Day 114 Saco Maine
Trip Start
May 07, 2008
1
122
205
Trip End
Nov 22, 2008
Saco,
Maine,
United States
Friday, August 29, 2008
Yes we are still in Maine. The idea of doing a boat ride on a Windjammer was abandoned, we drove back to Camden township to the port the boats leave from, parking the RV was a difficulty we immediately discovered, the parking at the departure point was already taken, we had already had missed the small road into the departure point, we quickly decided we were unable to book the night before (no phone) and the challenge faced with parking, assisted us to decide to head on South.
The route along highway 1 was not the best surface; it wound a track through further small towns/villages, with a few glimpses of bays and water views. We mention again the tidiness of the homes and gardens, definitely the picture we carry of New England homes and pretty gardens.
We came into another small town called Bath, noted for shipbuilding since the early settlement days, continuing to this day as a ship building yard for the US Navy, with a modern floating dry dock
York Beach
.We chose to pull over here, for our morning tea and called at the information centre to obtain a map of the town as well as directions to the Maritime museum. We had morning tea next to the information centre close to a rail line/station. The information centre was a converted railway station office. While we were parked, a train came alongside and loaded/unloaded passengers, they had to place a step outside the doors to allow the passengers to alight and load because the platform was at ground level and not door level, this is a scenic train trip called the Maine Eastern, taking a scenic day trip back along the route or close to the route we have just come along. The train came through the main road to the town with long train whistles to warn traffic it had right of way, who would argue?
We headed through the small main street of the town and then our to the Maritime museum, this is set up, with a new building housing artefacts and models of a lot of wonderful Square riggers pertaining to the days of sails.
Then the outside section ( the old working ship building yard) was through the yards covering three different boat builders, with a full sized sculpture of the front section and the rear section of a 6 mast boat built on the actual site. This gave a great perspective of the size and length of this boat (Called the Wyoming the last 6 master built by this yard)and the biggest ever built
Rick returning after testing the water
.The self guided tour took us through the buildings housing the design and set out stage and into the actual sawmill with the machinery still in place, into a house that was the home of another ship building family in the process of being fully restored to the late 1800's by volunteers. The volunteers are available to give tours and explanations of the people and the house, from information gained from photographs etc.
We followed the pathway to find ourselves in a working boat building shop, this is still staffed by volunteers, they are teaching young people how to build small wooden boats, they run workshops each week on Fridays, the usual compliment of class is 8 students, this year they have 16, (the guy that takes the group suggested this is the class of the big freeze. Of course we had to ask the question what that was about. The storey goes back in the mid 90's Maine state as well as surrounding states had an ice storm that brought down high tension power lines and a lot of the State was plunged into no power for up to a month in some places. The ice storm lasted two weeks with the effects created to the point only emergency vehicles were allowed on the road. I guess the house bound Maine inhabitants had to amuse themselves in other ways. Hence "double the usual number of students this year."
We also watched another volunteer demonstrate the launching of a model boat, this demonstrated the way they launched the large 6 masted boats from the land into the water alongside the Boat building yard.
We managed to walk over and through a large wooden schooner cod fishing boat built in or around 1940 and was in work until around 1962, fishing with long lines out of Nova Scotia.
By the time we finished the wander around the maritime museum it was time for lunch (hey it was 1:30pm). We had lunch in the car park (gee another advantage of the Castle, we save on paying for lunch and also get real personal choices)
We then decided to find a place further down the track to stay, a little concerned with the Labour Day Weekend.
Before we left Bath, one of the "seafood loving Travellers" decided it might be chance to purchase a Maine lobster, so another run through town to check out a place to purchase this poor sea food creature.
No fish shops in the main street, but we turned into a road along the river and there in front of us was a wholesale seafood truck. Of course there is no stopping the determined traveller, we stop and out hops the seafood fanatic, walks to the back of the truck and asks the question, the woman delivery driver had no lobsters and doesn't sell them from the truck, but we were given good directions to find a place along the road we were taking to get out of town.
Off we go, yep! There it is and pull over to go get the Lobster. Gee 2 lobsters cooked fresh while we wait for $18, "how good is that?" oh dear only one person of the crew eats lobster, We are sure he will do his best!
We rolled the Castle on south towards a KOA RV park South of Portland, Mandy and Karon did a good job and we arrived in the park easily enough. We head into obtain a spot to be told, unless we take a spot for 3 days they have no spots! The explanation was, it is the Labour day weekend and they are busy! Mmmm, at least they gave us a list of RV parks in the area, we drove to the next RV park and the reception was great and we had a choice of spots, so here we are.
Marian's birthday (Aussie time) Happy Birthday Marian, we are attempting to make phone connection to give the harmonious song of the day, hopefully we will be successful in achieving the connection. If not Happy Birthday Marion from Earnie and the Travellers.
Tomorrow further South and maybe make Boston area, yet to be decided, but as you all know, we will be somewhere in the great eastern states of the USA!
