From Our Traps …

August 7-10

We’re up North, or Down East, as the case may be, taking a break on Sunday in Evangeline country. We’re in a rustic retreat across from a golf course in Hancock, Maine, about 15 or 20 miles from Acadia National Park.

We left New Jersey on Wednesday and covered largely familiar ground almost to Albany before we veered east to reach Keene, N.H.

Keene is one of those charming, manicured small towns with lots of bars and restaurants and upscale shops selling everything from jewelry to souvenirs. It’s that combination of hip and traditional, old and new so often replicated in touring destinations. 

Neither Joanna nor I had been to New Hampshire before, but we knew Keene pretty well. It also goes by other names, including Brattleboro, New Hope, or even Easton.

It has an old movie theater and a state college.

We stayed in a small B&B called the Carriage Barn. The wing of the building we were in may have actually been a carriage barn at one time. It’s a square pitch-roofed structure attached to a gabled house. 

But if it did house the horses once, all sign of that has been removed, and the wall with the carriage doors rebuilt.

The place is on the main street. If it hadn’t been pouring rain on and off all day we might have walked downtown for dinner.

Will, the manager (maybe the owner), recommended a few places to eat. We chose The Stage, which is on the town’s central square.

The square has its requisite white gazebo. Also the monument to the Union soldiers and sailors.

The Stage’s hamburgers were terrific, very beefy, a little browned. I take mine pink inside, and it was perfect.

There was one local ale on draft, Stoneface IPA, from Newington, N.H. Heavy on the citra hops, maybe even more so than Lagunitas, but OK. 

The best pairing with a burger, though, is Guinness, so I had that next.

Thursday we pressed on toward Maine.

We still hadn’t had a chance to pick up New Hampshire road maps, so just before we left the state, we stopped at an official welcome center. 

It was a bit of a surprise, though, to find that it was a hybrid state operation, a New Hampshire Welcome Center, Liquor and Wine Outlet. I had noticed in Keene that liquor was sold at state stores, but it was a surprise that the welcome center would include one. Very efficient use of space.

Otherwise it was a conventional welcome center at a highway rest area—tourist information, fast food, t-shirts, exhibits of local lore. The lore in this case was pretty impressive, a two-story water wheel turning next to a wall. 

We crossed the bridge over the Pisquataqua River to Maine around one or so, and three hours later were at the White Birches in Hancock. 

The man behind the desk recommended Ruth & Wimpy’s, a mile or so up the highway, as a prime stop for lobster.

If you go there, you won’t miss the place. Just look for Wilbur, the 6-foot-tall red lobster outside. 

Wilbur looks like a prop left over from a 1950s sci-fi adventure. Revenge of the Nuked Crustaceans.

We had to have lobster. This is Maine.

We opted for a combination, the meat of two lobsters removed from the shell and a portion of steamed clams. It was almost enough food for two people. We shared an oyster roll for dessert.  

The local beer was Rock Harbor IPA, which had a mild, pleasant fragrance and an almost earthy hop flavor.

Friday we drove to Acadia National Park.

The park sits on an island with the ominous name of Mount Desert.

A lot of influential people loved this place. Even in the early 20th century many feared that development would destroy it, so they formed an organization to buy as much of the land as possible. 

Even John D. Rockefeller became involved. He had miles of carriage trails built, along with more than 100 stone bridges through the area. 

Most of it was donated to the U.S. government to form the park.

There isn’t a lot of parking available, so we took the bus ride on the Loop Road

The route gives views of the bay shore and Atlantic Coast. It also winds through miles of forest. It goes under and over various Rockefeller bridges and past geological features with names like Otter Cliff and Thunder Hole. 

I didn’t hear any thunder, but the surf crashes into a natural rock wall there. Maybe it gets pretty loud when the wind kicks up.

We took the bus as far as the Jordan Pond House, about three-quarters of the way around, before we stepped off. 

There was a half-hour wait at the restaurant, but that was all right. We didn’t want a meal anyway. Instead we went upstairs and got a sandwich from the grab-and-go shop, along with some coconut water, which was a pleasant surprise.

We took it out on the deck, where we could see Jordan Pond itself, a fair size lake some distance from the pond house. 

