For the last few years, Daniel and I have been traveling to distant destinations—from Spain to Mexico to the western United States. This summer, we opted for something closer to home: Maine. Specifically, Southport, on the coast near Boothbay Harbor. I lived in Massachusetts for nine years but made it to Maine only a few times for day trips. Daniel has been fond of New England since our first trip to Provincetown in 2007. An additional advantage of this trip was being able to stay with my sister and her husband at a cottage owned by his family. The cottage is a rustic but comfortable affair, blessedly lacking Wi-Fi but equipped with such decidedly off-grid amenities as a wind-up Victrola and a selection of 78 rpm records. The cottage sits directly on the shore, with a dock extending into the water.
Southport is a very small community with little in the way of shops or restaurants. An abundant selection of both can be found in adjoining Boothbay Harbor, which boasts an astonishing variety of amenities considering its off-season population of just over 2,000: numerous restaurants, art galleries, stores, and even an opera house. Of course, like any location where “summer” is a verb, the population balloons during the warmer months.
When one thinks of the culinary delights of
coastal New England, one’s taste buds naturally gravitate toward lobster,
oysters, and other sea-borne delights. I satisfied my craving for those at Boothbay Lobster Wharf. We
also made several visits to Downeast Ice Cream Factory,
which has at least two locations. The selection is generous, and I found the
Coconut Almond Chocolate Chip and Caramel Apple particularly appealing. While
the prices were high, as one would expect in a tourist town, the servings were
equally generous—a single scoop was really closer to three scoops in volume.
Shopping in downtown Boothbay Harbor is mostly
devoted to tourist-oriented stores selling T-shirts and locally branded
merchandise—the kind of items that remind one, or prove to others, that one was
here. However, one store also had a selection of old LPs, and I bought three,
including one featuring Dolly Parton, who had passed away the day before. There
are also a number of art galleries, but our walls are fully occupied, so we
didn’t even enter them. Leaving downtown and its expensive retail rents behind,
we found several thrift and antique stores. One was next
to the nearby Railway Village Museum, where I found some
very nice dessert dishware.
As noted above, the year-round population of
Boothbay Harbor is small, and many residents are retirees or otherwise
affluent. Consequently, many of those working in restaurants and other
businesses during the summer are not native Mainers. We encountered a good many
Romanian university students filling seasonal jobs with the help of J-1 visas.
I hope the Trump administration doesn’t get wind of this, because ending the
program could cripple small summer towns in New England and elsewhere. Then
again, Trump is fond of Eastern Europeans so long as they’re female and easy.
As our trip was brief, we left the
Southport/Boothbay area only once, to visit Pemaquid
Point Lighthouse Park. The lighthouse itself is
the one featured on Maine’s 2003 State Quarter. It is owned by the U.S. Coast
Guard and open to visitors. The rest of the park is owned by the Town of
Bristol and includes a fishermen’s museum, art gallery, and gift shop. We visited
all of these, and climbing to the top of the lighthouse tower was one of the
highlights of our trip. Having worked up an appetite, we afterward made our way
to Moody’s Diner in
Waldoboro.
We made the journey to Maine and back by car,
mostly on Interstates 90, 95, and 495 until we passed Portland. From there, it
was good old Route 1 most of the way to the swing-bridge that
leads into Southport.
By the time Daniel and I arrived home, we had
already resolved to return to Maine one day. Given how dog-friendly the
state—and particularly Boothbay Harbor—is, we'll most likely bring Brownie
along next time.
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