maine, part 4

We're almost there folks. After leaving Acadia, we had planned to drive down onto the blue hill peninsula in hopes of finding some neat art galleries. However, on the way there, we realized that we didn't quite have our finances in order for the house we are trying to buy and that it was urgent so we literally parked on the side of the road in this tiny little town and made phone calls for a few hours. By the time we got everything figured out, the shops were closed so we changed our plans. We actually stumbled upon a cute roadside motel in Searsport. . .the Bait's Motel, to be exact. Haha! It had an attached restaurant where we ate Susan Ada's birthday dinner. She tried fried clams for the first time, and they were quite good!

Friday we started our day of shopping with bagels in Camden. Delicious! Then we strolled around the town and wandered in a few shops. Our destination for the day was Freeport, perhaps most widely known as the LL Bean headquarters. There are lots of outlets there in addition to LL Bean so that kept us busy for quite a while. We celebrated the completion of our shopping with Ben & Jerry's. Dinner and hotel that night were uneventful.

Saturday we continued driving down the coast. For lunch, we drove out to the fabulous little spot in Georgetown. You walk in, tell them what type of lobster you would like, they bring the live boogers out and weigh them for you, then you go sit at a picnic table and wait for lunch. It was a beautiful view, great weather, Susan Ada was feeling much better. . .one of our more memorable spots. Here ya go:

We continued on to Portland for the afternoon. Honestly, a hoppin metro on the water. Really enjoyed our time there. The rest of our trip pretty much consisted of driving home. Yippy. One thing we drove by really caught our attention:

Apparently, it's the only one. . .and that is a crime! Sadly, we had just eaten breakfast and couldn't make any excuses for eating so we didn't get to try it, but the menu was ridiculous and everything looked superb! If you ever go, just don't tell us how great it was, and if you work at Stonyfield we've got some great real estate options for you in downtown Lynchburg.

And that's it. We're home! Well, we were home. One of us just left this afternoon for SC for the next month. It is NOT the other one's favorite thing. However, we just might meet up later this week to share some exciting news. . .

maine, part 3

On Wednesday morning we woke up in a quaint bed and breakfast in Eastport, ME. It's just about as north as you can get on the Maine coast. After a ridiculously delicious breakfast, we drove around Cobscook Bay and over a big bridge to Campobello Island. . .which is in Canada! It was Curt's first visit and he was stoked to say the least. We started with a quick tour of the Roosevelt summer "cottage" and then drove to the northern tip of the island to see the East Quoddy Lighthouse. In case you're not familiar, the water levels in the Bay of Fundy can vary up to 60 ft between high tide and low tide. Pretty crazy. Because it was low tide we were able to scramble up and down multiple ladders to get out to the lighthouse. A few hours later and the paths would be covered in 20-30 ft of water. Once again, crazy. It was wicked windy, but the views were stunning. . .and we were in Canada! A few shots of the pretty.

That afternoon we drove down the coast to Acadia National Park. Wouldn't ya know a cold front was blowing in from the north?? It was unbelievably windy and the expected low was 30 degrees, but these snugglebirds roughed it out and camped in Acadia anyway. Perhaps not our best decision. Susan Ada pretty much hacked her lungs out all night and was begging for a doctor by Thursday morning. So on the morning of Susan Ada's 30th birthday sweet Curt put her in the car, packed up camp all by himself, drove to the nearest doctor, and begged them to examine her. Thankfully, they obliged. She walked right in and was diagnosed with an ear infection and general yuckiness. Z-pack in hand she was out the door with hopes of improving quickly. We spent a little time in Bar Harbor looking in the shops and ate a yummy breakfast. Then we returned to Acadia to drive the Park Loop Road. It was gorgeous!! That wind had blown all the clouds away, the sun was shining, water sparkling, and the crowds weren't so bad. Here's some of our favorite shots:

The top of Cadillac Mountain on Susan Ada's 30th birthday!

the north, part 2

After staying at the B&B in Southern Vermont we took a swing up through Burlington. One of the differences between Vermont and home is that there are little road signs everywhere listing nearby attractions and other businesses everywhere. Well, as we were driving into Burlington we noticed a sign for Magic Hat Brewery and decided to just run in and see what could be had.

