to Colby College. I graduated from there almost 50 years ago.

Ken's Maine Trip -- Day 2

Friday, August 28, 2009

It was a chilly morning in Augusta -- 42 degrees at 7:30 A.M.

After breakfast at my parents' house we took a drive up to Livermore Falls, Wilton and Farmington. I grew up in Wilton, actually in the village of Dryden just outside of Wilton. I was born in Farmington. We moved from Dryden to Augusta when I was 12 years old.

The scenery everywhere was very green. It has been a wet summer in central Maine.

Wilson Lake in Wilton was as beautiful as ever and the sky was very clear.

Farmington's downtown hasn't changed a bit.

We ate at Boivins Harvest House, a restaurant between Wilton and Farmington where we had eaten before. Now it's under new owners and althought the food was good last time it was even better this time.

Spent a lot of time in the afternoon and evening watching Teddy Kennedy's wake. What a fantastic cast of characters had asembled to speak about him.

Ken's Maine Trip -- Day 1

About three weeks ago I went to Maine to visit my parents, my sister and her family.

Thursday, August 27, 2009
This was my first flight since my knee replacement and I had very few problems with the long spells of sitting on planes. Getting through security was a hassle and the TSA folks clearly wish people with implants would stop bothering them by flying places.

I needed a direct flight from Pensacola to Portland and so, instead of going on American Airlines (via Dallas-Ft. Worth) and driving up from Boston, as usual, I found that AirTran had the best conections at very good prices. There were stops and changes of planes in Atlanta and Baltimore/Washington International.

This was the first time I had flown on AirTran and I was impressed with the comfortable planes and the on-time arrivals. Also it was possible to upgrade to business class on all segments at a reasonable price. And they have XM Radio jacks on every armrest.

The planes were full on all legs, so we were able to take off a few minutes early. This was a good thing because we were just ahead of some rough storms every time we taxied down the runway. In Pensacola Jack was following my flights via the Internet, as were my parents in Maine. Jack said he could see the pilot changing course and avoiding the storms as we headed northward.

It was sunny and bright when we landed in Portland around 5:30 PM. I picked up my Hertz car and headed north. It was chilly in Augusta, in the low 50s. I visited with my parents and then crossed the Kennebec to check in at the Holiday Inn Augusta Civic Center.

Maine Trip, May 2007 -- Day 2, Part 3

After looking at the arsenal restoration project we passed the nearby, and beautifully restored Fort Western, built in 1754. For reasons I must have known as a child, but have forgotten -- I do not know why the fort, clearly on the east side of the Kennebec River would be called Fort Western.

We crossed the Kennebec and continued south along the western bank of the river to the next town, Hallowell. In pre-colonial days Augusta was part of Hallowell. The first settlement was in 1625 by British traders and trappers. The city of Hallowell was founded in 1762 and Augusta became a separate city in 1797.

Maine became a state in 1820 having been a territory of Massachusetts before that. In a way it was a colony of a colony. Hallowell's granite quarries were famous and many grand buildings throughout the U.S. including several in Washington, DC and New York City were made from Hallowell's stone.

Today Hallowell is best known for the many antique shops that attract visitors from all over the northeast U.S. and eastern Canada. There are many beautifully well-kept, lovingly restored old homes big and small here. But there are many more in sad shape. One needing massive restoration work is the 1875 Governor Bodwell House on Middle Street in Hallowell.

Fortunately an organization in Portland identifies the state's most endangered structures and coordinates restoration efforts. To read about the Governor Bodwell House and other properties on Maine Preservation's list of Maine's most endangered historic properties click here. Their site also has a list of their success stories. The photo is by Joe Phelan of the Kennebec Journal.

Maine Trip, May 2007 -- Day 2, Part 2

The drive from Bangor to Augusta takes about an hour and fifteen minutes. On a sunny day it is very pretty, with low hills, distant mountains and some lakes here and there. For my drive I didn't see much of anything other than the highway. There was fog and heavy rain all the way.

I got to my parents' house mid-morning and we had a nice visit. After lunch we went out to run errands and drive around town. On the east side of the Kennebec River along the riverfront we drove through an area that was the Augusta Arsenal.

The old Arsenal is a complex of eight granite block buildings, dating back to the 1820s. Today it is part of the Kennebec Arsenal Renovation. The buildings will be fixed up and will be part of a riverside recreation and tourist area -- planned are residences, a marina, a major hotel and lots of shops.

After the military stopped using the arsenal buildings they housed patients of the Augusta's Insane Hospital, later known as the State Hospital. In recent years the arsenal building looked abandoned although I believe the state government used them for storage.

