Maine Summer Roadtrip 2013 Wrap Up

The leaves are starting to turn and my ever-sensitive feet are starting to get cold again, both of which are tell-tale signs that summer is well and truly over here in the Pine Tree State.  The summer of 2013 has not been the greatest one weatherwise, with the state having received more than its fair share of rain.  In spite of it all, I’ve dodged the raindrops and made roadtrips around Maine every two to three weekends.  Having taken up tent camping a year ago, I decided that this year I would make an effort to explore some corners of the state that I hadn’t seen much of before.   Maine’s state parks offer numerous high-quality camping options at very affordable prices, and they can be found in all corners of the state, so I used them as home-base for my trips. If you include day trips from home, I traveled from Madawaska in the north to Kittery in the south this summer.  I had some terrific experiences, and what follows are a just few of my personal superlatives from my recent travels in Maine.

Favorite campground: Hands down, my favorite camping spot in Maine is Cobscook Bay State Park in Edmunds Township, located about halfway between Calais and Machias.  I’ve yet to find another state park that lives up to the standard Cobscook has set for me.  This sprawling park of 888 acres offers a wide variety of well-spaced sites, almost all of which have a view of the bay and its hugely fluctuating tides.  The tidal range in Cobscook Bay can be up to 28 feet in some spots.  The campsites are mostly wooded and private, the staff is extremely helpful and professional, and I’ve never seen or heard of other campers being inconsiderate or noisy.  The birds, on the other hand, can give you quite an earful, especially early in the morning.  Birds of every shape and description make a home there in the summer, including bald eagles, of which I will never tire of watching.  There are hiking trails for all abilities at Cobscook, including one to an old firetower and another to the top of a small mountain, as well as a nature trail.  You are even allowed to rake for your own clams at low tide in the mudflats there when conditions are right.  Granted, Cobscook Bay is quite a ways off almost anyone’s beaten path, but it is totally worth the trip.  It also makes for a great home base for day trips to the nearby town of Lubec, about which I wrote a few weeks ago.

A very typical view from a campsite at Cobscook Bay State Park (My own photo)

I found this gravesite along a trail while hiking at Cobscook.  I'd love to know the story behind it. (My own photo)

Favorite day trip:  The town of Lubec is still my very favorite day trip , but since I first visited there in 2011, I’ll pick Peaks Island as my favorite Maine day trip discovery of this year.  Peak’s Island is technically part of the city of Portland, but it is a 17 minute ride on a Casco Bay Lines ferry out in the bay.  Part of the appeal of Peaks is getting there on the ferry, which affords spectacular views of the city of Portland, as well as three lighthouses and several forts which date back to the Revolutionary War era.  The island is not overly large, and is a beautiful place to explore on foot.  Golf carts and bicycles are available for rent during the summer months.  You can bring your car over on the ferry, but why would you want to do that?  Speaking of cars, it is especially interesting to see “island-only” vehicles on Peaks, many of which are old beaters held together by waferboard and duct tape, and cannot be used anywhere but there on the island.  There are some places to eat and get a souvenir as well as some bed & breakfast places, but most of the structures on Peaks Island are residential.  You can walk the village streets or take some trails into the less developed parts of the island if you like.

A shoreline view on Peaks with the city of Portland in the distance. (My own photo)

A view of Peaks from the ferry just before docking. (My own photo)

Waiting for my ship to come in, literally (My own photo)

Favorite places to eat: Maine offers no shortage of excellent places to grab a bite to eat.  Admittedly, I am no “foodie”, but in my opinion, if you really want the taste of Maine, go to the Trenton Bridge Lobster Pound, which is just on your right on Route 3 before you cross the bridge onto Mount Desert Island.  It’s not fancy, but the food is terrific.  As you can imagine, lobster is their specialty, but they also have steamed clams, mussels, scallops and crabmeat.  The eat-in facility is seasonal, but they ship around the world year-round.  For me, it’s just not a trip to MDI in the summer if you don’t roll down your windows to smell the wood smoke from the fires at Trenton Bridge Lobster Pound before and after crossing the bridge.

