A New Leader

When you think of New England a lot of things come to mind. History. Lighthouses. Beautiful homes. Rocky coastline. Quaint towns. Maine has all of this. Maine is classic New England. Maine quickly made it's way to the leader position of favorite places. 

We crossed the state line and stopped to take our picture with the sign. It smelled like a pine scented Yankee Candle outside. Like a scratch and sniff Christmas tree farm. We started falling in love here. 

We treked across the state to begin our journey of Maine in Bar Harbor. Acadia National Park. Enter rocky cliffs along the shore. We did some hiking and exploring throughout the park. We put our toes in the chilly Atlantic. We learned about peregrine falcons. They are being reintroduced to the area and the babies were playing along the cliffs. They are the fastest animal and reach speeds of up to 200 miles per hour during their dive. (We've banked a wealth of random information on this trip). We meandered the streets of Bar Harbor. We continued falling in love. 

We then journeyed down the coast. Highway 1. A very different Highway 1 than that of the west. This one is great town after great town. Old New England homes. Towns established in the 1700s. History, character, and charm. Lighthouses. Sailboats (some that look like Jack Black could be aboard!). Still falling in love. 

Maine also brings blueberries and lobster. They have blueberry everything in Maine, including soda and beer. Naturally we tried both. We could really be official taste testers! 

Mindi doesn't really care for seafood. She tried my lobster in Alaska and it ended up in her napkin instead of her stomach.  But she's a good sport and we went to a lobster pound for dinner. She wanted to give fresh Maine lobster a try. She thought it might be different. She went for it and ordered a lobster roll. The first bite look on her face told me it wasn't different. She ate more roll than lobster. I gave her my coleslaw, corn on the cob, and some blueberry cake so she wouldn't be hungry! All of this came with the little guy I had for dinner. The little guy was top notch. Fresh and fiesty going into his boiling bag.  I've had lobster tail many times. This was my first whole lobster experience. I wasn't entirely sure where to start and what to do with his body. A kind middle school aged boy at the table next to us provided assistance. He told me to eat the green stuff inside. His mom was eating the green stuff inside. It's great they said. I'll eat almost anything. I will never again eat the green stuff inside. 

We are cheating on Tahoe. We now have a love affair with Maine.