The location is on a beautiful part of the Kennebec River looking across to the State Capitol buildings. If this project goes as planned it will be a great benefit to the city, its visitors and residents. It will take unused land and make it a destination -- creating something from nothing.

Maine Trip, May 2007 -- Day 2, Part 1

On Friday morning, May 18, I woke up in Bangor, Maine. Something
I had not done in probably 45 years. It was cold and rainy. My room overlooked the airport terminal building. It was very grim in the gray light that morning. It looked like an Eastern European concrete block building from the Cold War period. Like a rural East German airport in a black and white movie of a John LeCarre novel.

After a really bad breakfast in the hotel coffee shop I checked out of my room and went across the street to the airport lobby to pick up my Hertz car.

I realized that despite the warm weather in Maine the week before, I was now facing more cold than I had planned for. So I stopped on the way at a Wal-Mart to get a sweatshirt and some jeans.

Bangor looked a little bit more prosperous than my last visit four years earlier. Probably from all that gambling money. Recently a slots-only casino has appeared downtown and there was more tax money pouring in than the locals ever expected.

Fans of Stephen King's books also bring money with them when they visit the area to see some of the real-life locations mentioned in his books. They may not bring in as much money as a shoe factory provided 50 years ago, but they are relatively non-polluting and don't burden the public schools. Mr. King himself is known to be a generous donor to good causes in the area. He probably provides as much, perhaps more, than a typical factory owner did in charitable giving. His house is quite the landmark, Gothic towers, spider-web gate and a high iron fence decorated with bats and gargoyles.

Bangor was a very well-off city through much of the 19th Century and into the 20th. But business and jobs moved away and it showed. A bad joke from years ago: at a party sombody said, "Bangor has seen better days." Sombody else said, "No, Bangor has seen better years." And then, "No, no, Bangor has seen better centuries." We all laughed, but it was true.

By the time I headed out of Bangor, south-bound on Interstate 95, the skies were brighter and the town looked very green with signs of spring all around. But the heaviest rains were between Bangor and Augusta and that's where I headed in my rental Toyota Matrix.

Maine Trip, May 2007 -- Day 1

Fright Night is Every Night in Bangor, Maine

About two weeks ago, on a Thursday in mid-May, I went to Maine to see my parents and sister and her family. I took American Airlines (and their American Eagle brand of little jets for smaller cities) from Pensacola, Florida, to Bangor, Maine. Jack stayed home to watch the cats and tend the garden.

Usually when I go to Maine I fly to Boston and then drive up to Augusta where my parents live. From Boston to Augusta is a little more than a three hour drive -- longer if you stop at L.L. Bean in Freeport. Going to Boston instead of Bangor means less time in the air but it was certainly worth the extra flight and the extra flying time to arrive in Bangor, just an hour's drive away from Augusta. With no big-city traffic congestion.

I left Pensacola at 9:25 A.M. (Central Time) and arrived in Bangor at 10:20 P.M. (Eastern Time -- it's one hour earlier than Central Time). The distance was 2,371 miles: 604 miles from Pensacola to Dallas; 1,389 from Dallas to New York's LaGuardia; 378 from New York to Bangor. All the flights were full and there were many disappointed people on stand-by. I spent the night at the Sheraton Hotel that's attached to Bangor International Airport.

The hotel was fine and I was tired from a long day of flights and waiting for flights. I was delighted to discover the AM and FM radio reception was good. I love to listen to the radio at night. And the one station I wanted to listen to in Bangor came in clear as a bell -- Stephen King's WKIT, 100.3 FM, the Rock of Bangor. It is one of the only live radio stations left in Maine and it has actual local DJs, 24/7. And yes, it's that Stephen King. Oh, and yes, Stephen King fans -- Bangor is Derry.

You can check out the station's website here and listen to it here. (If you have trouble listening to it from my link, try launching the live feed from the station's website.)

The Strange Maine Blog

The blog called Strange Maine Blog promises "Freaks. Weirdos. Unmapped roads. Lost in the woods. Whispering rocks. Deadening fog. Ghost pirates. Lonely islands. THINGS in the WOODS. Maine -- the way life should be!"

It includes lots of links to other strange folks and happenings Down East. And, of course, naked bowling.


Strange Maine Blog contents copyright © 2006 their respective authors and/or Michelle Souliere.
Photo credit: www.curiouslittlemonkey.com.

The Signs of Maine

Last November I posted a photo of a sign I had seen at a rest area in Maine. It warned about "snacking wisely." You can view the post by clicking here.

The Voice of Maine, an online forum devoted to Maine issues has a collection of comments about the sign and the "thinking" behind it -- they call it, 'The Ultimate in Nanny Statism'. Big Mother is watching you.

