Maple Juice Cove, ME

On our last morning in Camden, Sunday August 25, we decided to have breakfast in town. There were a couple of popular breakfast spots in the center of town and we walked up to Mariner’s and put our name on the waiting list. That gave us one last chance to stroll through town and we walked up to the impressive and stately Camden Library that overlooks the harbor. It is not only a library but also a community center of sorts and the grounds are quite beautiful.  The stone walkways are engraved with quotes about books and reading from famous people such as Jacqueline Kennedy and others.

We had a very good breakfast seated on the small outdoor porch overlooking the harbor.  I’m not a big egg eater but my special of the day, a scramble with eggs, buratta, pumpkin seed pesto, and caramelized shallots was delicious and Jonny enjoyed his blueberry pancakes as well. We have to eat as many blueberries as we can while we are still in Maine!

I love this shot of the colorful skiffs lining the dinghy dock as we made our way to ours.

On our way back to Zendo we saw that Dan and Kathy had returned from their cruise and were unloading their trawler at the dock. We stopped to chat and thank them for the use of their mooring and for all the great advice on anchorages they have given to us on this trip. All their recommendations proved to be excellent! See the next photo for the schooner that Dan and Kathy skippered for many years.

We left lovely Camden Harbor at 11:05 passing by the many floats that are placed throughout the harbor,. These floats allow two to four boats to tie up to them instead of to mooring balls. We have used them in other places and they are effective and useful as space savers in a harbor.

Our initial idea was to cruise to Harbor Island until we realized that we had already been there!  We passed the picturesque Marshall Point Light as we cruised past Port Clyde.  The original keeper was Charles Clement Skinner who was a Civil War veteran and he lived there with his wife and six children from 1874 to 1919! 

We were still deciding between Maple Juice Cove as a destination or Port Clyde which has more of a town.  Eventually we chose to go to the whimsically named Maple Juice Cove because it was more remote and we had just been in a town for two days.  We arrived at this large, open cove by 3:10 and were essentially the only boat there!  We dinghied in to the nearby lobster dock which was also empty since it was Sunday.

We walked up the quiet country road.  

And we quickly came upon the house that is featured in Andrew Wyeth’s famous painting, Christina’s World.  We knew we were in Wyeth country but were surprised to be so close to one of Wyeth’s best known subjects.

Three generations of the family lived and painted in this part of the Maine coast. The house and surrounding property are currently under renovation. It is all owned by the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine. The property is several acres and there is signage describing the various buildings. The parking lot was large enough to imply that the homesite gets plenty of visitors but everything was closed while we were there due to the renovations. Nonetheless, it was exciting to discover it in this remote corner of the world.  The setting was very pastoral and serene and the home was quite stark, just as it is in the painting. 

 

We continued our walk a bit further along the scenic country road

 then headed back to Zendo passing this lobster boat with a cute reference to its prey.

After a little relaxation we had delicious leftovers from Long Grain, the Asian restaurant in Camden.  By the time we finished eating, fog had unexpectedly rolled in totally obscuring any sight of the shore. We were fully socked in but thankfully we weren’t going anywhere. 

That night we watched the Miami Vice movie enjoying the scenes shot in our own Magic City. We are making our way slowly to Portland where our good friend Cathy Tisdale will be joining us in a couple of days.