Weathered Maine Barn

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The Haunted House

In a remote corner of Maine sits an old derelict house.  Now I can’t say for sure that it’s haunted, but as I was taking photos I thought I saw faces and movement behind the windows and through the cracks.


I didn’t go too close……

…..but left whoever or whatever dwells there in peace.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN 

Northern Maine Barn

This is another drive-by shooting of an old barn taken in northern Maine.

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Waterfront Scenes

We spent some time at the waterfront around Portland, Maine, today.

Then we headed south along the coast, planning on getting a couple of hours driving time in before we stopped for the night.

As we traveled down US 1 the motels seemed to disappear when we were ready to stop.  Then began a saga of trying to find our way following signs that were unclear, or trying to find signs that must have been removed by gremlins.  Ah, but adventure comes in many guises, and ours tonight was traveling on the freeways and along narrow dark roads on the outskirts of Boston, seeking to find a place to spend the night.  (Not all adventures are fun!)  Success at last, we found a spot in Marlborough, Mass, much closer to our next planned destination than we thought we would be.  Road signs have been a bit of a problem for us on this trip--they seem to be poorly placed or nonexistent, causing much confusion for us.  Is it an East Coast thing, or have we become too used to the wilds of Alaska, or, heaven forbid, just feeling the effects of getting older......

Logging in Maine

Logging is one of the big industries in northern Maine.  You see evidence of it all around.  The white pine that is abundant in Maine has been logged for many years.

While we were in Ashland we visited the Ashland Logging Museum which has many artifacts from the early logging days in the area.  The museum was established by members of the community who wanted to preserve their heritage.  They donated numerous items to the collection that tell the story of logging in northern Maine.

The collection includes handsaws, power saws, peaveys, axes, wedges, and other items used to bring the lumber out of the woods.  A replica of a log landing shows a man on top measuring the board feet of lumber and the mechanism used to bring the logs down to the water.  Horses were an important part of the logging process in the early years.

I found the model especially interesting because I can remember my dad having a landing on our property in Oregon in the early 50s and he used horses to bring the logs out of the woods.  In the late 30s he worked in a logging camp on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington, and logged in Oregon and along the coast in northern California.  He had scale sheets much like the one below, and they were always kept in a cookie jar--it never held cookies.  Today that Shawnee Winnie Pig cookie jar is a collectible and it is one of my treasured keepsakes.  I wish I still had some of Dad's old scale sheets to keep inside.

Life was not easy in the logging camps.  The Ashland Museum has recreated a bunk and cook house as they were typically built.

One end served as the bunkhouse.....

....and the other end as the cook house.  Note the big cast iron pots in the lower left hand corner.  Bean-hole beans were cooked in them and the beans were a staple in the camps.  To make them you dig a big hole three feet deep and line it with rocks.  Build a fire in the hole and let it burn down to large embers and ash.  Fill your pot with dry beans, salt pork or bacon, onions, molasses, and brown sugar, and cover with water.  Put the lid on the pot and lower it in the hole and cover with a wet burlap sack.  Shovel embers and ashes on top and cover with dirt.  Wait about 16 hours and then dig out your beans.  I don't believe I'll be trying the recipe anytime soon, but I can imagine they were pretty tasty.

There is also a blacksmith's building with all of the equipment that would be needed to take care of the horses and harnesses.

There are two sheds with some of the old equipment.  The most notable is the Lombard steam log hauler.  It was invented by Alvin Orlando Lombard in Waterville, Maine, and was the first practical tracked crawler and had skis in the front for steering.  It ran on coal or wood and could reach a top speed of 4.5 mph.  There were 83 built between 1901 and 1917.  The could pull eight sleds at a time, carrying 40,000 to 100,000 board feet of logs.  They required a crew of four, an engineer, fireman, striker, and steersman.  The steersman was the highest paid man on the job, and his position was the most dangerous in the exposed position on the front of the machine.  He had to contend with freezing weather, sparks, and the possibility of the Lombard jackknifing if the sleds moved faster than the engine causing an inevitable crash into the trees.

There is much more to see at the museum, and it provides a fascinating look back at early logging in Maine.

Going to Camp

The last few days we spent in Ashland, Maine, a small town in Aroostook County.  We were staying with a friend without Internet access, but I continued to take photos.  We watched some Canada Geese land on a small lake near Presque Isle.  There were several camps around the lake.  It looks like a lovely place to while away some warm summer days, but it was rainy and a bit chilly when we were there.

