The alarm went off in our room around 7ish. We both got up and used the bathroom before everyone else needed to be in there to get a shower. All I had to do was wash my face and brush my hair. You could smell food being cooked downstairs. I wonder what kind of awesome food Mindy cooked for us.
Mom and I went downstairs followed by Rhonda and Amy. Mom and I sat at the tiny table while Mindy finished up the scrambled eggs. She asked us if we slept well and if there's anything she needed to do or add to make our accommodations better. Each one of us told her that we slept fine and had plenty of pillows and blankets. We saw our spread - she made scrambled eggs, sausage, homemade bread and blueberry waffles because you know, we're in Maine and it would be weird without wild blueberry waffles from Maine. The food was delicious and definitely hit the spot. We thanked her for a great breakfast.
We all went upstairs and finished getting ready. Mindy had another adventure a head of us for the day and I was excited! We piled into Mindy's SUV and headed southeast towards the coastline on Maine Hwy 1. The first town we drove through was called Wiscasset, it has been featured in literature and was in the news in 1991 due to a small fire at the nearby power plant that seemed worse than it really was. This small town is visited by tourists every year due to the early architecture it features. It is also well known for Red's Eats, a seasonal lobster shack, that people line up for hours to get its world-famous lobster rolls. Mindy told us a little bit about it when we drove by. She said that she's spent time in the long line in the past.
Our first stop was at Fort Edgecomb, located just outside of Wiscasset, on Davis Island along Route 1. We pulled into the small parking lot and made our way around the fort and down the hill next to the water. It was another beautiful day in Maine! I checked to see if there was a cache here and there was! Fort Edgecomb Guardian (GC9C5V5) was right outside the gate hidden inside a guardrail. The name totally gave it away. I quickly put our names on it, got my picture, put it back and joined back up with everyone. We wandered around the grounds for about an hour.
Fort Edgecomb, built in 1808-1809, is a two-story octagonal wooden blockhouse with restored fortifications. It is the centerpiece of the Fort Edgecomb State Historic Site. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1969, with its boundaries increased to create a historic district in 1991. We got back into the car and drove to our next place.
We drove east through New Castle and Darmariscotta and then south down through Bristol to Permaquid Point. We got to the parking area and got out. The Permaquid Point Lighthouse was amazing and in a great geological spot to boot! We started making our way around the grounds, when another set of visitors, who may have been from out of town, asked Mindy if she was homeless because she was bundled up in a large coat. The lady with the older man apologized to Mindy and walked the other way. He may have had dementia or something. Who knows? Either way, it was a weird conversation. Throughout the day we asked Mindy if she was homeless.
We took several pictures of the lighthouse and even walked down to the oceanside of the property to admire the earth porn down below. This was some awesome geology and very different than what we were used to on the west coast. Our coastline in Washington was not as rocky as Maine's. I was very lucky to be able to see this. We probably spent a good hour and a half here exploring. This lighthouse is featured on Maine's state quarter. I saw there was a cache nearby but would have to drive to it because it was too far away to walk to it. When we left, I asked Mindy if she could pull over so I could look for Permaquid Light (GCV4CX) and she said she would. I hopped out of the car and made my way down to the rocks. I looked everywhere and could not locate the ammo box. It looked like many people had a hard time finding it as well. It may be missing, and this was my first DNF on vacation. Bummer. I had a great view of the ocean from here though.
Mindy took us back to the New Castle/Damariscotta area. There, we found a place to park and were free to walk around. I saw there was a geocache nearby, Kid Cache 02 (GC7BMX9) and asked Mom if she wanted to walk across the street with me to go get it. She said sure. It was showing us on the back side of the building but there wasn't a way to access the walkway, so we had to go in front of the building instead. It led us to a rock wall. I haven't done a rock wall in a while. Luckily, it wasn't a rock wall cache that was hidden really hard or had crappy coords because I found it pretty quickly. I got our names written on it and put it back where I found it.
We walked back over to the other side of the road to meet up with the ladies who were walking from shop to shop. Mom and I spent a lot of time inside of Renys, which is similar to our Sun Bird's at home. We walked into a few more shops and then we decided it was time to head to our next place on our way back towards Auburn. We piled into Mindy's car and drove back through Wiscasset and into Bath, known as "the city of ships" due to all the sailing ships that were built in the shipyards. We parked near the City Hall and walked around to all the shops on Front Street for about an hour. I walked down to the Chocolate Church to find Cold Stone Chocolate (GC5XDZN).
