Travel & Destination Blog Posts

I’ve had the last few pictures from the short road trip Steve brought me on sitting in a folder for a while. I figured I really should post them before they get too old.

All right – the final destination of our trip was a place called Coos Canyon. It’s located on Rt.17, North of Roxbury (which is North of Rumford). The canyon is really neat. There’s also a trail system, along with a dirt road that leads to Tumbledown Mountain, a popular hiking destination. There are also cabin rentals nearby.

This is a picture of the bridge that spans the canyon and heads towards Tumbledown,

And here is a look over the side.

And a few pictures of the bridge from underneath.

Now for some pictures of the canyon itself.

I always like to photograph my surroundings, just for memory’s sake, so I did so of the parking lot at Coos Canyon. I know it’s nothing special, but I like it.

And finally, a quick shot of the trail head, right off the road.

Moving on along our motorcycle trip (read about our first stop here), we rode into Rangeley, Maine and stopped for a break. We decided to get some lunch because, unfortunately, I hadn’t eaten anything yet. Steve suggested a pub across the street from where we parked the bikes. The pub was called Sarge’s and I have to say, it was a decent lunch. We got all sorts of filled up and went on our merry way.

We rode through the rest of Rangeley and continued to head West on route 4/16. When we made it to Oquossoc (which was the coolest little place), we made a left to ride South on route 17. I think Steve wanted to show me some lookout points.

After a while climbing a few mountains, we stopped here:

The two pictures above are looking out over Rangeley Lake, which is fairly gorgeous. There were times the lake looked almost fake – with all the islands and mountains. Very nice area with just tons of activities, such as pontoon boat tours, boat and canoe rentals, camping, eating and all the rest. Vacation extraordinaire.

This is a sign that was situated in the parking lot. It describes the history of the area and how previous inhabitants traveled through the local lakes and rivers. If you care to read it, click the image.

And here we have another picture of the motorcycles. I think this is the last one.

After we left this particular lookout point, we rode some more and stopped at what people around here call, “Height of Land.” This is another lookout point where you can get a great view of Mooselookmeguntic Lake. Say that three times fast.

This area was awesome. When I get a chance, I plan on returning to show some people. Here is a somewhat weird video I found of the Height of Land. Even thought it’s wavy, you can get a pretty good idea of what things look like.

Height of Land – Rangeley, Maine

On Saturday, Steve managed to get in touch with me and asked if I’d like to join him and his son for a motorcycle tour up and around Rangeley, Maine. I excitedly accepted his invitation and less than an hour later, I was sitting upon one of his many motorcycles. In this case, I rode a Triumph Bonneville. Nice bike and really fun to ride. We toured about 112 miles in a few hours and it was a blast riding like I used to. Here’s one of my more dorky pictures:

I took many pictures throughout the day – too many to show in one post. Since there were a few “spots” we spent time at, I figured it would be better to break things up a bit.

The first place we stopped at is called “Smalls Falls.” It’s located in Township E in Franklin County, Maine. I guess the town doesn’t have a name. That happens up here.

Anyway, I thought that taking a quick picture of the bikes was in order.

I initially thought we were just pulling over for a rest. We had ridden for about a half hour and the sign out front said in big, bold letters, “Rest Area.” After we pulled in and after I saw how things were situated, I figured we were someplace good. I asked Steve where we were and he confirmed that we were at a series of waterfalls. Pretty damn neat.

After we parked the bikes and walked through the parking lot, I noticed a few signs. Since I always take pictures of these things, I decided to do so here as well.

The first sign educated the public on how mountains are formed and the second sign talks about what types of trees were around us. You’ll see those trees in the following pictures.

The signs were right next to the stairs that lead to the Sandy River.

After we made it to the bottom of the stairs, we got a better view of the first and second falls.

And as we continued walking, we were greeted by some signage and a very beautiful mixed pine forest.

That smooth path didn’t last for long. After we walked to the right, we (or I) discovered that we were going to have to do some hiking. And by that, I mean climbing over roots and huge boulders.

Luckily, for the weaker and less agile hikers, there was a chain link fence for people to grab onto. Of course, I didn’t use the fence – because I am agile and strong.