Someone contributed a photo of another sign, below, this was also found beside a Maine highway. It encourages exercise while driving. Are there more signs like these? Would they make just two versions?

Can these be for real? I wonder if they might be hoaxes. Everyone seems to be all too willing to blame the government of the State of Maine for such intrusive silliness. Perhaps some art students at the Maine College of Art in Portland thought this up after a silk screen class?

There was a case in Los Angeles a few years ago of a fraudulent highway sign that looked so real it stayed up for five years. Yes, an art student did it.

On the Road [never] Again

A few posts ago I promised you a report on the Road Trip to Maine. Now that we are back I think I am safe in saying -- "You don't want to know." But let me tell you a little about it anyway.

Early in November we left northern Florida on a Monday and drove over 400 miles to Chattanooga and stayed in a horrible motel. For the rest of the trip the motels were better, but the weather turned on us. The first day was mostly gray skies, but the next day the rain and fog started and never let up. Twelve days -- and we had maybe three days without rain, totally overcast skies but no rain. And two sunny afternoons.

We missed seeing any of the beautiful, I am told, Shenandoah Valley, both ways.

We got to Maine on Friday after stops in Roanoke, Virginia; Wilkes-Barre, Pensylvania and Auburn, Massachusetts. Lunch was in Kennebunkport, Maine, at a wonderful restaurant in the heart of town, Alisson's, lobster rolls and chowder. Then on to central Maine.

My parents, both in their late-80s, were fine as was my sister and her family. On Saturday we drove to my sister's house -- about 90 miles away -- and had a turkey dinner. There were ten of us. Not only was I there but all her children could come up and most of them couldn't on Thanksgiving Day. So we did it early. Everybody had a good time. Everybody except Jack who stayed at the motel, feeling poorly. The long car trip was taking its toll on him. It appeared that he hadn't had time to recover from his hospital visit, and surgery, a few weeks before.

The next day was Sunday and we had plans to drive to the Maine coast for the scenery but the cold rain and lack of visibility made that a bad idea. So we went to The Weathervane, a nearby seafood restaurant, and had seashore food at least, but without a view of the sea. Although The Weathervane is part of a chain, it is a small chain and a local one, so the food is good. Very good.

By late Sunday afternoon the rain and wind was getting heavy. And the wet roads were beginning to freeze. Because of that, coupled with forecasts of worsening weather and Jack's continued illness, we decided to head south a day early. We left on Monday morning driving through a heavy storm that lasted for the next three days -- with overnights in Fishkill, New York; Chambersburg, Virginia; Max Meadows, Tennessee and Fort Payne, Alabama. We moved right along. The rain plus thick fog is nasty to drive through but we needed to get home ASAP.

If you find yourself in Staunton, Virginia, even in the rain, don't miss a meal at Mrs. Rowe's Restaurant And don't leave without a jar of her apple butter.

We got home on Friday afternoon -- 3536 miles, 12 days and 13 states: Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine.

Looking on the bright side:
We had a good, however brief, visit with my family. We got home, lame and tired, but safe and fairly sound. The cats were well fed and happy to see us.

PS How did we get to Maine and back? Here's the story of the car...

Although both of our cars are capable of such a long trip they are light-weight, compact cars. We knew that something a bit heavier would make for a more comfortable ride, especially one that's going to be well over 3,000 miles long. And although both cars are in good condition they are not new cars. The last thing we would want is car trouble on some far away Interstate highway with winter coming on.

So, it would be a good idea to rent a big, heavy car for the trip. It would be comfortable with a nice smooth ride. If there were any problems, all of the rental cars companies have branch offices along the way. Plus I had a coupon from American Airlines for a rental car upgrade. Standard to full size or full to a premium class car.

We decided to reserve a full size and hope for an upgrade, they said it would be something like a Grand Marquis (whatever that is). The afternoon before we started out I went to the car place and the person at the desk said he was sorry but they were out of premium class cars. But because of my membership in American Airlines' Gold Club, he could give us a double upgrade and I drove away in a light tan Lincoln Town Car with 140 miles on it.

The ultimate big ol' retired peoples' car.

I couldn't fit it into the garage. It was huge, but it rode like a dream and had features I had always scoffed at, like heated seats. Well, living in Florida a heated seat may not mean all that much but on a frosty morning in Maine, or even Virginia, in November it was very, very nice.

Welcome to Maine (but watch the snacking, Lardass!)

Watch out, the snack police are watching those vending machines.

Sorry about the low quality photos. It was a dark and rainy afternoon and all I had was a cell phone to snap the pictures.