Photo from http://trentonbridgelobster.com/restaurant

Special mention also goes to the Clambake Restaurant in Scarborough, on the road to Pine Point and Old Orchard Beach.  When I was a kid, my family used to eat there every summer on our annual vacations to southern Maine.  Large, comfortable, and clean with a huge seafood menu, the Clambake is located on a saltwater marsh where you can see all manner of wildlife through the large windows.  Again, the Clambake is not a place for food snobs, but I am terribly fond of it anyway, especially the batter-dipped fried clams.

Photo from http://www.clambakerestaurant.com/

Favorite “tourist attraction”: The Owl’s Head Transportation Museum, appropriately located in the little town of Owl’s Head near Rockland, could be a full day’s visit if you wanted it to be.  There are more than 100 historic aircraft, automobiles, bicycles, motorcycles, carriages and engines on display, in addition to workshop classes, vehicle auctions and special displays.  You can see a life-sized replica of the Wright Brothers’ first plane, a fully restored antique fire engine, and every kind of early automobile you could possibly imagine.  They also host special collections and shows on their grounds, such as an “Earth Movers and Shakers” event later this month.  I made the mistake of visiting the Owl’s Head Transportation Museum on a getaway day when I had to head back home, and was forced to cut my visit much shorter than I wanted to get home at a reasonable hour.  The next time I am in the area, I am going to see aside an entire day to explore the entire place.

1935 Stout Scarab

1929 Springfield Rolls-Royce Phantom I Derby Tourer

Replica of the Wright Brothers' 1903 Flyer

Some favorites of mine from the Owls Head Transportation Museum (My own photos)

Favorite “secret spot”: I don’t think I have ever been quite as back to nature as I was during my visits to Baxter State Park.  Baxter isn’t so much the home-base for a trip as it is the actual trip itself.  On a rather hot day, I went hiking along a road from my campsite (it was too hot for me to do any mountain trails that day) and I happened upon a side trail that led down to the quintessential cool mountain stream.  It looked just like something out of a nature calendar or a National Geographic magazine.  I hoofed it back to my site, changed into my swimsuit, grabbed a towel, and drove back to the spot in my car, where I spent a highly relaxing afternoon floating in the cool, shallow water, watching eagles soar overhead, listening to any number of their smaller cousins chirping in the trees, getting nudged on the leg by curious fish, and even spotting a moose from a distance who poked her head out of the woods to take a drink from the stream.  When the snow is flying and the temperature is dropping this winter, it will be the memory of this spot that will keep me warm.  Speaking to other people who have also been to Baxter, it seems that many of them also have their own favorite secret spot that they have found by accident in the park.

Photo from http://www.baxterstateparkauthority.com/hiking/

It was a bit sad packing away my camping equipment for the season, but it was way too cold at night on my last trip the weekend after Labor Day, so it’s time to call it a season.  I’ll still be making occasional trips around the state in the off season, but not nearly as often, and certainly not to camp.  Next year however, I plan to start up my series of camping roadtrips again, and see what other sides of Maine I can discover.  I am open to any suggestions for my 2014 sojourns, which you can put in the comment section below, or you can e-mail them to me.

Confessions of a Total Coffeehouse Rube

As someone who comes from a rural area, I am rather sensitive to the “country bumpkin” label, especially when I am traveling.  Not all of us from out in the boonies just strolled off the set of the Beverly Hillbillies.  I am perfectly capable of driving in multilane traffic, ordering in a fancy restaurant, and taking buses and/or trains from one end of a city to another by myself, among other things.  I don’t exclusively wear flannel shirts and jeans, nor have I ever once referred to a swimming pool as a “cee-ment pond”.

Overall, I’m pretty comfortable with life in urban areas, with one notable exception: coffeehouses.

How I'd like to come across in a coffeehouse.