The shoulders of two wooded hills dip down to frame the scenery. There were kayakers on the water. In the distance are two roundtops, named North Bubble and South Bubble.

The picture of the day is Joanna taking the view.

The bus didn’t go to Cadillac Mountain, another of the park’s highlights, so we took the car after the bus brought us back to the visitor center.

The mountain isn’t high, but it feels like an alp. We drove up a steep snaking road to get there.

We stopped at one overlook on the way for a spectacular display of other hills and ocean inlets. A field of rock gently slopes away from the pavement there.

I guess it’s granite, and it’s covered in blotches of pale green, orange, and black. I assume that’s lichen and not spilled paint.

We saw a collection of cairns, stone markers that blaze trails when there are no trees. Some were conical stacks. Others were Bates cairns, named for the trail blazer who invented them.

The Bates cairn uses a flat slab with a stone on top to point direction. Joanna stopped at one of the cairns to add one of her own.

It was on the way back that we read a sign saying no one is supposed to add or remove stones from the cairns because it could confuse hikers. 

I don’t think we did any harm this time. Joanna was using small pebbles, and the wind kept knocking over her work.

The top of Cadillac Mountain has a treeless, rocky crown, which helps make it feel higher than it is. At 1530 feet, it’s nowhere near the tree line, but everything’s open around you.

Then you look from the summit directly to the ocean. You stand on top of 1500 feet less than a mile away from sea-level zero. It creates quite a sense of altitude. 

There are other mountains on the island also topped with rock.

That’s how the island got its name. Champlain saw it and noticed several bare hilltops, so he named the place Ile des Monts Deserts, Island of the Bare Mountains.

We detoured to Bar Harbor on the way back to have dinner. This is the closest town to the park and may be the number-one tourist destination in the region.

When I first researched this area a couple of months ago for a place to stay, I started with Bar Harbor. Fat chance. Most of the place was booked and what was left made Manhattan look like a bargain.

It has some of the feel of Southampton or Cape Cod. That makes sense, since they all share proximity to the Atlantic and lots of money.

We found a promising restaurant called Testa’s where we had more seafood. Mine was a take on shepherd’s pie with lobster, shrimp, scallops, and other things that sink or swim. Joanna had seafood Alfredo.

We had that with a New Zealand sauvignon blanc so good that Joanna went through half a glass—a lot of wine for her at one sitting.

Saturday we went back to the park to visit Seal Harbor. 

On the way there as a small sign “Best Damned Lobstah” pointing for a left turn ahead. So of course we had to take it.

It was a private home with one garage door open. It was apparently fisherman selling lobsters to take home. As his sign put it: “From our traps to your yaps.” 

Seal Harbor isn’t in the park. Rather, it is a harbor with a community built around it. 

We didn’t see any seals, but there were lots of small boats, including many that appeared to be commercial lobstermen.

Then we got good and lost. 

Mount Desert Island is maybe 16 miles long. There aren’t that many roads on it. Most of them loop back on themselves or lead to major highways. 

I saw a sign for Highway 102. We checked the map. There were two ways to go, the short way and the long way. 

We finally found it, but I don’t know how long it took. 

At one point, I took a road that ended in a parking lot for a trail head. There was a huge (granite, I guess) boulder on the edge of the space.

Joanna took one look at it and said it reminded her of the pedestal of the Winged Victory of Samothrace.

It certainly did.

Once we got to Highway 3, I knew the way.

We stopped at the Gateway in Trenton, Maine, for more lobster. This time, Joanna suggested we order it in the shell. 

There’s more meat this way than in the lazy way. You can bite the shell of the legs and eat the meat. There’s meat in the thorax and the head, which isn’t usually served.

I wouldn’t want to do this in fancy clothes. I won’t wear a bib, but if I can plan ahead, I’ll take an apron next time.

I was thinking about the sauvignon blanc at Testa’s so I misspoke and ordered a cabernet sauvignon. 

I don’t know where it’s from, but it was surprisingly mellow and had a hint of fresh blueberry. I guess that’s why it went so well with the blueberry cheesecake we had for dessert.

Blueberries are big business in Maine.

Good night, all, and stay well. You never know how long it will take to find your way off the island.

Harry