Kennebunkport Fun

We drove to a town called Wells just south of Kennebunkport today. We were headed to Rachel Carson Wildlife Refuge but saw a sign for the Wells Estuarine Research Refuge. That sounded fun (secretly Mom had already researched about it). We checked out the visitors center and then wanted to go explore the old dairy farm. Mom wanted us to take a hike for a bit and burn off some energy.

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You can see my joyous attitude pouring from my body.

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A forced smile and Mom explaining that she promises the hike will be worth it.

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Well, it WAS worth it! We ended on a beautiful beach filled with rocks and tidal pools. These were smaller tidal pools so we didn’t find many larger critters.

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We found lots of sea weeds and kelp. We found thousands of snails and other swimming critters we couldn’t identify.

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Mom totally got a thumbs up for this one!

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Our shoes got wet but Mom got them all washed up and dried.

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What a fun time we had looking for critters and wondering about the marine life around us. I hope to explore more tidal pools on this trip.

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So the campground we are staying at offers fresh caught and steamed lobster at cost delivered to your campsite daily! Their prices were way better than any place Mom called. So of course we had to order a few. After we filled our bellies with fresh caught and steamed lobster at the campsite we headed into town. Mom was laughing hard at this sign.

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We wandered Dock Square and saw the tidal difference from when we drove past this same spot earlier today. Earlier there was no water just mud visible! The tides are starting to get higher as we go north. The sun also is an enemy as we travel east. Mom is used to getting up with the sun, now that is 4:55am! ugh!

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Our final pit stop of the night was Walker Point to see the vacation compound of the Bush family. The Bush family was in town for Memorial Day and there are still quite a few cars at the residence. What a lovely place to vacation for a president!

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Exploring the Notch

Today we headed out before the weekend crowds and drove the The Flume. This was a giant crevasse that was filled with volcanic matter that eventually wore away. The water continues to carve this flume.

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The air was cooler and the water was rushing over the rocks.

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This little place was called Avalanche Falls. I would not want to go over that!

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I wanted to know if there were real bears in the cave. Sadly, there were not!

 

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Mom was tuckered. Mom had a sore knee from hiking yesterday so took the short path back and we continued on.

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We crossed a covered bridge.

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Then entered the Wolf’s Den. It was a very tight, dark space. You could navigate through it. We were a bit apprehensive but eventually went through, TWICE!

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Climbing out.

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There was another exit but this one seemed better.

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We stopped at the grocery on the way back to camp and saw 1.5-2lb lobster for $7.99 a pound! We had to get a lobster each. They even steamed them for us. Emmerson tried lobster but didn’t like it yet. But hi willingly helped crack them open for us and pull out the yummy lobster meat.

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This is really roughing it!

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After lunch we went down to Echo Lake Beach and played int he water. It is spring fed and a lovely 52F year round!

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E and I braved the cold.

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We did get wet but it didn’t last long. We played a for a bit and then wanted to come back for warm showers and to thaw out.

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We had a great time in Franconia Notch State Park. We move on in the morning to Maine. We will be in Kennebunkport for a few days.

Mt. Washington and Hiking Cannon Mountain

Happy 41st birthday to Mom! We started our morning rather early to drive to Mount Washington. Mt. Washington is the highest elevation in New England. You drive up a 7 mile winding road to get to the top. The road is interesting because you pass through different climate zones. At one point, called Tree Line, trees stop growing. It is a cool thing to see the transition. We listed to an audio CD about the road both up and down the mountain.
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It was very foggy at the top. We were up in the clouds!

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You couldn’t even see the top of the stairs once we got out of the can in the parking lot.

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We climbed up the rocks to the official summit of the mountain at 6256 ft about sea level. It was very windy and cold.

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We headed inside for some warmth and a behind the scenes tour of the Mt. Washington Observatory. Since they have extreme weather on the mountain this is a great place for a 24 hour a day weather monitoring station.

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We learned how the equipment works and that these paper discs record the weather during a 24 hours period. There are computer backups but this is a great graphic of the weather. We got to see some discs from the extreme days with high winds.

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This is a very old barometer. We learned that the instruments have to be extreme as well. Their wind vane in called the torpedo and they have to keep it heated so ice doesn’t form on it.

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Our on the observation deck you can look up and see the highest pontoon the mountain where the equipment is located.

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We climbed the stairwells to the top. Sorry the sun was in my eyes.

