good gravy

has it been a week?!  Well… the only really interesting thing (and it’s frankly not all that interesting except perhaps to a few) was my weekend.  I finally made it to Acadia National Park.  This trip was only 25 years in the making…  So here’s kinda how the weekend went.  I promise to upload photos later.  [Side note:  Can you believe after 25 years I FORGOT MY CAMERA?!]  Two of my children brought theirs and were gracious enough to share.  Ugh. The pics below are from my phone.  It doesn’t help either that my camera’s been acting up lately.  I think I’ve about worn it out.  No question that I’ll need a new one for Italy.

So, the weekend…

Left from home for Maine 4:00 pm ish

Arrived at Cabela’s in Scarborough, Maine and wandered around a bit.  Had quite a bit of fun competing with the play rifle range in the back.  (I won. After 26 years I’ve still got it…)

Drove to local pizza place (1 hour wait) so we moved on in search of an iHop – dinner was a fun round of laughter

Drove to Super 8 in Lewiston Maine (yuck – this is not an indictment of all Super 8s but this is not one I’d recommend to anyone.  Ever. )

Woke up Saturday morning before 8 and hustled the gang down to the “Continental Breakfast” in hotel

Drove to Acadia and went to Cadillac Mountain – I loved it fog and all and can’t wait to build a house on top of the mountain,  the Jordan Pond Restaurant  where we had the popovers, but honestly I think mine are better.  The prices were pretty up there for what it was.  Oh and when they say “Tea” they literally mean a popover and a cup of tea;  Sand Beach where we ran into an old friend from work (it’s a small world); then      Thunder Hole where owing to the tide being out and the sea being relatively calm was more like Whispering Trickle and I got the biggest kick out of people looking down into the crevice rather than running like mad from the huge sprays blowing up between the rocks;     Bass Harbor light house. (I was thrilled to find out one of my dearest friends stayed here for a week when her father worked at the lighthouse.  How cool is that?!); and of course I kept my eye out for the carriage roads.  I particularly loved passing under the old bridges of the carriage roads;

Drove to Brunswick all excited to eat at Fat Boys only to discover they had closed a couple hours earlier.  So we gave in and went to Burger King and back to the Super 8 (ick).

Up a bit later than we’d planned we drove to Freeport and had lunch at Isabella’s Cafe and then checked out LL Bean;

Then we drove to Yarmouth to see Eartha at Delorme and I was so excited that it was rotating at maximum speed so we were able to take in the whole world, and it’s been a couple months so we also got to see North America.

Drove to Portland first to Cape Elizabeth and got as close as we could to Two Light Lighthouse, then over to see Portland Head Lighthouse (I’m so bummed that these are all now electronic), and of course in the bay, the  Midway Lighthouse and then we toured the museum.  Pretty cool stuff there.

It was Megan’s birthday, but we were running low on funds so we drove around Portland in search of food and finally end up at Cameron’s Lobster…  which the GPS orginally indicated was Pine Grove Cemetary next to Bowdoin College.

Then we drove home where I crawled into bed and went immediately to sleep.  My last thoughts were how differently the moments of each day were depending upon everyone’s mood.  I’ll have to learn to let Alan drive when he’s behind the wheel.

Somehow I made it out of bed and into the office today.  This was purely the grace of God, as I only discovered after I got here that I am nearly out of vacation days.  Woe is me.  Well at least I can still take off Christmas week!