We visited our friend's camp a few miles from Ashland.  The road was a bit iffy in some places, as you can see in the photo below where a beaver dam had flooded the road.  They've had lots of rain this summer, so there were many sections of the road covered with water.

However, once we got there, we spent a pleasant few hours and had a picnic lunch.

The pond was beautiful, and again a lovely place to while away a warm summer day.

Having a camp gives you a place to get away from it all and enjoy the outdoors.....

.....after, of course, you stock the woodpile, cook your dinner on a wood stove, and pump your water with an old hand pump.    

In northern Maine most of the leaves are on the ground.....

.....but some still cling to the trees.

And of course the fir trees are still green and full of cones.

We drove around the countryside and saw many lovely old barns and houses.  We visited the Ashland Logging Museum, which contains many items donated by local residents.  It provides a fascinating look at the early days of logging in Maine.  I'll do a post on it later.  This morning was rainy and a good day for traveling south through the beautiful Maine countryside.  

Shortly before we reached Portland the sun came out.  We're spending at least tonight here, and will see what tomorrow brings--hopefully some sunshine!

Losing Its Shingles

On the way north towards Presque Isle, Maine, I took these drive-by shots of this interesting old barn.  It looks like it was shingled, either partially or all, to keep out the weather, but over the years it's lost a shingle or two or a hundred....

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Fort Point Lighthouse

This morning we woke up to sunshine.  It was very windy all day, but a huge improvement over the rain we've had for the last couple of days.  We didn't travel very far, only from Rockland to Ellsworth up the coast highway.  We did visit the Maine Lighthouse Museum, Owls Head Transportation Museum, and two lighthouses, Owls Head and Fort Point.  I'll come back to the others and concentrate on the Fort Point Lighthouse today.

It was established in 1836 at Stockton Springs at the west side of the mouth of the Penobscot River to aid ships bound for Bangor hauling lumber and potatoes.  In 1857 the present tower and keeper's house replaces the original granite structure.  The light station's fixed white light, a fourth-order Fresnel lens with a 250-watt halogen bulb, is 88 feet above sea level and visible for more than 10 miles.

The lighthouse was tended by civilian keepers employed by the U.S. Lighthouse Establishment for more than 120 years, and the Coast Guard assumed operational duties in 1957.

The keeper's house is still in use, and in 1890 a barn and bell tower were added.  The barn is the building to the left in the photo below.

The pyramidal bell tower is one of the few left in New England, and the bell has been replaced by a foghorn, but the bell still hangs beside the tower.

In 1897 an oil house was built.

Because of its beautiful and accessible location, Fort Point Light was a sought after station for keepers, and only four served from the 1880s to the 1930s.

Interestingly, the square tower is round on in the inside with a circular iron staircase.  We didn't get to go inside, but the story goes that the plans called for a square tower.  The carpenters had an old circular staircase, so they made the inside round to match the staircase and the outside square in accordance with the plans.

Looking out at the water you see a beautiful view.  Unfortunately it was extremely windy so we didn't linger long.

Maine in the Rain

We've been meandering slowly up the coast of Maine on Highway 1.  It rained all day yesterday, and it rained all day today.  The rain makes taking photos as you drive down the road just a wee bit harder.  The side windows are covered with raindrops and no rolling down the window for the shot unless you want to be very wet.  It's not always easy to time the click of the shutter to coincide with when the windshield wipers are in the down position.  If you're very lucky you might find a place to stop for photos during a lull in the rain.  Today that happened once.

We would have ate lunch on the deck if the sun would have been shining, but today they weren't serving there.

So, when you're traveling on a rainy day you look for things to do that let you be indoors.  We stopped at L.L. Bean in Freeport for a little shopping.

We went to the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath.

Some things at the museum required a walk outdoors, like the Grand Banks schooner Sherman Zwicker.  She was built in 1942 in Nova Scotia and was powered by a large marine diesel engine.  She made her last trip to the Banks in the early sixties.

There were many more exhibits inside covering all aspects of life on the sea and the seashore.

I'll cover some of the exhibits from the museum in more detail later.  Tonight we are in Rockford and it's still raining heavily. The view below is from our hotel window.

The weather forecast says partly sunny tomorrow.  I wonder.....