There was, in fact, a magic hat outside. They weren't offering tours that day but they had a neat balcony overviewing their bottling operation. The only thing we didn't see at Ommegang was their bottling operation running and it was awesome, loud and just all around fun to watch the high volume bottling going. We're suckers for a good factory.

. . . Like the Ben and Jerry's factory that we also went to just on the other side of Burlington. Their tour was pretty neat but it was a lot fancier than the low budget brewery tours that we'd seen before. It did come with a tasty sample at the end though. Curt might have neglected to take the camera on the tour with him so there aren't any good photos; although, we do have this photo of the big tanks out back.

So we'd been through the White Mountains in Vermont, through Burlington in the northwest of Vermont so we then headed over to New Hampshire and the Green Mountains where we camped for the night. We found a nice campsite in the woods. There was a campground host trailer there but we never actually saw any other people in the whole campground. We particularly liked the loud creek running near the tent.

The drive through the Green Mountains was particularly beautiful.

As you can see we were a bit ahead of peak leaf season. Honestly though, the trip was scheduled around the half-marathon so the fact that we saw much of fall at all was great.

We were planning to camp in Baxter State Park toward the upper part of Maine that night. As you can see though things were quite cloudy and the rain was coming. By the time we were getting into Maine it was clear that if we went camping it would be camping in the cold, pounding rain. Both set up and tear down. That, combined with the fact it was kind of out of the way and that Susan was getting sick meant we decided to find somewhere to stay for the night. Eliminating Baxter put us a day ahead of schedule and we went ahead and aimed for the Maine coast/Canadian border.

The beginnings of our trip down the Maine coast will be coming soon.

to maine and back

Secret's out. Susan Ada turned 30 last week. It was time. Unavoidable, really. To celebrate, Curt trained for a half marathon with her and then embarked on a trip down Maine's coast in the fall. Really can't think of a better way to usher in this decade. It will probably take a few posts, but we are actually going to attempt to document one of our trips! (and within 48 hrs of arriving home - Meg Robinson be proud!) We started with a drive to Corning, NY on Thursday, Sept 29. Some of our closest friends in Lynchburg are from there and invited us to join them for the Wine Glass (half) Marathon. We arrived on Friday morning so we had time to drive up to the Finger Lakes for the afternoon. It was a gorgeous day and we enjoyed lunch, wine tasting at Red Newt, shopping, and starting our vacation. Here we are with Lake Seneca:

Here is Susan Ada's impression of the Finger Lakes. Look at a map, and it will make more sense. . .

Then, we went to Watkin's Glen. There is a beautiful walk up a gorge that we enjoyed very much. The sounds of the water rushing/crashing through the rock walls were probably our favorite part. Hard to capture in photos, but here is our attempt:

Saturday, we spent the day in Corning. Had a lazy morning with our friends, then went to the Corning Museum of Glass. It was very interesting. Curt and I signed up to blow our own glass pumpkins. Here is Curt in action!

The two small ones are ours!

Sunday was the big day. The race didn't start until 8am so we honestly didn't have to get up too early. However, it was about 40 degrees and raining so that definitely hurt Team Hamilton morale. You can see our previous post about how all that went. Ironically, we have no pictures from this occasion. None. You're just going to have to trust us. We were so cold when we crossed the finish line that we couldn't get in a hot shower fast enough. It's all about priorities people, and we choose to keep all of our toes. That afternoon we said goodbye to our friends and were off to see New England. We made a quick stop in Cooperstown, NY to visit the Ommegang Brewery.

After our tour, we ventured into town because it happens to hold THE Baseball Hall of Fame. We looked at it, but we had to eat dinner and keep on driving. We spent the night at the Buckmaster Inn in Shrewsbury, VT. Once again, too tired to take a picture of our room (it was lovely!), but we grabbed a shot the next morning before we left.

More to follow. . .we promise!

half marathon anyone?

A quick on the road update: Susan Ada and Curt just completed the First Annual Wineglass Half-Marathon in Corning, NY!! It's the 30th anniversary of the marathon and it seems to be a pretty big deal in these parts of the woods. We didn't exactly have ideal weather conditions - 45 degrees and rainy the whole time. We literally dumped water out of our shoes when we completed the race. Susan Ada definitely enjoyed it, but Curt's still making up his mind (he never really finished getting better from being sick before the race) but odds are good he'll be happy about it soon. Now we're off to our next adventure.