The last week of October is one of my favorite weeks to escape, even though I do hate to miss any of our extra-short fall in Minnesota. But by then, tourism season has died down and it also allows us to avoid any Halloween party invitations (sorry, but it’s true: we’re not Halloween People). In 2019, our only full-week vacation was a moody, restful, and truly adult-feeling get-away to Maine.
I started by planning a trip to St. John’s on the Newfoundland coast in Canada. For some reason, I am drawn to the idea of getting as far east on North America as possible. I still am and I still do plan to do that trip someday. But since there are still states I have not explored, we decided Maine would be a more affordable, less complicated first step.
Maine was the state I had to my “state project” on in elementary school. Did everyone have to do those? All I remember was a very nice, perfectly outlined drawing I did of the state (which was hard given all that rocky coastline), that it’s capital is Augusta, and that lobster are important to its identity.
Apart from the lobster, I didn’t have many expectations. I did have a copy of Collective Quarterly’s Penobscot Bay edition. It was filled with grainy, windswept photos of hardscrabble island and fisher people. There was a streak of independence the stories captured, like the one of an engineer who left his lucrative city job to move to Stonington to make knots, or of an elderly couple who were the last residents on their little island.
We started our trip with a couple of days in Portland, where J’s friend, and the pianist for our wedding, lives. We spent most of our money and time at Tandem Coffee. We’d had their coffee beans before, but it turns out their baker outpaces their very good roastery crew. Portland also has these potato donuts (“The Holy Donut”) that are incredible.
The baked goods at Tandem Coffee are on-par with their excellent coffee.
Portland was named Bon Appétit’s 2018 Food Capital of the year, and we found this to be deserved. It rained most of the time we were there, so we stuck to restaurants that were within a few blocks of our Airbnb. Luckily, there were several. And none of them were fish or seafood focused. Instead, we had a lot of great Thai and Southeast Asian dishes. Another favorite place to escape the rain: Portland-Flea-for-All. It was filled was affordable Mid Century furnishings, secondhand L.L. Bean sweaters, and everything in between.
Downtown Portland, ME
Portland Museum of Art
After a weekend in Portland, we picked up our rental car and headed north along the coast. We took a brief detour to drive through Bowdoin College in Brunswick. In Rockland, we toured the Farnsworth Art Museum, which has a ton of the Wyeth family art. Andrew Wyeth is one of my favorite painters, and I was able to peak in at the Jamie Wyeth exhibit they were taking down. We stopped at the Home Kitchen Cafe for a cozy lunch with seemingly everyone else in the town of Rockland; J did impressive work on an impressive Reuben, and I had a Haddock fish sandwich for the first time.
Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, ME
Young Andrew Wyeth, it turns out, learned to draw by painting war scenes.
Farnsworth Homestead, the Rockland home of the museum’s founder, Lucy Farnsworth
Fueling up at Home Kitchen Cafe, Rockland, ME
To walk off our massive sandwiches, we took a pitstop stroll at Beech Hill Preserve, just outside of Rockland. It was actually one of my favorite parts of the trip. On a Monday, it was quiet, with just a couple local retirees out for their daily constitutional. It was cloudy and damp, but the landscape was still alive with color. After a gentle, inclined hike, we came to a cleared knoll that had a stone building at the top. It was surrounded by deep red sumac, browning grasses, and golden trees.
A damp walk at Beech Hill Preserve
From Rockland, the drive just kept getting more beautiful. We passed through charming seaside towns like Camden and Belfast, and over bridges offering glimpses to the larger bay. We stopped in Ellsworth for groceries and finally got to our Airbnb, less than a mile from the Lamoine beach and tucked into a quiet, wooded neighborhood. Within an hour, a fire was lit and I was in the bathtub with wine.
Our 1-bedroom Airbnb guest home, just 1 mile away from the Lamoine Beach and a close drive to Acadia
We spent the next couple days hiking around Acadia National Park, lighting more fires, boiling our own lobster, and when it rained, poking around antique shops and watching Great British Bake-Off. The vacation was almost better for the rain. I took 1-2 baths a day, finally read a couple of books, and slept without alarms.
