The Maine Thing (wrapped up)

View of Casco Bay from Portland

Wow–got so busy for the last couple of weeks that I couldn’t finish describing my trip to Maine…

Stuck a little closer to Portland for the last half of my trip. Went south to Wells and ate lunch at Billy’s Chowder House. Delicious…although it was the first time I ever ate “anatomically correct” clams (i.e. belly clams) and found their syphons a little disconcerting, to say the least!

Billy

Went on to visit the new Cabela’s store; loved their taxidermic displays of animals in different habitats, including the following prairie dogs (notice the backside of one disappearing into its burrow!):

Prairie dog display at Cabela

On through Ogunquit and Old Orchard Beach; beautiful little towns, and not too crowded this time of year (in between summer sunbathers and fall leaf-lookers). Drove to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and walked around the downtown area for a while.  I love the old bridge over the Pisquata River and wished I was hungry enough to justify eating at the Portsmouth Gas Light Co., which has a lovely wood-fired oven pizza menu (http://www.portsmouthgaslight.com/pizza_menu.cfm) that I’ve enjoyed on other trips.

As for the rest of the trip, it was lots of “gomming and yowing” (that’s Southern for eating and talking) and hanging out with my friend. I caught up on my reading (Dombey & Son by Charles Dickens, which was fabulous and made me weep at the death of little Paul Dombey and the subsequent harsh treatment of Flora Dombey by her father); caught up on some videos (No Country For Old Men and Juno); and had dinner at Fore Street (http://www.forestreet.biz/), which has become a tradition when I visit Portland. Very simple, open interior features the entire kitchen at a glance, and everyone’s food looks and smells heavenly as it’s carried by your table.

Wrapped up my visit with a quick trip through the beautiful neighborhoods around the Eastern Prom(enade), then off to the Portland airport, through Detroit, and back into Asheville. A truly wonderful week, as the following photographic evidence supports:

Belted Galloway steer near Wells, Maine

Fresh Brussel sprouts on display

 

Giant LL Bean boot (Portland, ME)

 

The Maine Thing (continued)

The second full day of my trip to Maine, we drove north up the coast as far as Belfast. (Maine seems to have a high percentage of towns named after European cities and countries, although not necessarily pronounced the same way. Calais, for example, is pronounced “Callus” by the locals.) Beautiful day of blue skies, blue water, and white sailboats in the harbor.

Belfast Harbor

 

Turned back toward Camden; visited all the little shops and had lunch at the Camden Deli. The food is good, and the seats at the back of the deli have a perfect view of the spillway that flows down into the harbor. It’s like a scene from a New England calendar.

Went through Rockport after that, and Thomaston. The small coastal towns have definitely changed since my last visit–they’re still peaceful and rural, and still have the obvious strong connections to shipping and sailing heritage on which most of the communities were founded in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries–but there are many more people and houses and businesses than I remember.

The next day, we attended the Common Ground Fair in Unity, Maine. The fair is an annual event sponsored by the Maine Organic Farmers and Growers Association (MOFGA; www.mofga.org), and features local products, environmentally-friendly products and ideas, and a pretty hefty emphasis on social activism.

Common Ground Fair sign

I’ve attended the fair several times, and it’s always an interesting mix of vendors, exhibitions, families, local foods, heirloom plants and animals, speakers, demonstrators, and crafters. Some booths are new every year; others feature folks whose wares are very familiar. Trillium Soaps was there (www.http://www.trilliumsoaps.com/), and Peace Fleece (http://www.peacefleece.com/); the balsam pillow people (I don’t have their contact info, but I bought a balsam pillow from them at the 1994 CGF and it still smells good!); honey and bee products from Sparky’s Apiaries; and, of course, the french fry stand featuring hot-out-of-the-fryer hand-cut fries that can be drenched with sea salt and garlic-flavored vinegar. Lots of family farms with flowers and herbs and apples and anything else they grow; a plethora of all-natural “unguents and ointments” for every imaginable condition or situation, and, of course, bales and swags and heaps of Sweet Annie–a  pungent herb that helps control things like moths and mice in your house.

Harry Brown Farm of Starks, ME

A fair-goer with a backpack full of Sweet Annie

Booth featuring dried rose hips

Left the fair late in the afternoon, and made a point of stopping at the A-1 Diner in Gardiner for dinner. The A-1 is located on Bridge Street (can’t miss it if you go through Gardiner) and the structure is an actual dining car.* The food is always good, from the basic burger to the specials of the day (specials are often elegant–even exotic–for diner fare). I enjoyed my Greek salad with calamari and hoped to try the caramel pumpkin pudding, but had to pass on dessert–insufficient stomach space! 

A-1 Diner in Gardiner, ME

Back to Portland after dinner, and still several days of vacation left! I’ll try to wrap it up in the next post.

*The bathrooms at the A-1 were legendary:  Their location at the end of the dining car required you to exit the diner completely and cross over the creek on a little metal footbridge that always felt a little rickety, plus you could hear and see the water running underneath. The bathrooms were part of the structure, but you “couldn’t get there from here,” as the saying goes. They’ve been remodeled since my last visit, and though you still have to go outside to get to them, the footbridge is much sturdier now (and not nearly as exciting!).

 

The Maine Thing

Spent a wonderful week in Maine recently. They’re about two weeks ahead of us in fall color, so the leaves were already changing, and it looked like it would be a beautiful season.

Flew into Portland and stayed with a friend who lives on Pine Street. In 1994, I spent a semester at the SALT Institute for Documentary Studies (http://www.salt.edu/), which was located at 21 Pine Street (it’s moved a couple of times since then). My apartment was right next door, and in the last ten years or so, the space has become The Percy Inn (http://www.percyinn.com/). Owner, innkeeper, and travel writer Dale Northrup has turned the entire place into an elegant establishment, right in the midst of Portland’s historic West End, just off of Longfellow Square. 

Kicked off my visit with dinner at DiMillos (http://www.dimillos.com) – a floating restaurant  located on a big boat in Portland’s harbor.

Sweet Leaves Teahouse in Brunswick, Maine

The next day, my friend and I visited Sweet Leaves Teahouse in Brunswick, Maine (http://www.sweetleaves.com/). The setting is delightful–a large room that oozes the quiet conviviality of tea and conversation. We tried the special of the day–a lovely chicken salad sandwich with avocado and other good things; drank White Pomegranate Tea (described in the menu as Pai Mu Tan with Pomegranate , China , Organic: Smooth cup with hints of sweet fruit); and indulged in a trio of homemade sorbets flavored with cantaloupe, grapefruit, and watermelon. 

Went to Damariscotta after that and visited all the little shops I hadn’t seen in several years. I love Weatherbird, which features a small deli with all sorts of local foods and gourmet specialties, and also has a section featuring cards, clothes, body lotions–with an emphasis on the local and unique. 

Oh, what a lovely trip–and I’m still just recalling the first full day! More in the next post…