Wednesday Photos

We are into the summer travel and hiking season, and that means less time to read and review books. But it means more photos to share! We recently spent a week in Maine, so here are a few highlights.

Among other things (like visiting colleges with our about-to-be-Senior), we spent three days camping at Flagstaff lake, a large man-made lake about 25 miles from the border with Quebec.

This gave us a chance to get up very, very early and see the sunrise (do you know how early the sun rises in Maine a few days after the summer solstice??). Given how warm the days were, it was something of a surprise to find it was only 43 degrees when we crawled out at 4:45 a.m.

Mist rising on the water before the sun hits.

We thought this pond looked like moose habitat, but the moose didn't cooperate.

We went on to climb peaks in the Bigelow Range, some of the highest in Maine (not very high by western standards, but the trails start low and climb rather directly).

This was the sucker part, the easy walk through a birch forest.

This was the stairs part. Later, we realized that this was the trail being NICE. Other places were at least as steep and just a pile of rocks.

Cool to hit the Appalachian Trial, though--and just a week before, we'd hiked a little piece of the Pacific Crest Trail!

We hit the ridge near the West Peak, and went back down about .3 miles past Horns Pond.

It was a grunt to get there, but the view was phenomenal. The lake is spread out below, lots of inlets and island for good paddling.

After all that hiking, sitting on the dock watching the sunset was about right.

Next day, hiking wasn't looking so good, so we rented some boats. Our local friends had their own, and looked pretty competent. (I had to use my husband's photos, as we decided to risk only one camera on the water).

Perfectly calm morning.

Our boys, on the other hand, had only once before been in such boats. They were...entertaining.

Not sure if they didn't know about keeping the paddles in unison, or if they couldn't pull it off!

A good workout deserves a good treat, and a nearby town was celebrating "Family Fun Day" with things like ice cream for sale.

The spouse and I had blueberry, of course.

Before and after the lake adventure, we did a couple of daytrips to the coast.

Rockport

You know you're in a small town when the checkout stand at the local bookstore looks like this. No one around, total honor system. We left our payment in an envelope per instructions.

There was even an IOU option!

I greatly fear all the travel was too much for my boys!

This was the next day after arrival--and we took a red-eye from the west coast. They got up before that cloud started dumping rain on them.

Hope you enjoyed the little trip to Maine!

©Rebecca M. Douglass, 2016
As always, please ask permission to use any photos or text. Link-backs appreciated!

Summer reading sale--The Ninja Librarian and Return to Skunk Corners--just 99 cents!

And yes, work is underway, slowly, on Book 3, The Problem of Peggy