“For I must be travelin’ on now, there’s too many places I got to see” – Lynard Skynard
Miles traveled: 272.2
It was sadly time to leave Bar Harbor, ME and Mount Desert Island. It is one of the most beautiful places I have visited on my road trip, and I absolutely had the best time on the island. We got up this morning, packed up the Jeep, and made our way off the island and to Highway 1 South. While Manchester isn’t too far away, today was a leisurely day of driving through the small, charming towns along the coast of Maine. With no real agenda, we would just pick and choose what to do along the way – my kind of day!
It was once again a pretty foggy morning, but it didn’t take away from the beauty of the drive and scenery at all. In fact, it made the small harbors along the way almost mysterious looking. Mom was on her game today with the audiobooks, and we closed out one John Grisham and ended up finishing another one – making the grand total of books listened to with mom 5! We’ll talk about what mom wasn’t so great at today a bit later. Sarah “the insensitive” HR person had to make a brief appearance later in the day.
After passing over the Verona Island bridge and through the fog, we drove through a few small towns, and then over the Passagassawakeag River (try saying that 10 times fast, much less once). Our first stop was Lincolnville Beach, really to just stretch the legs and get out of the Jeep. It was foggy at the beach, but it made for a unique look at the harbor. Next we stopped at Camden (Maine, not New Jersey – this Camden is far safer and is not a crime-stoppers new paradise). Camden is a beautiful little harbor town, and it was really neat to walk around in. We strolled through a great little park next to the harbor and stopped into a few shops in the quaint downtown area. Really cute place, peaceful, and established.
Lincolnville Beach, ME
Camden, ME
Camden, ME
We continued south on highway 1, passing through more small towns, and passing by a plethora of antique shops and seafood stands. We even hit a traffic jam, which was a result of the ever-popular Red’s lobster shack. Serioulsy, the roadside shack cause about a 6 mile traffic back-up on the one lane highway. At 10:30 in the morning no less. We thought about stopping but there was no parking as far as the eye could see (and I couldn’t quite bring myself to have a lobstah roll for a late breakfast)! We pressed on and made out way into Freeport, ME. As many of you likely know, Freeport is home to the flagship store of LL Bean. Of course we stopped to check it out. The LL Bean ‘campus’ is huge. And there’s a large Bean Boot out front. Who doesn’t love that. There is also an Outlet store – which we made a stop at. I mean, when in Rome. I scored some tall Bean boots at the Outlet for half the price, a lightweight down vest, and a new leather belt – all for a fraction of what you’d spend in the retail store – woohoo!! Yes, I am quite proud of myself. The boots alone are a major find.
lobstah roll jam
Next on the agenda were lobstah rolls! I was excited about this – I mean I have tried lobstah in various ways – boiled with lemon and butter and obster mac & cheese (not all at once) – during my time in Maine, and I was saving the ever so popular roll variety for last. Drum roll, please. We got a recommendation on a great spot for the rolls in Freeport, ordered our lobster rolls, and put them down like a couple of pros. The lobstah roll was very very good – buttery and delicious! I think I prefer the boiled variety that requires a little effort to pick and eat though – but I certainly would not turn down a lobstah roll!
After a fun afternoon in Freeport, we continued our way down highway 1 south, passing through Portland and many other smaller towns along the coast. Once we were nearly out of Maine, we headed west towards Manchester, NH to close out the day and mom’s last night on the road trip. Now, if you will recall once more, my mom had a couple of simple tasks as the passenger. One of those was state-line crossing management. Since she missed the New Hampshire sign last time, I gave her the opportunity to redeem herself today. I even gave her a 2 mile heads up! I had high hopes as her camera was at the ready, but it was an epic fail and mom didn’t even get a shot off. Holy moly. So I had to don my HR hat after what will now be known as “strike three”, and terminated mom from state-line management duties. She gave it her best effort though.
portland, me
Since it was mom’s last night of the trip, we headed to a nice dinner in downtown Manchester. We had a fun dinner at Hanover Street Chophouse, which was a recommendation from my Aunt Selma, who used to live in Manchester. Food and service was great – so it was an excellent recommendation!
Until next time…
-traveljunkE
day 38
trip totals
