Day 6 - Wednesday, August 9

I woke up at 5:00 a.m. and noticed a red glow on the ocean horizon. Carol got up and started taking pictures out our picture window, while I went back to sleep. She got a lot of great shots of another ocean sunrise. After snoozing until 9:30 a.m., we checked out and tried to eat lunch in nearby Rockport. The quaint, touristy village looked like a lot of fun, but it was jam-packed with tourists and we couldn’t find a parking place anywhere. We headed back into Peabody, and ate lunch at the Sylvan Street Grille. Carol had the soup and salad, and I had a ½ tuna salad sandwich on marble rye, and a salad and Pepsi. Then we got gas and headed for Maine again.

This time we took I-95 directly up to Brunswick, avoiding all the traffic in the coastal towns this time, and then drove all the way down a long, narrow peninsula to land’s end at Bailey Island. We took a few pictures and bought some gifts in a gift shop there. Then we drove all the way back up that peninsula, about 25 miles or so, to Bath. We drove down the next peninsula looking for a ‘typical Maine coastline view’, which we never really found. As it was getting toward sunset, we decided to try to find a place to shoot some ‘sunset over the ocean’ pictures. On the east coast, its very hard to find a spot for this type of photo, since the beaches and coastline almost always face east, as you might imagine.

After driving south to the end of this peninsula and finding it all privately owned, we decided to give it up and drive back up to Bath. But we saw two ladies walking along the road, and we asked them if there might be a spot to take a sunset picture. They suggested a nearby campground called Hermit’s Island. This campground was privately owned, and off-limits to everyone but campers. Never a quitter, Carol asked the gatekeeper about taking some pictures. He hinted that we might sneak up a back trail over the beach and dunes and into the campground. He told us he could never authorize such shenanigans, but he gave Carol a campground map and told her how we might get to Sunset Cove. I must say I opposed this idea at first, but we hiked through about 100 yards of dune grass to the beach, walked up the beach a ways and found another trail through the dunes which led us into the camping area. There were about 80 campsites, and they were all full of campers – individuals and families, in camp trailers and in tents. They seemed to be having a great time…most of them were finishing dinner. We just walked by them like we belonged there, and after about another half mile of walking, we came upon Sunset Cove. It was only about 15 minutes until sunset when we arrived….accidental perfect timing. We took lots of sunset pictures and then retraced our steps to the car. Nobody was the wiser, and we had our photos!
After driving back to Brunswick, we found the Viking Motor Inn, a small, privately owned motel which offered free fast Internet service. We checked in and headed to Applebee’s for dinner. Then back to our room where I am writing this post!