The following pictures show some of the falls. I’m not going to describe each one because they’re all kind of similar. I will say though that there are many of them. Probably about five in all, going all the way up the mountain. Some slides made of rock, some drop offs and some swimming holes. Very nice place and well worth another visit.

A while back – actually, all the way back in January, Laura and I were on our way to Madison to grab some stuff. I’m not really sure what we were doing. That’s not important right now because what I want to show you in this post has nothing to do with what we were going to Madison for. The pictures we took that day are what I’d like to refresh in your memory. You can read the post here:

The Ice Field and Snowmobile Trails

If you don’t want to read the post, you may gander at one photo in particular. I’ll show it here:

The day Laura took this picture of me was a day this field was covered with about six inches of ice. I stopped the car on our way by, jumped out and began sliding around. I asked her to take a few pictures so I could display them here on the blog.

Funny thing happened yesterday on our way to Madison. We took the same route and right when we were passing the same field, we saw the ever elusive bison we’ve been waiting for on the other side of the road. I pulled the car over and ran out to the spot I was standing in back in January. I asked Laura to take a few photos of me to post on this blog. Like she did back then, she did again. Here is one of the pictures:

Is that funny or what? I’m starting to think I’m a one trick pony. My stances are almost identical. And it wasn’t even me I wanted her to take a picture of. It was me in the field. I wanted to show you how the field changed from Winter to Summer.

Well, at least we met the challenge in the next two photos. In the first one, you can see the field and the hills in the background and in the second one, you can see how the hay is piled up. Luckily, you have me in both of them.

We’ve got a nearby lake that’s probably considered the crown jewel of the entire area. It’s called Clearwater Lake and it’s located in Industry, Maine.

I’m not a big lake guy. I used to be when I was growing up, but after I left home to go to college, I haven’t found myself visiting and swimming in lakes like I used to when I was a kid. The lake I swam in when I was a kid was basically the thing to do. I can remember getting out of bed every morning during the summer, hopping on my bike and riding down to the lake. All my friends met me there and we spent weeks and weeks and weeks boating, turtle hunting and every other activity the water down the road offered. But since I moved away from my home town and as my friends got older, those types of activities just faded away. But sometimes, when I just lay around thinking, I find myself wishing those “summer” days would somehow return.

I didn’t expect Maine to feel much like summer. Before we arrived, most of my focus was on how we’d get through the winters. Summer was an afterthought. As it turns out though, summer is really what people come to Maine for. We’ve got a wide temperature range up here. It’s mostly mid-70s during the day and high 40s at night. It’s that range and the cool nighttime temperatures that remind me of those camping trips my family used to bring me on long ago. Pulling a sweatshirt over my head as soon as the day cooled off was something I never paid much attention to, but now those thoughts cause all sorts of memories to flood my mind each time I do it. It’s weird and somewhat of a challenge to sort things like this out. I’ll get used to it though, because it’s truly a rewarding feeling. Searching and searching for those old summer days, only to find them someplace I never thought they’d be – odd and satisfying at the same time.

I think Clearwater Lake has the potential to be the lake for us. People around these parts truly value the area and every time I pass by the lake, I see kids climbing on the rocks and varied individuals fishing and boating. Some of them swim, but the water is still chilly, so I think I have to wait a while to glimpse more of them jumping in for a dip.

While Seth was up visiting, we passed by Clearwater Lake on our way to Farmington. I stopped and we took some pictures. I just filtered through mine and will post them below. After that, I’ll post a few of Seth’s. It’ll be fun to see the different angles and subjects between the two of us.

Here are the three I’ve got:

Here are Seth’s photos.

Maine has got some unique bridges. I know of three so far. One is Wire Bridge, one is South of us and one is North of us. I don’t know the names of those two, but as we visit them and get to know them, I’ll be sure to gather some information on them and pass it along here.

