On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
The last time I left Maine, I actually cried when I said goodbye to the ocean. Who would have guessed that someone named WaterGirl would’ve the ocean that much?
JanieM
Portland and Pemaquid this time, for the sake of the lights.
Portland Head Light at Fort Williams Park in Cape Elizabeth, just outside Portland. It’s a city-owned park, free to the public, with lots of things to do besides gaze at the lighthouse. It’s beautiful, like everywhere on the coast of Maine, but I only go there when family and friends come to visit and want to see the famous lighthouse. I prefer the wilder, less crowded coastal places further downeast.
Steve Romanoff of the Maine folk group Schooner Fare wrote a song called Portland Town that memorializes the lighthouse. “I see the light across the bay….”
Looking across the bay from the base of the lighthouse. The beige rectangle in the distance is Fort Gorges, which is also a park of sorts, but currently the subject of some disagreement as to what should be done with it.
Pemaquid Point Light, the image of which is on the Maine state quarter. The park has a restaurant and a little museum.
Looking up at the light from water level. The rock formations are intricate and beautiful — Here’s a nice article about them.
Another view of the rocks.
The view from up in the tower. Unlike at Portland Head and West Quoddy Head (see Part I), you can climb the tower at Pemaquid for a few bucks admission. A screen covers the glass, accounting for the slightly filmy look.
The former lighthouse keeper’s house is now a museum. This is a collection of pictures of the lighthouses along the coast of Maine, most of which are still operating.
Another visitor. As far as birds go, the buildings at Pemaquid are one of the few places besides my own house where I’ve seen cliff swallows nesting under the eaves and flitting around the buildings. They’re hard to photograph—they’re rarely still!—and on this occasion I didn’t try. They do give the place a homey feeling, though.
Lapassionara
What a refreshing way to spend the evening. These are wonderful! Thank you.
Mike in Oly
Those rocks are wonderful!
Skepticat
My grandfather commanded Fort Williams during World War I and I grew up in Cape Elizabeth, so this area has always had an important place in my heart. I can see Portland Head Light from the island where I live now.
JanieM
@Skepticat: That’s cool about your grandfather, and I envy you your view! I consider myself lucky to live within sight of a lake, but the ocean is another world altogether. I had close relatives living in the Eastern Prom neighborhood for the past year, but they’ve now bought a house inland (Portland being too expensive), and I’m going to miss having a sort of home base down there.
Mary G
Those are wonderful.
Salty Sam
We sailed past the Cape Elizabeth lighthouse twice last summer, once on our way downeast, and then on our way back south. One of our favorite stops there in Portland. Thanks for the memory.
errg
This is a good closing….
There go two miscreants
That fourth one reminds me of a Hopper painting. Great, vivid pictures here.
randy khan
I’m loving the rock formation photos.
BigJimSlade
@JanieM: So I take it you’ve seen the light! Nice pictures, thanks!
BigJimSlade
@JanieM: Regarding Pemaquid Pt. – you’re full of shist! (My guess was slate because of the grayness.) Well, that’s some gneiss shist you got there. Sigh… I’m sorry. But, hey, at least I clicked through to the article :-)
JanieM
@BigJimSlade: LOL. My last geology lesson was in about 1970, so I thought it was better to look for someone who had a clue. Glad you clicked through. :-)
TMC
I took the catamaran ferry from Portland to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia a couple of years ago and it passes the Portland Head Light. I had planned on visiting there this year but you know.
I have close friends who live in Midcoast Maine and often spend time in Acadia National Park. I drove up to Lubeck two years ago and stayed on Campobello at a lovely motel facing Friar’s Bay.
One of the big adventures was the hike (and climb) out to East Quoddy Lighthouse, aka Head Harbour Lightstation, which is only accessible by foot at low tide. To get there you climb up and down slippery steep ladders, across slippery rocks and sand bars that are underwater at high tide which comes in really fast because its on the Bay of Fundy which has some of the highest tides in the world due to the shape of the bay. Because of the speed the tides, which come in at 5ft/hr, you have to plan your departure from the lighthouse otherwise you can be stuck there for 12 hours. There are plenty of warning signs. Some advise, wear long pants and good walking shoes. The hike takes about 10 – 15 minutes. If you’re up there it is well worth the visit.
oh and I saw whales while I was out there. Awesome!!
pb3550
Article on rock formation geology was fabulous. Now I want to be in Maine looking at rocks – with a great guide. Thank you.
cope
Lovely pictures and how wonderful to get a geology-centric post. I have never been to Maine but I have seen these rocks. Well, not these rocks exactly but their equivalent formations in Scotland. In fact, the pictures Albatrossity put up of Lewisian rocks on the northern islands of Scotland include the same types of rocks deformed at around the same time as these formations in Maine.
If I’ve got this right, they were all part of the continuous belt of the Caledonian/Acadian Orogeny, a period of intense tectonic activity and mountain building that happened in the early Paleozoic Era. When the present-day Atlantic Ocean opened up, the current pattern of continents broke up from Pangaea and moved on in their own separate, merry ways. There will be a quiz on Monday.
JanieM
@cope: Instead of a quiz, how about a ticket to Scotland? ;-)
Or Ireland. Does the west coast of Ireland have some of the same rocks? Surely it must…?
@TMC: I’ll put that suggestion on my travel list. Campobello, for me, is at least within a few hours’ drive, i.e. much easier to plan and carry out than an overseas trip.
I had that experience of having to time things against the tides on the Olympic coast. Some headlands weren’t passable except at low tide, and we almost got caught a couple of times. It wouldn’t have been any great disaster — another night on the beach, oh the horror! But it can also be dangerous if you persist.
Miss Bianca
Casco Bay…sigh.
You’re really, really making me miss Maine.
JanieM
@Miss Bianca: Post-pandemic, come visit!
The place sure does get under your skin.
A couple of times a year I drive to Ohio to visit family — I could still navigate the town I grew up in, and most of the county, blindfolded. And I love the drive itself, through ME, NH, VT, NY, and PA. (I stay off the interstate for the most part.) But once I cross the New Hampshire border on the way back to Maine, I’m home — no matter what the self-appointed proprietors of Maine purity think about people “from away.” ;-)
DaveInOz
We visited several lighthouses during our trip from North to South and in Portland’s Tourist Information Centre, we saw all of these beautiful prints of Maine’s lighthouses.
https://alanclaude.com/collections/maine-lighthouses
Well worth a browse. We were sad to leave Maine too but we had a date with destiny – our whole holiday timing was based around getting to Boston in time to see a game at Fenway Park and we caught the last game of a home stand.
JanieM
@DaveInOz: Thanks for that Alan Claude link — those images are great, and that gallery is within easy reach for me.