Trying to be a Real Mainer

So, I have this bucket list of things to do while I'm in Maine. I actually accomplished more than I've thought so far: visiting the L.L. Bean outlet (um, $90 shoes for $7 anyone?), cross country skiing, that sort of thing. Seeing Bass Harbor Head Light was one of my "to-do"s. 

\\ So legit \\

I left the house around noon, buying half a tank of gas before driving south on the island. The parking lot of the lighthouse was empty, but I got out of the car anyway and followed the well-stomped path to Bass Harbor Head Light. I have to say, I was not impressed with the view. Pictures online had promised I’d be able to see the entire light and keeper’s house with the rocky coast as a  striking backdrop, but the light was literally 50 feet away from me and surrounded by a fence. Figuring there was more, I looked around and discovered a less trodden path to the left. Footsteps in the snow led me to a narrow set of 37 wooden stairs that turned into granite steps carved into the coast. This was the view I was looking for. Scrambling over granite boulders, I tried to get the best angle for a photo. Then I got distracted by the rose and gray granites, seams of quartz running in patterns through them, fractures so straight they seemed to be cut with a ruler, and a very visible high tide mark. Looking out to the islands, I realized the sun would set right in between them and I must wait for sunset. Luckily, I only had to wait a few hours since the sun sets so early. 

\\ Check out that high tide line, where the gray turns more brown \\

I whiled away some time in a restaurant in Southwest Harbor, a small village about three blocks long, scrutinizing the coffee menu before ordering just a cup of drip coffee (as I usually do), and a cup of seafood chowder. As I studied spoonfuls of chowder, I identified shrimp, scallops, and potatoes and tried to transfer the warmth of the soup into my hands by wrapping them around my bowl. I did not remove my hat for fear of the mess of hair that lay underneath. I paid and walked out, deciding I'd try to find the library I had spotted as I drove in, couldn’t, and ended up driving back to the parking lot at the lighthouse where I waited in my backseat, reading a nature magazine and writing in my journal and feeling like a weirdo for sitting in a lot with a giant “U.S. Department of Homeland Security”  sign directly in front of me. I half thought the Feds would come out and demand to know how I'd missed seeing the "no soliciting" signage (which didn't actually exist).

When it was time, I packed my pocket with my headlamp and prepared myself for a scenario in which I get caught in the rocks as the tide’s coming in have to saw through my arm to free myself before drowning (127 Hours with a new twist!), by bringing my knife. More than adequately prepared, I returned to the now familiar path through the scrubby pines down to the water. The tide was indeed coming in, a red bell buoy just offshore clanging with each wave as it rushed in and sighed out. The rose quartz glowed even pinker in the setting sun and the red '4 seconds on, 1 second off' pattern of the Bass Harbor Head light brightened with the oncoming darkness. I didn’t spend much time down there. In truth, I’m a wuss when it comes to being out in the cold for extended lengths of time. 

\\ I really don't even have words for this \\

Still the sole vehicle in the parking lot, I pulled out and drove north through the twilight, accompanied by Paul Simon as I passed homes shuttered for the season and homes spilling warm light out onto the snow. The smell of woodfire occasionally flowed through my car’s vents and crept over the road as a land breeze pulled the smoke out to sea. Driving through Southwest Harbor, Somerville, and Town Hill, I admired the great white sided, black shuttered homes resting feet from the main road like towns used to be in the olden days, and the cedar shingled homes, faded to gray from exposure to the salty air. Echo Lake, frozen thick with a hearty layer of snow on top crisscrossed with ATV tracks, glowed with pinpoints of light from ice fishing shacks and the weak light remaining from the day silhouetted the bodies standing outside them. I passed roads with names like “Less Traveled” and “Big Moose” on my way back to my so-called cottage and round out the evening with a cup of tea and a pen to cross one more thing off my Maine bucket list. ///