August 21, 2013 - Part 1

 Tonight was the full moon.  We were anxiously awaiting it, and were not disappointed.  

August 19, 2013

Some friends of ours from Rockland came for a visit today.  I've been wanting to make these rainbow Jello Pinwheels for a while, and this was a good time to try them out.  They were super easy and super quick, and super pretty.

Jed was the one who spotted this gorgeous moon outside this evening.  I knew the full moon was going to be this week, but I didn't expect it to be this beautiful 2 nights before.

I think the reflection in the water was even prettier than the real thing.

August 17, 2013

Today was really pleasant.  I started it by running errands - 8 of them! - and getting back home before Tracy and Jed were even really awake.  :)  I love Saturday morning errands.  One of my stops was at a nursery to get flowers to replace the ones I planted at the beginning of summer...they didn't make it, unfortunately.  No one has ever accused me of having a green thumb.

After lunch Tracy took Jed to a bluegrass festival in nearby Palermo.  I'm not a huge fan of bluegrass, but I am a huge fan of peace and quiet and I took advantage of the rare opportunity to enjoy it at home alone. 

Jed had great fun with this game - rubber ducky races using old-fashioned water pumps.

Of course, this was Jed's favorite activity - ice-cream eating. :)

Apparently bobbing for apples was on the schedule for today's games and Jed was disappointed to find that it wasn't happening at the festival after all, so we picked some apples and set up our own bobbing station.  I was the first to get an apple but thankfully there is no photographic evidence of that feat.  haha

See why I'm thankful?!

August 15, 2913 - Part 2

Tracy took the little camera with him to the stream where he and Jed went fishing.  We discovered the stream, at the southeastern-most point of the lake, a couple of weekends before and had a great time exploring the 1-1/2 mile waterway that leads to a man-made dam just shy of Weeks Mills Road.

I love how the water is blue near the mouth of the lake, but as you can see in the following pictures, it mutes into something more greenish as the light changes in the stream, which is rather narrow and surrounded by growth.

My favorite part of this stream was the beaver dam we found, which at one time had stretched across the stream but had been washed away (or torn down) on either side, leaving large piles of sticks on either side of the stream as well as in the middle.  I barely got over it on the way back, and was hoping my activity around the dam, using my paddle to push off, would arouse the beavers but no such luck.  We didn't take a camera with us that day, and Tracy didn't get far enough down the stream during this fishing trip to get a pic of the beaver dam.  I suppose that's another trip we'll have to make.

On the way home at twilight.

August 15, 2013 - Part 1

Tracy came home from work today hankering to go fishing, so he and Jed hopped in the kayaks and headed down to a stream off our pond/lake (it's called a pond but it's the size of a small lake) that we had found the weekend before. 

Jed likes it when I don't go kayaking with him and his dad, because then he gets a kayak to himself.  :)  He's getting quite adept at paddling.
 

August 12, 2013

Boy, does it make my heart sing to see my son reading for pleasure.

The best part of summer!

August 7, 2014 - Part 7

We stopped to take a few more pics on the way home....this restaurant has been closed, so we won't get the chance to enjoy Jed's cooking till he is a little more accustomed to the inner workings of a kitchen.  :)

We've passed Lake St George State Park numerous times and never knew what was inside the park, so we stopped and looked around a few minutes, and were sorry we had never been before...it's beautiful!  There is a small fee and we were on a 5 minute fee-free take-a-look-around time limit, so I didn't take time for pictures until I saw these little dragonflies flitting about.  We went back to the park a couple of weeks later with some friends from the area, but I didn't take a single picture...too busy enjoying myself.  I suppose that means we'll have to go back.  :)

Our last stop of the day was in China, just a few miles from home, where this sign always makes me laugh out loud.  Early Maine settlers weren't very creative in naming their towns!

August 7, 2013 - Part 6

There is a spot on Route 3 near Searsmont where you catch your first glimpse of the ocean.  It always makes me catch my breath a bit to see it, so today on the way home I turned the car around at that spot and took some pictures.

I was tickled to see this message to bicyclists at the spot...apparently I'm not the only one who appreciates it's proximity to the coast.  :)

August 7, 2013 - Part 5

 Exterior shots of the fort and grounds.

August 7, 2013 - Part 4

This post highlights some of the views from the windows and doorways of the fort.  

This is a view of the Penobscot River and the steep side of the fort, reinforced with bricks.

This relatively new bridge over the Penobscot Narrows has an observatory at the top of one of these high beams, which is the tallest such observatory in the world.

August 7, 2013 - Part 3

 The interior of the fort was fantastic - full of twists and turns and dark tunnels.

 This is one of a dozen underground food storage areas.

 Jed particularly enjoyed the jail cells.  :)

I had to use the flash on this shot because it was too dark without it, but I hated to do so - 

it was deliciously dark and creepy in real life.

August 7, 2013 - Part 2

After the train ride, we went to Fort Knox in Prospect, named for Major General Henry Knox, America's first Secretary of War, who was born in Boston but retired to Thomaston, Maine in 1796.  Maine's Fort Knox predates the more famous one in Kentucky.

The Penobscot River, which the fort was built to protect.  The British had a bad habit of using this waterway to penetrate the interior of Maine.

Fort Know is another pentagon-shaped citadel like the one we visited in Quebec earlier this summer.  This picture shows the walls surrounding the interior court, while the picture below shows the grass on the roof of the exterior walls.