Downeast

For as long as I can remember, my family has gone up to Branch Lake in Ellsworth, Maine for some amount of the summer. My grandparents owned a camp there and my mother spent much of her childhood there. My family rented a camp for a period of time each summer before purchasing our own. 

This year, I didn't have much time and almost didn't go at all. I had a week planned to go up with some friends, but didn't end up having enough time to take off work. I still had the week reserved on the calendar though, and as it got down to the end of it, I thought it would such a shame to waste it all. So I committed to the nearly six hour drive from my home in CT. And for the first time all by myself, sans friends or family, I went back, for a couple days, to the one place that has never demanded anything of me; a place in which I can let go. Unwind. Expand. 

Getting off the highway (I always think of Stephen King when I pass signs for Bangor- his house is a great place to visit if you've never been before), you sidle onto Route 1, this long stretch of barren road. You can almost smell the water not far off, though you can't see it, and the businesses passed are flat and long, visually blank or unappealing and far and few between. Punctuated with things like a stand for lobster rolls or blueberries, and about a million antique places. There's a wide gasp of space between everything, rolling, rural grass and the sky has a different tint to it. You'd have to be here to see it, to really feel it, and luckily today you are. You're here with me.

I stop and pick up some whoopie pies and gas at a Dysart's gas station. You can't throw a stone without hitting a whoopie pie in Maine (and I'm a sucker for them, so I always get a handful to bring back with me). After Dysart's, I cut off the main road and drive 20 minutes on progressively more winding, pine-crowded dirt lanes, until we hit it: camp. Cue head hitting pillow. Sleep.

I wake up to the silence, the sound of waves lapping against a dock. Dawn has drained from the sky, leaving it spotless, a blank slate.  The lake is still covered in a sparse layer of mist when I brew a big pot of coffee and walk out with a cup to stare out at it. The day seems to brim with nothing but delicious time. I have no obligations, no appointments, nothing. It feels like I’ve ushered myself into a different dimension, one where time runs backward and the same rules don't apply. I start with a walk down the winding dirt road, peering at all the little camps nestled out back in the trees- one direction leads me back to my grandparents' camp (closed these days as my grandmother permanently resides in Florida now) where sometimes I'll wander around the property and get lost in memories. One takes me on a forest path through the trees, and the other takes me down to Sand Beach, a public beach on Branch Lake.

When I loop back to home base, I bring out my typewriter and start on some writing- poetry flows out of me, musings, plot ideas. Everything is more lucid here. When I've sated my inspiration, emptied out my creativity, I go to enjoy someone else's, going to the hammock to read a book- something I've been meaning to pick up for so long. The temperature all day will hover in the seventies, the breeze pulling in from the water a refreshing caress. The sound of people at other camps, voices carrying across the water, or a boat trucking into the cove, the chopping of its motor slowing as it trundles into shore combine with the chirping of birds in the trees overhead are the ambient background, like a real-life version of those dreamy lo-fi beats.

I could spend all day here easily, but since I'm only in Ellsworth for a short time, I make the trip into town in the afternoon to a couple spots I know and love and a couple that I haven't personally been to yet. 

Up first- Airline Brewing Co. Airline is a tiny hole in the wall of a building with great comfort food and greater beer. This time around, I got a steak horseradish melt, some hefty-ass potato skins, and a flight of six different beers to try. Before leaving, I bought a couple of four packs of my favorites to bring home. 

I also visited Fogtown Brewing, which was a new stop for me, where I tried a couple flights of beer (and one blueberry cider) and a mushroom pizza that was absolutely delicious (they do wood-fired pizzas). Fogtown also has this really cute little outdoor seating/ beer garden-like area. It was too hot to be outside this time around, but there were these little, almost mini-greenhouse-looking shelters with benches inside where a couple people could cozily sit more privately. 

After Fogtown, I hit The Rock & Art Shop, which is always a lot of fun. Filled with crystals, geodes, and eclectic little gifts that are not the standard tourist fare, it also has a lot of animal bones, skulls, and sometimes whole skeletons on offer. I have a full bat skeleton from them I'm working on getting into a shadow box. 

Finally, I checked out Lincoln's Farmstand. This was a new place I stopped at on the way back to camp. They have a little shed set up on the side of the main road where they keep a couple of coolers and shelving and stock fresh fruit pies and other desserts and food. I got a blueberry crumble from here and it. was. so. GOOD! They work on the honor system and have a Venmo QR code posted for payment. 

Coming home in the hottest peak of day, I change into my swim trunks and dive into the lake. Someone's left one of those maximally relaxing floats where you can flip onto your back and just kind of float. I loop the rope attached to it to the dock and float there for a while, bobbing over the swell of occasional waves coming out from boats passing over the water.

After I get out and towel myself down, I get in the boat lashed to the dock. Spiders creep down to vibe in their little webs in the corners of the boat canopy and I photograph them against the dying light. I sit as the evening phases into night, smoking a good cigar and reading more of my book (I demolish books out here). Occasionally, I pause and look out at the lake as dark falls, the smoke from my cigar curling out into the air, contorting and dissipating into a velvet night studded with stars. A fire crackles and leaps a few camps down, talk and laughter echoing off the trees. Later, as time wears on, more complete quiet falls except for the occasional wailing of a loon somewhere, carrying eerily across the water. I read by lantern-light, stopping to watch a fireworks show popping off in the sky, sparks raining down into the trees. When the last of this gratuitous show dies down, I trail back inside to get ready for bed.

And just like that, the day is over and done. Time is so precious here, but I feel thoroughly satisfied in a way I'm not used to feeling back in the normal chugging of my wake work sleep routine back in CT. I may only have a short time here this year, but I feel satisfied that I've wrung all I can out of it and find myself so glad I've made the trip. It's filled me with something that I hope will last until I can come here again.

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Notes:

•   If you want to recreate something like this day, I'd look for b & b rentals around Ellsworth, particularly on Branch Lake or Green Lake for waterside perks. This whole area is absolutely gorgeous, though.

• ALTERNATE MORNING OPTION/ BONUS EXCURSION: 

If you're ambitious, take the morning to go to Cadillac Mountain. It's an early wake-up and about an hour drive from Ellsworth but it's well worth it.The highest peak on the east coast offers a breathtaking view of the sun coming up. Located on Mount Desert Island in Bar Harbor, Cadillac is part of Acadia National Park which abounds with hiking opportunities. I used to go here one day every summer growing up with family. It was tradition to watch the sunrise, and there was something about the experience that felt almost holy. There's a sort of reverent hush in the pre-dawn dark of the summit, filled with silent murmuring and coughs as people settle into place, perched on rocks or seated on blankets. Some people have set up more professional cameras and others bring a journal or simply their phones and a companion or two. Note: Cadillac now requires a reservation! Acadia is busy during peak season, which can be a downside if you want to walk the park after.

After Cadillac, I’d recommend Jeannie's Great Maine Breakfast in Bar Harbor. It's a popular spot for hearty comfort food, egg dishes and pancakes, and opens early at 6:30 AM to accommodate all of the tourists who've just finished the mountain. I've literally never ordered anything here I didn't like, and the portions are extremely generous. There is usually some level of wait, but they've got a great outdoor area to do that in where there are even spaces to sit down if desired.

After breakfast, troll around on the shore path while waiting for the local stores to open up. It's a walking loop along Frenchman's Bay with great scenes of the water and of some really pretty historic homes. 

I didn’t do Cadillac this time around, so it wasn’t on our journey together- I chose to keep us in Ellsworth- but I’d definitely recommend it & Bar Harbor if you’ve never done it before!