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The cloud blew away just long enough to get a photo of some of the buildings up top. They have to be built so they don’t blow away. The highest recorded wind speed was 231 mph! a few weeks ago they recorded 109!

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We even got to climb the last ladder up to the torpedo and other instruments. Ice will form on the equipment and red railings and they have to beat it off with hammers!

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The TRUE highest pointing New England!

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After our tour we checked out the views and saw the Cog Railway coming up the mountain.

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What an amazing contraption. It has a giant gear that slots into a track and the engine pushed it up the mountain. This is the coal operated engine.

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This building is chained down to keep it safe. The original one blew away in the winds once. So now they chained the new one so that doesn’t happen again.

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Heading down. The trip down ins terrible on many cars. There are spots to pull over and allow your breaks to cool. Dad did a great job getting us down without issue.

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At the bottom we saw some of the old coaches that the horses would take up the mountain. People have used a lot of fun ways to get up the mountain over the year. Today was Alton Weagle Day and there were about 20 people hiking up the road with a “first” way to do it. One guy was dressed at the Grinch, another as a hotdog, one couple was dressed at Red Sox players tossing baseball the entire time! It was fun to see all the people making history.

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To continue with Mom’s birthday we headed to Cannon Mountain to take the tram up and hike down the 1.7 mile trail.

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We were well prepared with water and snacks for the 1.7 miles down. Someone told us the average person takes 2.5 hours to go down. We looked at them like they were nuts. Apparently they were not kidding! It started as a pretty hike in the trees. We followed the blue blazes and wandered forth.

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Dad played caboose and took lots of photos. See that road on the left, that is the goal!

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The rocks got bigger and bigger. We were hiking down the wash out!

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Still excited and having a blast.

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We came across lots of hidden ice patches that haven’t melted yet. The temps at the top were in the 60s and towards that ROAD were in the upper 80s.

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As we went lower all that ice was melting and running down the rocks. This made for a slippery time.

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Some of the down was steep and balance was key. Mom fell once. Dad fell once. I slipped several times and was saved by a tree branch and a tree from what I felt was certain death!

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Some areas you could avoid the rocks and have trees to hang on to.

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Others you had no choice but to sit on your feet and slide.

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We are half way down. That is Echo Lake we are camping in the paved lot to the left of the lake.

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It took 2.5 hours to get down as we were told it would. Mom asked an employee later about the milage because she saw a sign that said 2.1 miles versus 1.7. The lady said most people hike UP because it is an extremely tough hike down! OOPS!

 

 

 

Franconia Notch State Park in New Hampshire

We are staying at a 7 spot campground at Franconia Notch State Park. We set up camp and headed out to explore. We are loving all the huge mountains and the views.

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We made our way to the Cannon Mountain Tramway and bought passes for the tram and the flume. Fortunately we beat the crowds and had a nice calm spacious ride up in the tram.

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We stood by the front window and watched for bears. Apparently there are black bears that eat the dandelions in the ski runs.

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We saw a patch of snow!

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At the top we hiked the Rim Trail to the observation tower. The smell of balsam was amazing! Mom said she wanted to bottle it and take it home because it smelled like Christmas!

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Winded at the top because of the elevation.

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What amazing views of the mountains from up this high. I saw a sign on the way up that said you could hike down the mountain. I want to come back and do that!

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E and I fought all day and drove Mom and Dad nuts. Even for photos I was a pest to him by tickling him or bunny ears.

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Dad was at whits end!

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Mom considered running away and taking a tram down with everyones tickets!

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We made it safely back to the campground and played on the hill looking for fire flies. We only found one but it wasn’t blinking yet.

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Looking down from the hill onto out campsite. It was a nice use of space. The camping spaces are all the main parking lot for Echo Lake Beach. So when all the beach people left it was very quiet.

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They even had very fancy fire rings! It has the name Cannon Mountain RV park too! If you ever here it is a beautiful place to be. You can book the sites through Reserve America. Highly recommended to book early! Yankee magazine just picked this as the top freshwater spot in New England!

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Boondocking in Bennington, Vermont

After a long day of driving and hours ahead to our next major stop we opted to pull off for the night at a welcome center with a secure parking lot. Only a few other semis pulled in but were fairly quiet. We were even able to have pizza delivered to the motorhome!

We explored the welcome center and played the singing drums until Dad said ENOUGH!

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What a beautiful place to sleep!

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