The Thin Blue Ride - Part 3 Day 15 - Ogunquit, ME

Monday, September 23rd, 2019

Drive Report: None - we took the scoot down to Ogunquit today - lots of interesting stuff there.  See below.

We really only had a couple of things on the agenda today.  First, a boat tour to the Nubble Lighthouse.  Said ride departing from Perkins Cove in Ogunquit.  Second, a walk on The Marginal Way - it’s basically a pedestrian path along the coast.  There was some other fun mixed in there as well, but no point giving away the key to the city.  You’ll just have to check it out below.  Reader alert - there are a lot of pics in this post.  Apologies, but it’s some great stuff.  So, now that every body is locked and loaded, here we go...

The day started a bit late, but also quite well.  This was planned.  We had talked with the couple across the way from us in the RV Park last night - Kevin and Penelope (AKA Diane).  They recommended a local breakfast place called Congdon's.  It's a bakery/restaurant combined.  So we picked up some fresh baked goods for breakfast tomorrow (if mine lasts that long) and had breakfast in the restaurant.  What the reader sees in this pic is Lobster Benedict.  I know - I'd never heard of it either, but SHAZAM - there it was on the menu and it ended up on the table in front of me.  Man was it tasty.  I'm now officially a Maine lobster fan.

Then we were off to Perkins Cove - it apparently not being large enough to qualify as a Bay.  And it is pretty small.  We're standing on a pedestrian draw bridge - the only one like it.  More on this later.  Is that not one of the best tourist shots you've seen?  We're here to go on a boat tour of the Nubble Lighthouse aboard the Finestkind III.

When we boarded, the narrator for our trip showed us a lobster one of their other boats (it does a lobster cruise where they check traps) had caught.  Apparently Susan didn't get enough to eat at breakfast.

As is the case with nearly all the coast line we've seen on this trip, there are some amazing homes along the ocean front.  This being but one example.  It's called the Greystone Manor and is the only surviving example of the mansions initially built here in the 1800s. 

We continued on to Nubble Lighthouse.  Is this not an amazing pic what with the seagulls framing the lighthouse and the waves crashing against the rocks?

Susan took this shot from a slightly different angle - it reveals a bit more of the keeper's residence.  All the property on the island is owned by the City of Qgunquit and no one is permitted on the island except maintenance crews.  The exception is the Lighthouse - which is owned by the Coast Guard.  Used by permission of Susan Schoen Photography, LLC.

One final lighthouse pic - but this one isn't about the lighthouse.  The reader should open the pic and look in front of the small, white, peaked building in front of all the other structures.  Then look for the iron basket hanging just below the small building.  Note that the basket is attached to cables and has pulleys that run on the cable.  The basket was intended to ferry supplies to the lighthouse in winter when the small distance between it and the shore were impassable.  Interestingly, the last keeper had a seven year old son who needed to get to school every day.  That's right, they put him in the basket to send him back and forth to the bus every day.  The bus driver had to get out and pull him over.  When he went home, the process was reversed.  This according to our tour guide.

This would be a newer mansion we saw on the return trip to Perkins Cove.

Just as we were about to dock back in Perkins Cove, I took this shot of an old wood sailboat (the white one on the right) and its more contemporary counterpart.  Knowing that right after exiting the Cove you're on the open ocean, I don't know that I'd wander too far from shore in either of these boats.  But the old one is really cool.  Completely open air and made of wood slats about 4" wide bent around a frame, I think.

After we deplaned (Sorry, don't know the nautical lingo for getting off a boat) we walked back to the scoot and got a chance to see the previously mentioned pedestrian drawbridge in action.  According to the tour guide on our boat, when a ship needing the drawbridge comes to the Cove, any pedestrian happening by at the time just pushes a button near where the bridge hinges and up go the two halves.  Then somebody has to close it after the boat goes thru.  We later heard that Ogunquit is a town of about 1,200 souls, but on the 4th of July they have as many as 80,000 people in town.  GOOD LORD!  At least they don't have a problem finding someone to open the drawbridge...

Then it was off to walk The Marginal Way, a paved footpath which starts at Perry Cove and runs along the shore between the ocean and the houses/hotels just behind.  No - I've no idea where they got the name.  It's 1.5 miles long and at the other end one can catch a trolley back to Perking Cove.  Great - sign us up.

It was very scenic.  This is what my mind's eye saw when I imagined the Maine Coast as we planned the trip.  Stunning!

Atlantic ocean, Readers.  Readers, Atlantic Ocean.  Now that the introductions are done, we can get on with the walking tour.

This is Susan contemplating...something...as we sat for a short break.  We didn't sit for too long since we were in the sun and it was unseasonably warm here - I think it reached 84 degrees today.  She actually contemplates - a lot.  I see her do it, for example, after I talk.  Then she looks like she's about to say something, but doesn't.  It's spooky.

A nice gentleman with not one, but two, cameras around his neck asked if he could take a "photograph" (I think he meant pic) for us just as I was about to take a selfie of us here.  Well of course you can.  If ya can't trust a guy with two cameras around his neck, who can ya trust?  It turned out like this - pretty darned good, me thinks.

This is Susan and me cooling our tootsies in the ATLANTIC OCEAN!  Susan's feet were cold - but of course they were.  "How many times are you gonna get the chance to wade in the Atlantic with your husband of 40 years" I asked?  I tell ya, the things I do to get neat pics.  I had to promise to wash her feet when we got home.  And I know when we go to bed tonight, they're STILL gonna be cold.  This, of course, means that in short order my feet will be cold - because she'll put those little icebergs on me to warm up.

Once out of the water with her feet safely ensconced in shoes and socks again, we were all smiles.  Equally as important - check out that shore line.

Rocks, waves, water and a couple of sail boats.  Does it get any better?

So - after we finished walking The Marginal Way we found ourselves near the Ogunquit public beach and within spittin' distance of one of those fabled trolley stops.  Perfect!  I inquired of Google and learned that the trolleys come by about every 10-15 minutes.  35 minutes later we were still sitting there - no trolley.  So we decided to walk back down the road to Perkins Cove (about a mile)  and just as we entered the cove parking lot, we were passed by a trolley.  We were hot and thirsty so Susan murdered the trolley driver, stole his trolley and drove us the last .2 miles to the ice cream shop.  (C'mon - how gullible are you.  The worst she did was think unkind things about the trolley system in general.)  In truth, we walked to the local ice cream parlor, imbibed, then took the time to figure out where dinner was gonna be tonight.  We settled on the Wells Beach Lobster Pound.  This is apparently a place where one buys lobster by the pound.  There are several in the neighborhood.

This would be the nice guy behind the counter introducing me to my lobster - his name is Fred.  No, no, no - not the guy - the lobster.  Apparently before Fred and I could be formally meet, he needed a bath and a name change.

This is the lobster formerly known as Fred.  Apparently the "bath" involves a pot of boiling water.  Oh - and his name was changed to"Dinner".  I think he looks especially fetching next to that plastic tub of coleslaw.  

This would be the corpus aulicocius (a little Latin there), post dinner.  The lobster formerly known as Fred was messy - but yummy.   I think Humpty Dumpty looked better after his fall.  Now I just gotta navigate the scoot back to The Rig without falling asleep from bellyfullitis (a little pig latin there).

It was a good day.  The boat ride was great fun - I love what the ocean swells do to a boat.  The walk was gorgeous - if a bit toasty.  However, Susan is rethinking her decision to suffer the trolley operator to survive.  We keep looking at each other and saying, "We're in Maine!"

Till next time.