Maine Trip Volume 04

Well, posting every day sort of fell apart, we've been so busy!

So let's see, where did we leave off...

Sunday
Sunday we basically were touring around so we could start getting an idea of what we wanted to do. We drove up Cadillac Mountain to the top and walked around a bit. Simply amazing view. I could have sat there looking at the islands and mountains for hours. We drove past Jordan Pond, took a stop in at Thunder Hole (where we would return to later), took a spin around the park, and then headed to Bar Harbor. We spent the majority of our day in Bar Harbor shopping. We stopped at lots of cute local shops and ended our trip at a cute little Mexican restaurant where I had an awesome quesadilla.

It was a great way to be introduced to the area. We spent the evening starting to talk about what we were going to do for the rest of the week, starting with Monday, which was to be rainy.

Monday
Since it was all rainy and crummy in this area, after breakfast we went to the Big Chicken Barn. We spent almost three hours browsing first on the antiques floor and then on the gigantic floor of books. I found a couple of _beautiful_ pairs of gloves that I picked up. I expected not to find any books. And I didn't, on almost the entire floor. Except that Michael pointed out a huge case of Agatha Christie novels, all of which were half their cover price (minimum $1). Why minimum $1? Well, because most of the cover prices were between $0.95 and $1.95. So I got 13 books for $13. I also picked up Ted, a children's book illustrated by my favorite artist Tony DiTerlizzi. I collect as much of his stuff as I can.

While Genevieve could have probably spent the day, around 2:30 we headed out to find some food. We went to a restaurant called Jaspers. It's a mostly seafood restaurant, but they had lots of food Michael liked. We had these amazing pulled pork nachos and I had shrimp and clams. We stopped at a local supermarket to grab some snacks for home and then spent the rest of the night vegging at the house watching PBS Agatha Christie mysteries.

Tuesday
Tuesday morning we went to Thunder Hole, properly this time, and we watched the waves for a while. Afterwards we stopped for an early lunch at Jordan Pond (certainly my favorite meal as of now). It is the quintessential Maine experience. You are seated right on the lake outside. They bring your hot popovers. I had fresh lemonade. Genevieve and I both had lobster stew. We started with a backed brie in phyllo dough which came with crackers and grapes. Yum. And we sat watching the lake and view. Amazing!

We took a nice stroll around the lake and through parts of the forest in the area and then took a look through the gift shop. We then stopped in at a lighthouse area where we were able to climb around rocks on the water and get some incredible views. It was still very foggy from the rain the day before so you could only see out so far. Really creepy but also pretty. We drove around Southeast Harbor afterwards, stopping in at a local bakery to get local pizza. _So_ good! The rest of the evening we spent at the house relax and got to sleep relatively early, preparing to watch whales in the morning.

Wednesday
Wednesday morning we got up bright and early, had a quick breakfast, and boarded the Whale Watch boat at 7:45 and left the dock at 8:30. From about 8:30 - 10:30 it was _gorgeous_. We left the bay, got to see all the surrounding islands, we went at top speeds to the puffin island where we say puffins and other sea birds. Genevieve got us a spot right at the top front of the boat next to the naturalist that was narrating the tour. Then while on our way to the first spot they check for whales we saw a North American Right Whale. There are about 350-400 of these whales left, according to the naturalist. They expect to see one once a year _maybe_ and this particular naturalist hadn't seen one in three years. She was so excited. We got to see her reaction as she talked to the other researchers and naturalists trying to determine if that's what we were seeing. We stayed watching it for half an hour. It was incredibly active so we got to see it's belly and fins, It flapped its tail at us several times. Completely awesome. After that we went a little further and Michael and I ended up spending much of the rest of the trip (about an hour and a half) down in the galley from sea-sickness.

We're pretty sure it has to do with the high speeds and intense waves. But overall it was still a lovely trip. We saw a couple of Minke's and Finback's before turning back. I was able to watch us dock and _very_ glad to get back to solid ground. Afterwards we took a refreshing walk to Jordan's (a local breakfast/lunch restaurant famous for blueberry pancakes). Genevieve and I both got the _amazing_ lobster roll and slam chowder lunch special and Michael got _amazing_ pancakes. After walking back to the car, I promptly fell fast asleep and noticed only when we were pulling back up to the house. The whale watch _completely_ drained us! We all took about a three hours nap from 2:00-5:00. I haven't napped in so long! It was very nice though. All the windows were open so there was a nice breeze, I could hear the wind and lake from the window behind me. It was _lovely_.

After finally getting moving all of us contributed to making a spectacular dinner. Michael grilled up some steaks, asparagus, and jalapeños (those were for me :D). I made a big batch of popovers, and Michael's mom made some potatoes and a batch of mushrooms. It was _delicious. After dinner we all went back out to watch the sunset from Cadillac Mountain. It was so pretty. Freezing with the wind, but beautiful.

We all slept very well last night, even after a three hour nap. Fresh air really knocks you out!

Hopefully I'll keep up on the updating later tonight.