Southport Maine June 2016

All right, this makes two in a row...I'm rolling now. Last month I said I would have some pics of the park and here they are. As I have said, we are on Southport Island by the town of Southport and about six miles from Booth Bay Harbor. Being on a island it only makes sense that we have camping on the water and we do as you can see by the picture below. We have six sites down by the water and they are always full. People are already making reservations for them for next year.

We have several more RV sites up in the trees and also some tent sites.  This is a small park and it does present some challenges when parking some of the bigger rigs but it's very doable. 

This is my office, no not really.. this is the bath house. Not nearly as nice as the office that Holly works in. The picture above is one of the RV sites and the one below is an area where we have two of the tent sites. Now that schools are out and the weather is turning nice we are pretty much full every night. There is only one other RV park in the area and that is about 6 miles north of Booth Bay Harbor which is the big draw in the area.

This is our site, we are away from the main camp ground and I think that's to keep me from scaring the little kids. Holly has her bird feeders and flowers out and I have my rocking chair. What more could a guy ask for.

This is Holly's office...not very big. If you get three people in there all at once you have to get permission to turn around so everyone can prepare for it in advance. The smaller building on the left is where we keep the supplies for cooking lobsters (I guess I should say lobstah like they do here)  so I guess you could say that is my office. I'm getting the hang of the cooking thing.  I had 19 to do last week Thursday and everyone said I did a good job and that they tasted great.

This is the pier down by the beach with a ramp that goes down to a floating dock. This picture was taken about half way between low and high tide. Below is the entrance to the upper camp ground. I think the old salt sitting there is a Walmart greeter on his days off. Every once in a while Brutus tries to attack him...not sure what sets him off when he does, but it makes us smile.

We drove to the town of Belfast (no, not Ireland). Turns out the river walk goes right thru a boat yard and as you can see, they work on some pretty big and fancy yachts. The picture below is of a big tug boat. I know it's big because that is a full size Ford pickup parked under it.

I said last month I would find out what is going on in Portland with a stretch of fence covered with locks. Here is a closer picture of this. These are "love locks". You and the love of your life take a lock, write something on it to profess your unending love, lock it on the fence and throw the key in the water and you two shall never part. Unless it is a combination lock, that might be a little problem. Isn't that sweet? I haven't found a lock big enough to profess my love for Holly, but I'm looking!

This is the lighthouse at the head of the bay to Portland Maine. Very nice grounds and it's in a park right on the ocean. As normal for us, we arrived after it was closed so we will be going back to this one. I took a picture standing at the base of the light tower because I could and I thought it turned out nice. It gives you an idea of how tall some of these are.

Our friends Bill and Penny, who we worked with in Texas,  just  showed up one day ( we knew they were coming) and stayed for a visit. They had been touring in the New England area and we were able to spend some time together and show them around some.

We drove up to ______________________ (read the sign on the left, saves me typing it all out) and took the scenic drive thru the park twice. Wanted to be sure we didn't miss anything. Turns out it was a little farther then we first thought. My GPS said 87 miles, turns out it was 120 miles one way. Add the 27 miles for the loop thru the park (remember we did it twice) and it was a long day. The dogs loved it, the driver not so much. It's a beautiful area though, so it really was well worth it.

This is Bill, Penny and Bear going down to see the "thunder hole" shown below. When the tide is coming in and the waves are just right it will sound like thunder rolling in. Pay attention to the two words above "just right".  That day things were not "just right".

We all went up to Pemiquid Point and toured the lighthouse and watched the waves rolling in. The light tower was open so we were able to climb up there and look out over the ocean.

We had a great visit and it was nice to show them a little bit of Maine. Here they are getting ready to go and continue their travels. Like you, they are back home wishing they could spend some more time in Maine but don't worry, stop back next month and you can go with us as we explore some more of this beautiful state. See you then.

