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.
JanieM
Long ago I had a neighbor who was a professor of psychology. One day we were talking about my extreme night owl habits, which a number of people in my life have ascribed to rebelliousness, laziness, or any number of other remediable factors.
No, said the professor, studies show that being a night person or a morning person is pretty much built in to people’s physiology. “We call it ‘larks and nightingales,’” he said.
As a lifelong nightingale who has seldom seen the sunrise, I’ve been informed many times that I’m missing a lot. I believe what my morning person friends tell me, but it’s just as hard for me to get up at dawn as it would be for them to stay up being productive until the wee hours.
These days, though, I’ll do a lot for the sake of a good picture. So one morning this fall I dragged myself out of bed and went across the road to the town beach with a camera.
It was indeed beautiful, as a couple of the pictures in this set confirm.
Just before sunrise.
Another angle on the patch of black-eyed Susans at the town beach this past summer.
Commenter way2blue mentioned recently that her favorites among my Maine pics were the early farm ones. There are always more where those came from.
“Downtown,” taken from behind the library.
Congress Street during Pride month.
Congress Square Park on a lovely June day. I sat for a while, enjoying the sunshine, eating my Japanese take-out, and people-watching.
Mill Stream just below the dam. Someone was enjoying a paddle, which I rarely see at that spot. More often it’s people fishing.
Just before sunrise at the town beach. This was one of those autumns when the big vistas were a bit of a dud around here. Colors came staggered instead of all at once, and a lot of trees that are sometimes brilliant never got beyond a sort of rusty brown. I’ve been learning to look for the little gems in such a year – here’s one of those.
Taken from the East Readfield Cemetery near the Jesse Lee Church, looking southwest across the rolling hills.
Looking out from Norcross Point, a little town park at the south end of Maranacook Lake with a beach and some boat moorings. This was taken in late winter, when the ice was starting to surrender to sunshine and longer daylight. This end of the lake is always clear of ice earlier than the north end, where I live.
sab
That first photo is simply stunning.
JPL
It sure is pretty.
HeartlandLiberal
That first pictures is simply EXQUISITE, in every sense of the word: extremely beautiful and, typically, delicate.
Mathguy
I always enjoy your photos of Maine. It’s fun to see that photo of “Downtown”, a road I’ve driven down hundreds of times over the last 23 summers. My favorite landmark in Readfield is the beautiful large long house just north of the setting of the photo that has been in the state of being painted, but never finished, since I started going to Maine during the summer.
Spanish Moss
Gorgeous! Drinking my coffee and imagining I am in that first picture…
Kevin
Great photos. Being an early bird is nice but a bit overrated imo.
Dagaetch
Love these, thank you!
Miki
Oh, my …. That first picture is breathtaking! Wowsa.
Kristine
Agree about #1.
Also like the Readfield photo.
That said, they’re all lovely. I really need to visit Maine someday.
Oregon Girl
Beautiful! I look forward to seeing the photos featured on this site as I scroll through my favorite blogs with my first cup of coffee in the morning. A very nice counter to the (often) depressing news.
MelissaM
All lovely, but yeah, #1. I really enjoy your posts and wish I could transport myself (easily, quickly, and frugally) to your locale.
HinTN
I agree with all above regarding #1 but the one of rocks and reds is fabulous, too.
Miss Bianca
Funny, I’ve never been a “lark”, but Maine was always the one place on earth that could roust me out of bed at 5 in the morning just to enjoy the summer sunrise.
(now my sleep habits are shifting towards routinely waking up around 6 am, so I guess sometimes these things *do* shift around!)
Anyway, lovely photos and as always they are making me really nostalgic for Maine.
Traveller
These are, as everyone notes, Wonderful. The framing and composition are near perfect and I particularly like the way you use both earth and still water in these images to compliment each other. Kudos.
JanieM
@Mathguy: I’m guessing you mean this place. I watched it with bemusement for years as well. They did get it into shape eventually, and the “Carol” mentioned in the listing is on the Select Board now. Small towns….. There’s another place just west of the Weathervane Restaurant that had a similarly long phase of fixing-up, and about which there were also rumors of B&B plans. I don’t think that ever materialized, but I haven’t kept up with local gossip lately so I’m not sure.
@Miss Bianca: My sleep patterns have changed drastically as I’ve gotten older. I’m still a night person, but I don’t sleep as long or as uninterruptedly as I used to. Whether it had anything to do with it or not, I spent several weeks gradually shifting my sleep schedule in the spring of 2019 because I was facing jury duty, which meant I had to get up about 4 hours earlier than usual for an unpredictable length of time. Just when that ended, I retired unexpectedly (was let go…), then my mom went into rehab at 96, then covid came… It was a tumultuous year that turned into years. And my nice 8-9 hours never came back.
*****
To everyone — I’m glad you like the pictures. I had fun taking them, and more fun watching Steve turn them into something more than I gave him. The landscape here never gets boring. Even now, in the drabness of late fall, I look out and see textures and subtle colors and the light glinting off the water — and am very glad I settled here.
agorabum
Always get up for the sunrise on the Teton Range, if in the area.
munira
Gorgeous – love the lake before sunrise – that’s my time of day. I’m a basket case by evening.
JustRuss
Very nice. Thanks for getting up early so we don’t have to. Just kidding, I’m an early bird. My daughter and I were talking to my ex about this last night, she’s (my ex) never in bed before midnight, often 1:00 or 2:00. Just seems to be wired that way.
Cowgirl in the Sandi
I love the Readfield image – so lovely! Thanks for sharing.
sab
Personal clocks are weird, and changeable. I was a nightowl as a child. Tumbled down a couple of stairwells when my parents slept and I was awake and escaped my crib. I always stayed up late and read under the covers well into the early hours into my teens.
Now in my late sixties I go to bed at sundown and wake up at 2 or 3pm. Read for hours then sleep a bit and wake up early.
Actually I love geriatric hours. Sucks if you are still working but very freeing if you are not. Quite freeing.
sab
Is there any way we can buy these pictures, or are you just taunting us?
J R in WV
Great photos. I grew up a night owl, father worked nights as managing editor of a morning paper, so of course mom tried to stay up to greet him when he got home. Always love to read until late at night.
Then today I got an appointment for an MRI at 6:30 AM in a couple of weeks — tragic! I’ll have to leave the house before 5:30 to make it…
ETA: Great photos, all of them! Thanks for sharing!!
JanieM
@sab: No one has ever asked before, but I’ll look into it and get back to you. Thanks for asking.
Tehanu
Lovely pix again. I especially like the Mt. Vernon pic with the trees reflected in the still water.