The forecast for today was sunny. We woke up in the fog.
Our Plan A was to take Speedy over to the picnic area, park along the shore, have banana-pecan pancakes for breakfast, then get out the spotting scope and get a close view of the ducks offshore. Needless to say, it didn't turn out that way. Despite the fog we did go over to the picnic area and park along the shore, but we couldn't even see the end of the nearby rocks, much less out to where we saw ducks yesterday. We made do with coffee and the pancakes (which were delicious) and a view of the fog. A couple of crows who were poking around in front of us were all the birds we could see.
After breakfast we decided to go over to the store just outside the park. It had showers and after two days on the road, hot showers were welcome. They were, however, $1 for two minutes. Ellen started first and the first minute was wasted waiting for hot water. She had the $3 shower. Since I got started a bit later, there was already hot water (thank you, Ellen) and I managed to just make it in 4 minutes, the $2 shower. Now clean, it was on to Plan B.
Ellen wanted to visit Four Seasons Farm in Harborside, ME. It is at the end of the Blue Hill peninsula on the other side of Ellsworth. It is a small farm that grows vegetables year-around in Maine and is a well-known supplier to fine restaurants. The owners are well-known and Ellen even has a book on gardening written by one of them in the '70s. They have a farm stand and Ellen wanted to give it a try.
So, off we went. Out of Acadia, up Mount Desert Island to Ellsworth, out to Blue Hill, on to Sedgewick and then off numbered roads into the country. Finally we reached Weir Cove Road, where the farm was located we turned down it. It started out a normal two lane road, but became narrower and narrower as we covered the miles along the shoreline...then it turned to dirt. A few miles later we reached Four Seasons Farm....and the sign "Farmstand Closed". We pulled in the drive anyway, since the dirt road is too narrow to turn Speedy around, but find no sign of anyone around. The vegetable gardens were nice, though.
After getting turned around it was time for Plan C. We though we remembered that there might be someplace interesting to have lunch in Brooklin, so we decide to head ti that direction. Back down the dirt road, the narrow road and back to a numbered road and towards Brooklin. On the way is the turn towards Deer Isle. Just before that turn we spot a sign, relatively fancy, for 44 North Coffee, 10 miles—on Deer Isle. Plan C changes and it now on to 44 North. We turn right on Rt 15 and go across the suspension bridge over Eggimoggin Reach to the island.
In 10 miles we reach the town of Deer Isle and find 44 North Coffee, another fancy sign in front of a rather rundown building and no one around. Time for version 3 of Plan C. We continue on to Stonington, figuring there might be something there, if not we can at least park on the wharf and have lunch in Speedy. Ten more miles, nothing interesting there but heavy fog, and the wharf is marked "No Trespassing, Commercial Fisherman Only". Time to call Plan C a failure and head back.
When we reached the Town of Deer Isle, we pulled over at a parking spot on a causeway just beyond downtown. It was still gray, but the fog had lifted at Deer Isle and we had a great view in both directions. We made lunch and enjoyed the view, which included a little rock just off the causeway inhabited by a Greater Yellowlegs, several Bonaparte's Gulls and a couple of Ring-billed Gulls.
Time to go back to camp. We were flagging by the time we reached Ellsworth, so we stopped at the Maine Grind, a coffee cafe we've been to virtually every time we've passed through town. We fueled up on caffeine and took advantage of their free Wi-Fi to catch up on email, as there is no service at Seawall. We got back to the campground around 3:30.
It was still foggy, along the water, so we took a walk up a fire road that leads out of the campground along the edge of an area called "Big Heath". Ellen was hoping to see some birds on the heath. Unfortunately, there was no longer a heath along the road, just forest, and it was very quiet. Not a bird to be seen. It was back to the campsite, which was inundated with Robins, Cedar Waxwings and Chickadees, all munching on the red berries in the trees around us.
Dinner tonight is cheeseburgers with smashed new potatoes and a salad. Yum! Time to break out the grill.
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