As I mentioned in my last post, Seth and I visited Wire Bridge in New Portland, Maine and as I just mentioned above, Wire Bridge is unique. It’s made of small cables and wood. The arches are sided with Cedar shingles and the drive area is comprised of wood as well. I’m not sure of that type of wood, but as we watched cars travel from one side of the bridge to the other, the entire drive area flexed as if the vehicle was riding on a mattress. The bridge also moves. The cables are like swing set chains and the wood is free floating.

Both Seth and I took a whole bunch of pictures. I’m sure he’ll edit his and post them somewhere, but in the meantime, here are mine. I do want to mention that the area doesn’t only host the bridge. It appeared as though there was some sort of park on the other side as well as hiking trails. People were swimming in the Carrabassett River, having all sorts of fun. We didn’t go far because all we wanted to see was the bridge, but I’m sure we could have spent some time there.

Would you like to see some photos Laura took of the Wire Bridge? Check them out by clicking the link in the previous sentence.

Right after Laura and I were finished with our hike down Mosher Hill Falls, she requested that we drive North just a hair to take some pictures of a few fields that were close by. We did and she did.

If you continue North out of the parking lot for the falls, you’ll see a small road called Hymie Norton Road. It bears to the right. Actually, Hymie Norton Road stays straight from Mosher Hill Road – it just seems like it bears to the right.

Anyway, if you look to your right at the beginning of Hymie Norton Road, you’ll see this:

And if you continue up that road, you’ll see some fields that look this this:

And if you continue even further up the road, Hymie Norton will turn into Coffin Road. That’s where Steve and I rode his ATVs that day a few weeks ago. We’re talking a few miles up though.

Anyway, I just figured I’d show some pictures of the area. Beautiful, I’ll tell you that. Lot’s to do around here if you’re the outdoorsy type.

We were told about these falls by a fellow named Don who lives up the road. His description made it seem like the falls were right around the bend. In reality, they’re about three miles away from our house. Nevertheless, they are wonderful and quite the hidden attraction around these parts.

Some people call these falls “Mosher Falls” and some people call them the “Cascades.” I think I’m going to stick with Mosher Falls, because they are way too many cascade type falls in Maine. I’m going to attach a video to the bottom of this post where the person who took the video calls the brook the falls fall into “Cascade Brook.” I’ll take his word for it as I’m no expert of this area.

Between the two of us, we took over 100 photographs. It’s the kind of place where you think every single picture you take is pure excellence. Unfortunately, as I was going through them, I realized that not everyone wants to see 25 different views of the falls. Two or three, tops, but not 25. Needless to say, I deleted many.

I’m going to post the pictures I took and then I’ll update this post later with Laura’s. You’ll see the distinction between our photos because I had the wide angle lens and she didn’t.

Enjoy the pictures.

As we were on our way to the falls, I decided to stop the car so we could grab a few pictures of the road we were traveling. It was one of those kinds of days. You’d be surprised – once the Spring rolls around, Maine weather becomes magical.

I’m basically going to give you a rundown of what’s what with these pictures. I made sure they were in order, so you’ll see things as they happened during our hike. First, after we got out of the car, we began walking down the trail. The brook is on the left and we’re obviously heading toward the falls.

Further down the trail a bit was a swampy area on the right. The sun was shining through nicely, so Laura and I spent a moment or two there. I was the one who spent the moment, she was the one who spent the two.

The next four pictures are of the brook in all its glory. The first is me walking towards it, the second is me following it down toward the falls, the third is me getting closer to the falls and the last one is me getting ready to go over. Almost.

Once we made it to the actual falls, we stopped to rest at the top of them. You can tell that’s what this is in the picture below. If you’ve been to a waterfall before, you know what the top looks like. They’re all the same.

And right past the rest area was a cliff that looks down to the bottom. To the left was the falls, but they were barely in view.

Since it was so difficult to see the falls from the side we were on, we decided to head back upstream and cross over to the other side. I noticed a trail on that side earlier. Here is the trail we walked down and our first real glimpse of the falls.

I kept sneaking closer and closer to the edge, just so I could get a better picture. This is the best I could get from that point.

Finally, we continued our walk all the way to the bottom of the trail and then cut into the ravine. After that, we walked back up, but this time, right along the brook. This is what we found.

As promised, I’m attaching the video someone took of the falls. After that, I’ll append this post with Laura’s photos.