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How I actually come across in a coffeehouse.

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As someone who rarely experiments when it comes to food and drink, I’ve always stuck pretty close to my “usuals”.  In the realm of fare commonly found in a coffeehouse, that would be plain old caffeinated hot coffee with just cream for me.  Sometimes I get all wild and crazy and try a flavored coffee like hazelnut or, if I am feeling especially daring, maybe even an iced coffee.  Someday I might even try a flavored iced coffee, but I will have to work my way up to that.

When I am on the road, I find that most coffeehouses make for comfortable places to meet with friends, get a little writing work done, or tweet a little.  The staff and clientele are usually friendly and considerate, and there is not an expectation that you will simply consume your order forthwith and quickly move on in order to free up a table for the next customer.

There is, however, the perfectly reasonable expectation on the part of the coffeehouse staff that you will actually buy something while there.  And that something should be more than a 30 cent cup of ice.  Therein lies the rub.  When confronted with the menu board in a coffeehouse, I freeze like Bambi in the path of a freight train at midnight.  If there are other customers waiting in line behind me, that freight train becomes more like one of those Japanese bullet trains.

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At this point, you are probably asking a very simple question: Why not just order what you normally drink, a regular coffee with just cream?  To that, I respond with another question: Who does that in a gourmet coffee house?  It’s akin to going to an award-winning Chinese restaurant and ordering a cheeseburger. I may as well show up at the coffeehouse on a camouflaged ATV wearing a flannel shirt without sleeves and a backwards Mack Truck ball cap if I order “just a plain old coffee”.

Let me backtrack a bit.  I am currently working on a collaborative project with a writer from Connecticut, and we were recently planning on meeting halfway between our locations for a summit on the project, which put us in the Portland, Maine area.  We would need a place to do some work on a hot summer afternoon, and an air-conditioned coffee house near the water fit the bill almost perfectly, as long as I was prepared.

This southern Maine summit was an ideal excuse for me to take a mini-vacation, so I was already in Portland the day prior to the meeting with my co-author. High on my to-do list was some reconnaissance at the coffeehouse where we were planning to work.  It was a hot summer afternoon, and I had spent the first half of it in the sun-drenched bleachers at Hadlock Field watching the Portland Sea Dogs play baseball.  Not wanting to give up the great parking place I had found prior to the game, I decided to walk the five blocks or so to the coffeehouse.  By the time I arrived, I was pretty parched.  The idea of getting something hot to drink was not very appealing, but I wanted to sit for a bit and see how the place was.  So I stepped up to the counter.

First, I had to parse out from the mass of choices on the menu board something that sounded at least somewhat cold and refreshing.  I was looking for terms like “iced”, “frozen”, “arctic” and the like.

Next, I had to figure out what cold thing I was actually going to get.  There were lattes, café au laits, chais, cappuccinos, espressos, and all manner of other things, some of which I don’t think were actually real drinks, but just decoys put up there to weed out the weak like me.  I was getting a bit shaky in the knees, but I did not run screaming out the door.  Instead, I continued to stare glassy-eyed at the menu, letting one customer after another behind me in line go on ahead.

In time, I reached the conclusion that I was going to get an iced cappuccino because it sounded appropriate, yet somewhat safe.  Then it was a question of flavor.  There were choices like Mexicali Cream, Jamaican Me Crazy, Jazzy Java, and Streusel, all of which are probably terrific if you know what they actually are.  So I let more customers behind me go by.  Frankly, I cannot recall what flavor I eventually decided upon, though I do remember that it was vaguely chocolate-ish and quite tasty.  I think “Bavaria” was part of the name.  The experience is mostly a blur now.

Feeling good about my selection, I stepped up to the counter, where I was greeted by a very pleasant young person who just exuded coffee house know-how.  Undaunted by the presence of this fountain of java knowledge which would make my own seem like a Dixie cup in comparison, I rattled off my order in what I thought was a confident tone of voice. I was going to ace this.  Then…

Order-taking person: “What size would you like?”