Southport Maine May 2016

I'm back....Took a vacation from the blog but now I'm ready to rock and roll. We left Arizona on April 1st and made a couple of stops on the way home. We are now in Southport Maine. We are on Southport Island and about 5 miles from Booth Bay Harbor which is a quaint fishing village turned tourist town. We are in a small 40 site mom and pop campground which is what we like. We work with two other couples and the owners. We arrived on May 1st and spent the first two weeks  getting ready to open on the 15th of May but are starting to settle into a routine and going out and exploring. 

The weather here has been all over the place. One day of sunshine and three days of clouds and/or rain. I have only taken a couple of pictures of the park so far but I'll have some more next month. The big industry here is fishing and tourism and as you can tell by this picture, lobsters are a big part of it. Any place you go by the bays you can see hundreds of buoys out in the water. The fresh sea food and clam chowder have been great.

We went to the Maine Maritime Museum in the town of Bath. They have a beautiful building with some great displays. They cover everything from sailing ships and steamships up to the modern ships of today. It's built on the grounds of an old shipyard and they have restored some of the original buildings. They have a program where school kids come in every week and they work together to build a skiff. We had a chance to talk to one of the people that help them and see one of the boats they are working on. There are displays throughout the grounds and you can wander around on your own and take time to enjoy it all.  

There are many great ship models throughout the museum and I loved all of the sailing ship models. The old sailing ships have always fascinated me. The shipyard that the museum is on built the largest six masted sailing vessel ever built. It was used to haul coal up and down the east coast. They had a mock up of an old tug boat pilot house that was fun to stand in and look out and think about what it must of been like to be a tug boat captain in the days of steam.

There is a pirate ship for the kids to play on and we found this gentleman out by the carpenter shop painting Mr. and Ms. Pirate for the pirate ship. As it turned out, he also carved them. It must be wonderful to have the talents some of these people have. I have a horrible time carving the Thanksgiving turkey.

They have a building just for the lobster industry. They have displays that show the evolution of the lobster traps and boats and the packaging and canning of the lobster. They even have videos that show you how to cook and eat lobster which was a very good thing as how one of my jobs at the camp ground is cooking lobster.  We sell live lobsters to the guest and cook them if they like.

Here I am down by the river with the dry dock in the back ground for the Bath Iron Works. They build and repair many ships for the Navy here. They just finished the Navy's newest ship, the U.S.S. Zumwalt and just finished sea trials. It's still here and sure doesn't look anything like any navel ship I have ever seen.

Holly is feeding the birds again but we have more chipmunks and squirrels in it than birds I think. I didn't know they could climb right up a metal shepherds hook but I've watched them do it over and over and over.

If you haven't been following our travels since the beginning or haven't seen our first two posts, I'll tell you that we love lighthouses. Maine has a lot of lighthouses but a lot of them are on islands.  We have been out geocaching and searching out lighthouses. This one is Cuckolds Light and is located right off the end of Southport Island where we are.

On the island right next to it is this house. This house belonged to Margaret Hamilton. You most likely know her better as the wicked witch of the west from the Wizard of Oz.

This is Rockland Breakwater Light. We had to walk out 7/8 of a mile over large granite blocks to get to it. It has been restored and is open to the public. Too bad that we found out that it is open on Saturday and Sundays and we were there on MONDAY.  Well it was a nice day and we needed a walk of two miles by the time we walked from the parking lot and back.

We drove to Portland and wandered around the waterfront and had lunch on the bay. This is a picture of a section of about 30 feet of chain link fence that is covered with locks. All kinds, styles and sizes of locks. I don't know the story behind this but I think that the next trip down I'm going to find out what it is all about.

When we were in Portland we found two more lights. The top one is Portland Breakwater Light known as "bug light". the other one is Spring Point Ledge Light.

Well that's it for now. There will be more to come and more lighthouses and other cool things. Happy to be back and I'll leave a light on till next month. See you then.

Gold Canyon Arizona December 2015

Here is the view from the top of Silly Mountain (that's really the name). We have taken up geocaching.  That is where you use a GPS to find hidden caches. There are three of them on Silly Mountain and we have found two so far. It's a great way to get exercise and enjoy the great out- doors and there are caches hidden by people all over the world...that's right, the world.  That's me resting on the sign pointing to the Huff and Puff trail which is the right name as far as I'm concerned. So far we have found ten caches in the area. There are some in our group that have two and three thousand.