Our view from the Beehive Loop Trail at Acadia National Park
Late October at the beach.
Side note on Acadia: Go! We did the hike up to the Beehive, and another around Jordan Pond, hiking up to both North and South “Bubble.” In late fall, the trails were quiet. We did a hike near Long Lake and didn’t see a soul.
Snack break on the South Bubble, overlooking Jordan Pond
The famed “Bubble Rock,” just hanging out.
All of the grey made all of the golds and red that much brighter.
On our first failed quest to get fresh lobster. While this was an active harbor, everywhere was closed to tourists for the season.
The southern tip of Mount Desert Island on a workday.
I felt self conscious about my day job of sitting in front of a computer around all of these lobster traps.
Our Airbnb came with a lobster pot and cooking instructions.
J did the hard part and I just took pictures.
A hot and fast death.
In the end, I found I really don’t love lobster.
J on pink rocks
J on gray rocks
Finally, it was time to pack up. We had another whole day to slowly meander our way back to our Rockland Airbnb. We took a recommendation from Collective Quarterly and decided to do a detour to 44 North Coffee in Deer Isle. There had been a storm the night before, and most of that peninsula was without power. 44 North Coffee is its own roaster, owned and managed by two younger women. It has exactly two seats in one sunny window, which were occupied. We got our coffee and rhubarb filled hand pie to go and sat on the bench outside. It quickly became apparent that this tiny little shop is where the locals gather to exchange news and gossip.
The sun finally came out! And this bright blue bench outside of 44 North Coffee the morning after a storm was the perfect place to absorb it.
After watching an entire season of Great British Bake-Off without easy access to baked goods, there was no way to resist the galettes at 44 North Coffee.
Deer Island, the morning after a storm caused power outages
The gulls’ chopping block.
Deer Isle Library
Stonington’s harbor
Stonington was quiet, beautiful.
We strolled down to the harbor where we watched seagulls hovering over a rock, dropping shellfish to brake the shells open. Before heading back to the main road, we also stopped by Stonington, where Marlinespike Chandlery is. As we pulled up, the door opened for us. The owner and knot-master himself welcomed us, and said since the power was out, he wasn’t technically open, but he let us walk around. He had just drug in a huge piece of sandy kelp that he’d found on his morning walk. Storms dredge up the best and worst of the ocean.
We made a quick pitstop at Belfast Cohousing and Ecovillage.
Another highlight of the trip was Belfast. We had lunch at Chase’s Daily, which was both farmers market and cafe. It is also one of the most well-designed and beautiful spaces I’ve ever been in, filled with a curiously high number of gorgeous people all across the age spectrum (but like most of the Maine we’d seen, also predominately white). I’d been stalking the prefab, Passive House design company Go Home/Go Logic for a couple of years. They are located in Belfast, in the old Mason’s building, and the very kind receptionist gave us a tour of their office.
Chase’s Daily, Belfast, Maine
While we spent a lot of time in bookstores and antique shops, I limited my purchases to these finds.
After haunting more bookstores and antique shops, we made our way back to Camden where we had dinner reservations at Long Grain, and upscale Thai place. We had mussels. We learned we’re not Mussels People, either. But, our other food was incredible, and the space warm and inviting on another damp fall evening.
After haddock and lobster, we finished off our seafood tasting menu with these mussels at Long Grain in Camden. We’re clearly Midwesterners; none of these things were our favorite.
We spent our last morning back in Portland eating more potato donuts and sitting with the regulars at Tandem Coffee. At this point, we had become recognizable, which always feel nice, especially on a weeklong vacation with no routine and little familiarity. A few months removed from this trip, the things I think about most were all of the tiny towns we briefly glimpsed into - all the regulars glad for the quiet after a tourism rush, all the folks flowing into 44 North Coffee to talk about the power outage, the huge piece of kelp fresh off the beach on the owner of Marlinespike Chandlery drug in; the colors atop Beech Hill Preserve; the teal penny tile on the floor of our Airbnb (which I’m now going to put in our own bathroom); and books by the fire. And let us not forget the savory biscuits with a goat cheese spread from Tandem Coffee.