The coords kept taking me to places it wasn't so I had to let the phone settle down for a few minutes. I knew it was going to be near the church, but I had to be sneaky about it due to the traffic on the road nearby and a truck parked in the church driveway unloading plywood. I finally found what I was looking for but had to wait for the right time to grab the cache and log it since I had to be cautious of the people nearby. I did manage to get the names on it and put back before they came back out to the truck. I called Mom to see which store they were inside of and met up with them. We went into a couple more shops before we walked back to the car.
Mindy took us to our last place to visit, Freeport. She told us that it is the place to go if you want to shop at outlet stores...similar to the North Bend outlets in Washington. She says it starts getting busy in the middle of November for the holiday season. I'm glad we were going before it got too crazy. We got into Freeport and found a place to park in the giant parking lot. I saw there were a few caches I could get while we were here. She wanted to take us to L.L. Bean because Rhonda enjoys shopping there. I wasn't a fan of that brand, but I went with them anyway. We were stopped in the front of the store near the giant boot by some associates. They asked if we wanted a free S'more. Of course, we did!
They gave us some sticks with marshmallows on the end of them and had little fire pits to cook them in. Everyone burned their marshmallow while I tried not to but did anyway because I wasn't paying attention. We walked back over to the table and got our graham crackers and chocolate square. We took some photos of us at the giant boot while I did the virtual cache, Iconic Boot (GC7B63K). I had to count the stitching on the back of the boot to get credit for it. We had a good time with the boot. We went inside L.L. Bean to wander around. I found out L.L. Bean was founded in Freeport in 1912 and this is where the headquarters was located as well.
I soon got bored and told Mom I wanted to go find the other two geocaches that were nearby. She said she would go with me to the one outside the building, M Travelbug and Trackables Hotel (GC75CT8). We went out there and it was hidden inside of a guardrail near the parking lot. We signed the logbook but sadly, there weren't any trackables inside. I told her where I was going to go, and I would meet them back over this way. She went to go use the restroom.
I walked the few blocks to The Cornerstore (GC1RX5H) and saw it was a fake rock that had seen better days. I did manage to get it signed and I put it back the best I could. It needed some serious maintenance. I walked around to the other stores in the area before I met up with Mom, Rhonda, Amy and Mindy. They all wanted to do dinner in Freeport before we went back to Mindy's house. We decided on Linda Bean's Perfect Maine (Linda Bean is L.L. Bean's granddaughter). I wasn't sure what to expect when we went inside.
We got seated right away and had a really odd waitress who seemed like she was having a bad day or maybe she was sarcastic all the time? I don't know. Anyway, I looked through the menu and the chicken wings caught my eye. Maple BBQ sauce? Wild Maine blueberry BBQ sauce? I'm sold! I ordered six wings and half of them were maple and the other half were blueberry. Why not try it while I am in another region of the US, right? It was served with celery and carrots. I ate some of Mom's fries too. Let me tell ya, those sauces were delicious, and I regret not purchasing any bottles of the sauce to bring home with me. I also wish I would have walked across the street before it closed to get a whoopie pie as well. Maybe next time.
We paid, walked back towards Mindy's car, L.L. Bean let me do another S'more and this time I didn't burn it, and then headed back to Auburn.
We stopped at the CVS just down the hill from her house to pick up some more Sudafed since we were going through it quicker than I anticipated. When we did get back to the house, I took a quick shower and started a couple loads of laundry so we would have enough underpants for the rest of the week we were there. I made some more popcorn and shared it with everyone who wanted some and turned on the living room TV to Thursday Night Football. I watched the Eagles and the Texans while everyone else visited in the other room.
I talked to Ben for a little bit, got ready for bed and went to bed around 11:30ish. Again, it was hard to get comfortable because my nose was so stuffy and made difficult to breathe.
MA-VT-NH-ME Girl's Trip: Fort Williams, Oldest Cache in Maine, Bug Light Park and Wandering in Portland (Day 9)
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