The resort put on a Christmas party for the work campers. There was food and dancing, some great entertainment and a gift exchange. We all had a great time and as you can see, there are several work campers here. This is just half of them. it takes a lot of us to keep all of the residents here happy, We do every thing from setting tables and chairs, to the kitchen staff, the decor department, the deli, the on-site post office and of course my favorite, the softball concession stand.

This is Debra, she is the activity director and is also my boss. She is at the resort all the time. She attends all of the special events and tries to keep things running smoothly. You have to remember this is a resort and there is so much going on. If you come here and say you are bored then you're not trying. There is everything from line dancing to poker night, quilting to card bingo, lapidary (that's rock polishing) to geocaching, golf leagues and softball teams and that is just a small part of what is going on,

We went into Phoenix and visited the Arizona Museum of Natural History. They have everything from dinosaurs to stage coaches. They cover the history of the early natives to the present. We really enjoyed the visit. They had a lot of activities for kids so you know I was entertained the whole time.    

They also covered all different kinds of animals, snakes and insects. This is an Javelina; most people think it is a member of the pig family, but we were told it's really a rodent.  We can personally tell you that they get to be very big. We saw one when we were out walking the dogs one night. They roam the  park at night eating peoples flowers. We also have coyotes and a bobcat in the park. Holly has seen the bobcat on one of her morning walks and we hear the coyotes at night.

Holly was getting hungry about the time we were going to leave so she sent me out back to pan for some gold so I could take her some place nice. As you can see from what's in my pan we ended up at McDonald's.

This is John and Barb. They are from Oregon and in their first year of work camping. John and I work together in the softball concession stand. The other couple is Dana and Judy and they're from Missouri. They work in tables and chairs and are also in their first year of work camping and are our neighbors in the park. We spend a lot of time together. We go to movies and lunch or dinner and we all play a lot of bumbee ball together.

As it turns out Dana was an engineer for the BNSF railroad.  It seems that every place we have been we find at least one couple that we really enjoy doing things with and this year is no exception.

We went on a road trip with Brutus and Ruby to Prescott Arizona. It was about two hours north of us. Turns out it's up in the mountains and they had snow on the ground so if we need a snow fix, we know where to find it.

Prescott is a nice little town. We walked around the courthouse square with Brutus and Ruby. There are several little shops and restaurants, and a lot of people walking their dogs, or just spending time with their families. We stayed until all of the lights came on and then took another walk around. There were many trees and they were all wrapped with lights. The court house was also nicely decorated.

After we left Prescott we drove by Prescott Valley and we had just seen on one of the morning news shows that they had a great light display. There was a park where you drive through and there were light displays all around. There were tunnels over the road in a couple different places and some of the displays were animated.

They had a patriotic display for our service men and women.

They even had a special one for our Air Force, Oh wait that's Snoopy on his dog house.

I was so inspired by the decorations I went and decorated the motor home. Not quite the same but better then nothing.

This is bumbee ball. It is played on a tennis court with four to five people on a side. We have played with as few as three on a side but that is a lot of work, We use a large foam ball that is a foam practice tennis ball, and tennis rackets. The best way I can explain it is that it is a cross between tennis and volley ball. I have been accused by Holly of playing seven days a week but the most I've played six days a week. We have played twice in one day. I LOVE this game!

Here is Holly going for the kill. You can see the ball just leaving her racket. The good thing is if you get hit by a line drive it won't leave a mark but it will sting ( just ask Holly).

This is the die hard group - Me, Holly, Judy, Dana, Kelly, John and Barb. There is also Barry but I think this was taken on poker night so Barry was absent. This picture was taken in December.  We hope you all had a great Christmas and that your New Year started out good. That's it for now. We hope to visit with you all next month. I think I'll go out and raise a little racket now. Bye!