Me: “Huh?”

One would not think this to be a tough question, but for someone like me, in an actual coffee house, it is.  The sizes are not “small”, “medium” , “large” and “extra large”, but “tall”, grande”, “venti”, and “trenta”.  In my world, “small” and “tall” are just not the same thing.  If someone says “Gee, you sure are tall”, they do not mean that you are a small person.  And if something is “grande”, it sounds like “grand”, which is a variation on spectacular in my mind, like a grand finale.  It doesn’t sound like it would be just medium.  I panicked a bit.  For fear that I would say the wrong thing and end up with my drink being served to me in a bucket of some kind, I sheepishly asked for “whatever the middle size is”.

Now in a reputable coffee house, which this most certainly was, one’s order is not just thrown together.  It is constructed like a piece of fine art by a highly trained person known as a “barista”.  I believe that is Italian for “young person who is more hip that you will ever be”.  My barista, who was already busy with some other orders, was given mine on a slip of paper while I dutifully stepped aside and admired the various pithy mugs and bags of what I think was coffee beans for sale.  They were labeled with names like “Cappadocia Supreme”, and could have been magic beanstalk beans for all I know.

After a few minutes, I was handed a small cardboard cup that was very, very hot, and confusion immediately set in.  I had purposely ordered something cold because it was such a warm afternoon.  This drink was lava-like in its temperature.  Such was my confidence, or lack thereof at this point, that I was convinced that I had done something wrong or was missing something here.

I looked around the coffeehouse, hoping to see someplace where I was supposed to pour crushed ice or something into this volcanic liquid in order to create the frozen cappuccino I thought I had ordered.  Aside from a napkin dispenser, there was nothing like that anywhere.  I literally froze in place.  What was I supposed to do?  I considered just walking out with the hot cup and tossing it in the trash, hoping maybe my co-author and I could just do our work on a park bench or picnic table the next day instead of a coffeehouse.

Instead, I manned up and audibly cleared my throat to get the barista’s attention.  Being careful not to affect a “tone”, which I have been known to have and which is perceived as being sarcastic, I meekly said “I’m no expert on coffee-related things, but is this what I am supposed to be getting?”

The barista, probably young enough to be my daughter, looked at me sympathetically, as one might at a lost child in a shopping mall, and asked “What did you order?”   I mumbled something about having ordered a cold drink, and she swiftly swooped the hot little cup from my hand, gave it to the elderly gentleman next to me who had been reading a book of poetry whilst awaiting his order, and handed me a plastic cup of frosty, caffeinated goodness, complete with a yellow straw.

Relieved, I found a seat, fired up my iPad, watched funny cat videos, and sipped my frozen something-or-other, which was actually very good.

The writing summit with my co-author at that same coffeehouse the next day went very well.  He ordered some manner of something that wasn’t even coffee I found out later.  It was some stuff in a cup, but he also got a bottle that he poured into the stuff in the cup.  For fear that learning about this would cause part of my mind to blow a fuse, I chose just to live in ignorance of whatever it was. 

As for me, I chickened out when I made my order the next day.  I went with arctic lemonade, which I figured would not elicit any awkward beverage-related questions, and even mentioned the size I wanted (grande).  I was feeling pretty smug, having not looked like a hillbilly in the coffeehouse in front of my co-author.  That is until the order-taking person asked, “Do you want whipped cream on that?”

Wait…what?  On lemonade? Is that even a thing?

I need to take a class on coffeehouse fare before our next writing summit, I think.  Either that or I’ll just go with a regular old coffee with just cream, like a total rube.

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***CREDIT WHERE IT IS DUE: I would like to thank the staff of Coffee By Design on India Street in downtown Portland, Maine for their patience and graciousness as I struggled with the language of coffeehouses, and for their allowing my co-author and I to take up space in their wonderful shop for the better part of a Monday afternoon while we went over our project together.