Farmington, ME – Cascade Brook

As promised, Laura’s photos are posted below. I just finished editing them. Take a look at how different they are than mine. Granted, I had the wide angle lens, but still, it’s interesting to see what she’s drawn towards when compared to my shots.

A while ago, Laura read something online to the likes of, “You can live in Maine your entire life and you won’t come close to seeing everything.” I’m probably screwing that up, but I’m sure you get the idea. Basically, the gist of it is that Maine’s got a lot to offer. If you are the type to stop and smell the roses, you won’t need to get very far.

Here’s a case in point. Laura and I have been living in Maine for a bit over five months. While it was a difficult Winter, I have to tell you – the only places we’ve really visited are Madison and Farmington. And the real reason I visit Farmington at all is because that’s where my Jiu-Jitsu school is. If Madison didn’t have Hannaford, Madison Animal Hospital and Campbell’s, I’m not sure I would have been away from our property at all. There is so much going on inside our little square mile as far as recreation and entertainment goes, we don’t need much else. But, I do realize we have to eventually get off our duffs and see the state. That’s what today was about.

I remember sitting in Florida during 2013 some time and looking through the mountainous regions of Maine on Google Earth. I had a great time doing that. There were times though that my imagination got the better of me. I’d picture myself cruising through the pines with the windows down, cool air flowing over my arm as I hung it out the window. Those were some good daydreams. Mind you, the Summer I experienced in Florida was like nothing else I’ve ever experienced. It was hotter than all get out and honestly, I had not much else to do but daydream of places like Maine to someday venture to. Sort of like a personal goal, I guess. Something I made a point of doing. As luck would have it, here I sit.

One of the areas of the map I continuously returned to was Eustis. I know it’s just a small town, but really, the area is stunning to look at. Close by are the Cathedral Pines, the Cathedral Pines Campground and Flagstaff Lake, which is just enormous. The campground most likely did it for me. I’d say I’ve been having flashbacks of camping with my family for almost thirty years now. Now those are some days I with I had to do over again. I’m not sure how my mother and father did it, but they managed to choose some real gems of campgrounds to spend our Summer vacations. Gems I’ve been searching for ever since. I think I’m getting close because I’m not sure if I told you this already, but Maine is reminding a lot of when I was a kid. It may be all the nature or the people. Perhaps it’s the culture. Something’s going on up here and it feels pretty good.

Enough of that. Let’s get to the pictures of today’s great adventure. Like usual, I’ll give my description above each photo. And like usual again, if you’d like to see a larger version of a specific picture, all you need to do is click on it. Enjoy.

We started off today’s trip by heading North from Farmington. We passed New Vineyard and New Portland and drove Rt.27 all the way Kingfield. That’s where we took our first photo. I think it’s a bit difficult to take a picture of the town, but I’ll give you an idea of what it looks like as best I can. First, we have a quick photo of what appeared before us as soon as things began getting tight.

Just a few steps further than where I took that first photo was the stunning Herbert Grand Hotel. What a sight to see. It’s clean and in very good shape.

After driving through town, which isn’t a long drive at all, we stopped to grab a shot of the local cemetery. I don’t know – maybe it was just the way the sun was hitting things. It looked peaceful.

And here we are continuing our trip North on Rt.27 past Kingfield. I’m not sure of where we are exactly, but the sign giving us the distance to Canada was worth stopping for.

Now, I’m going to tell you that what we saw so far was really cool. It did justice to what I dreamed about while drooling over Google Earth while sitting in Florida. I was heartened by all the topographical surprises. Honestly though, what we had seen thus far was nothing compared to what we were in store for in the Eustis area. Things were about to get real.

The first “wow” we came across was the causeway just North of Stratton. There was a pull-off where we were able to hop out of the car and snap away with our cameras. I’ll admit it was difficult to delete many of the photos that we took, but I certainly couldn’t post them all here. I whittled them down to two. One that I took of the Bigelow Preserve and one Laura took of some Canada Geese foraging in the dried lake bed.

