John & Anne Wiley

2009/10/13

My Fair Lady

Filed under: Big Adventure,Has Photos,Nature — John @ 19:03

The rain in Maine falls mainly on the plane, because we’re cozied up in our hotel preparing to enjoy our second night in the same place since leaving San Diego. Delicious rain! Might feel different when we’re out walking to town in it in a few minutes, but right now it evokes feelings of closeness and memories of our years in the pacific northwest.

Here’s the view from our balcony just now at 3pm.

There’s a pine tree just out of view to the left that’s a few feet from the (briefly open) door on our balcony, and I’ve been trying to catch a photo of the little birds that flit around in it occasionally. They’re a bit larger than house finches, and seem to have pale blue bellies.
Hopefully we’ll get some snaps in town, and I haven’t yet looked through the ones we caught after dark last night. We saw a doe with two fawns on the road last night, and the silence of their presence added to the magic.
Sure feels good to rest, though if the weather were clear we’d be thrilling at all the new wonders of this journey. As our friend Willa says, happiness is an inside job. 🙂

NE to ME

Filed under: Aviation,Big Adventure,Flying,Has Photos,Nature — John @ 03:25
Taking off from Bennington, VT we passed over the famous spire. Those tiny dots near the yellow trees are people walking. This thing is tall!

After making the short hop to Keene, NH we stopped to touch another state, to top off our fuel for the flight to Maine, and to have a great lunch at a place near the bottom of this photo.

I liked how the timeless glacier-carved stone contrasted with the fleeting fall colors as we detoured near Mt. Washington before heading due east to Bar Harbor for the night.

Maine has a zillion lakes, and about halfway along our leg east I spotted an airport with a road that connects to this seaplane landing. Those are floats lined up at the top and down the right side. My current theory is that planes land on the lake and moor at this hangar, the floats are removed for winter storage, the planes taxi or are towed to the airport, and they fly home after a summer of lake hopping. Spring would then see a reverse of this migration.

Like all the photos in this blog post, these are pretty lame compared with what we experienced. This one of Bar Harbor, ME tops that list. You’ll find different, larger and better pix by clicking the Photos link at the top-right of our main blog page. Meanwhile, our hotel tonight is just beyond the ferry terminal at the top. There are some stunning mansions along the shore, Acadia National Park with hilltop lakes, and more attractions here than I have time to write or you to read.


Weather is predicted to be marginal for flying tomorrow and better Wednesday, so our location tomorrow is uncertain. It is clear though, that we are at or very near the furthest northeast point of our journey. This leg rightly began in San Diego very near the southwestern most point in the contiguous United States, so until we fly from Blaine to the tip of FL this may be our longest transcontinental flight. Soon we start hopping down the east coast, lingering and zigging around new england until we head for FL. Seems all too soon that we’ll cross the south and our Big Adventure will end back in Santa Barbara!

Meanwhile, good night from ME to you.

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