Maine

Even though Otisfield and the Oxford Hills region of Maine is pretty far isolated from everything, it is only about a forty minute drive or so to the nearest big box shopping area. Megan and I couldn't miss out on the after Thanksgiving shopping bonanza. I picked up a new four gigabyte compact flash card from Staples, and after which, we headed over to Kohl's for some more bounty. We struck out there however, and they didn't have what we were looking for. Oh Well. For lunch, we headed down to Portland, Maine's largest city, to meet up with her friend Katrina and her husband Nick. We ate at a great little brew pub, I think it was called The Great Lost Bear, or something similar I had a haddock open faced sandwhich. Maine is fantastic for getting fresh seafood. Haddock, clams, native shrimp, mussells, its all here. As a seafood lover, I'm in heaven.

Megan and her friend Katrina at Portland's Great Lost Bear

Megan and I wanted to explore the city of Portland a bit, so we headed down to the old port area. What a cool place. Definitely the highlight of the trip so far. We can see why our friends Brian and Rita raved about it when they came up to Maine for our wedding about a year ago. We'd never been down to the area, but there are plenty of old dockside warehouses that have been converted into offices and chic storefronts and restaurants.

Typical historical brick building in downtown Portland.

Especially cool was the U.S. Customs house, whose gray exterior stuck out from all the other brick and granite buildings. The old brick armory, which looked like a medieval castle, had been turned into a posh Regency hotel. All in all, a great little place to shop, eat, and drink. The brick sidewalks and cobblestone streets were packed. After shopping, we drove around the seaside perimeter of the city, taking a few pictures of low tide along the way. Portland is a fantastic place to visit at any time of year. From Columbus, you can hop aboard a Skybus flight to Portsmouth New Hampshire, rent a car, and be in Portland in about an hour.

Too cold for whale watching today! It was only twenty degrees or so.

As far as seafood goes, lobster is king throughout coastal Maine.

Although we didn't get much snow this trip, there were constant reminders of how much snow can fall in this region, like this gigantic plow just sitting and waiting in a parking lot.

After our downtown shopping adventure was over, we drove around the perimeter of the peninsula. This shot is to the northwest and looks out across Casco Bay.

A full moon was rising and followed us on our way up to the Oxford Hills.

Megan at the wheel of our rental Ford Focus, courtesy of Budget rental cars. We didn't get the free upgrade this time!

On the way back home, I decided to do some experimental photography since Megan was driving and I was fairly bored. Some of the results:





And finally, we got home. There was just enough light to capture a few photos of the pond, and the moonlight lent itself perfectly to night time photography of Megan's parents log home in the woods. What a place to live!

What I like about this photo is that you can see a few bright stars at the top left portion of the photo. This image shows the very last bits of daylight at little pond. This photo was shot at 5:46 p.m., a good hour after sunset. Both of these night shots are thirty second exposures taken with the camera on a tripod.

Tom