As beautiful as this area was, I’m telling you, it was nothing compared to what I moved to Maine to see. And that was the same thing we just took pictures of, but more North towards Eustis and just past the Cathedral Pines. What a sight. You’ll get what I’m saying here after you see these next few photos. It took us a while to stop taking pictures, but we eventually walked away and got in the car to trackback a bit. I’ll show you right after these.

The first photo is a wide angle shot of the Bigelow Preserve from the Cathedral Pines area. The second shot is the same thing, but closer. It’s the North face of the preserve. The third shot is me with the wide angle lens, just facing slightly more North and the last shot is me again, facing slightly South, looking at the shore of the Cathedral Pines Campground.

So what are the Cathedral Pines, anyway? Well, it’s an area near Eustis, Maine that holds really tall Red Pines. I’m not sure of their height, but they’re somewhat overwhelming to look at while driving through. The area is also quiet. I think the pines absorb ambient noise. Laura and I commented on the serenity of the area a number of times.

I have some photos of the pines that I’ll post below. The first one is a sign. You get the idea. The second one is the pines in their full glory. The third one is the pines as they line Rt.27 as we head back South and the fourth is another sign, telling us to be careful of the deer.

Now, one area I completely neglected to tell you about on our way North to Eustis is the Sugarloaf ski area. This, in and of itself, is something to see. I think we were so excited to get up North, we waited to photograph the ski area until we headed South again. That’s fine. We did what we had to do. We even drove all the way up the mountain road, until we saw a sign that read, “No Access.” That was pretty far. We saw all the snow grooming machines right past that point. Unfortunately, we were so close to the mountain, we weren’t able to grasp it in all its glory. It was kind of right in our faces. So, we backed up a bit and took our pictures. What I’m showing below isn’t in the exact order we took them, but they make more sense. I’ll start at the beginning.

The first picture is the Sugarloaf ski area sign. The second picture is the mountain from a distance and the third is the mountain more up-close. The fourth picture is a moose crossing sign and the last is a neat area on the ski area road that just looked perfect against the late day sun.

Well, there you have it. Did you like the photo tour of our Maine trip? We sure had a good time. Please leave comments and questions down below.

This was a difficult Sunday for many sap houses across the state. It’s been extraordinarily cold in northern New England and the longer than normal Winter season is taking its toll on maple syrup producers from Ohio to Maine. I just read a few comments on a maple syrup forum and a lot of people were complaining that their yields are a quarter of what they were last year. They don’t expect much more from what this year has to offer. From what I understand, things can change from Winter to Spring in a blink of an eye and syrup season will be all but a memory.

Just yesterday, we had our first Maine Maple Sunday. This is somewhat of a holiday in this state. People from all over come out to enjoy what local sap houses have to offer. I go on and on about the “culture” of the sap house. How you can sit inside one of these things and become mesmerized by the wood stove and all the steam. Last year’s experience was just perfect. And after I explained what goes on to Laura’s brother, he asked when we could start building our own sap house. It’s that good. I’m just waiting for that perfect year to get going. I still need some gear.

The sap houses in the area weren’t running. We stopped by Luce’s in Anson and had a good time. Even though they didn’t have their stove on, they did offer lots of samples of different types of food. We enjoyed the maple ice cream – a lot. I also liked looking through their sap house in stasis. These things have a lot of memories, I’m sure. Take a look through the pictures below and you’ll see what I’m talking about. You can almost hear the guys talking as they’re priming all the equipment. All that “stuff” collected. What I wouldn’t give.

We drove around a bit after we visited Luce’s. We kind of cruised through some local back roads. We even found an abandoned sap house up on a hill. I have a picture of that too. How can someone just abandon a sap house? I wonder if I can somehow move that to my back yard.

After we drove through the back roads, we quickly, and I mean quickly visited the lake nearby. It was a fast visit because the wind coming off the lake was traveling about 100mph and was extremely cold. I haven’t felt that kind of cold here yet. Gives new meaning to the phrase “wind chill.” Holy cow.

Enjoy the pictures. Ask questions. Leave comments.

This is the abandoned sap house we found. How cool is that?

These are a few pictures of the lake down the road. Check out the ice fishing cabin.