What better symbol of Vermont than a Ben & Jerry’s? While this is not the original – it was torn down long ago – this one is the flagship store in downtown Burlington. The factory is located a few miles east in Waterbury, but the store and visitor center are undergoing renovation and currently closed. We made do with this one. What flavor did we choose? New York Super Fudge Chunk – Chocolate Ice Cream with White & Dark Fudge Chunks, Pecans, Walnuts & Fudge-Covered Almonds!
Blue skies and sunshine just wouldn’t have been the right way to experience Mount Washington, said to have the “worst weather in the country” according to some. We saw no sunshine today, and in fact were amazed at the strength of the blowing snow, ice and wind at the summit. We rode the cog railway – no way were they letting cars to the top in those conditions!
Lots of fall color around, although we were faced with a lot of fog, rain and tourists. Photos to follow, however!
We only had a few miles in New Hampshire this afternoon until we arrived at our motel. So instead of lighthouses we now have covered bridges! We visit Mount Washington tomorrow, where the forecast is for 50 mph winds and a temperature of 30 with snow and ice. Yikes! 🙂
We visited Quoddy Head State Park today, location of the Quoddy Head Lighthouse as well as the Easternmost Point in the US. That gives us the two easiest of the four, along with Key West. The Northernmost and Westernmost Points are a bit more challenging. 😉
We took a harbor cruise out of Bar Harbor today – 4 more lighthouses! During the cruise our captain arranged (likely pre-arranged) to rendezvous with a lobsterman as he was tending his traps. We got to see him pull 6 out of his trap. Our guide told us that the solo lobsterman probably tended on average 150 traps a day. That’s a lot of lobster! There are lobster traps everywhere – every harbor is dotted with their buoys.
These guys will probably be on someone’s plate in the near future!
We visited Marshall Point Lighthouse near Saint George, Maine this morning. As it turned out, there was a group of people doing a photo shoot for an upcoming LL Bean catalog. We stood around and watched for a while. It was quite interesting to see how much work goes into just one photo in a catalog or on a website. Beautiful location for a shoot, however! And the people were all very friendly. The guy in charge talked to us for a while and complimented me on my camera.
Tired of lighthouse photos yet? Not me!
When I started thinking about photographing the Maine coast, naturally the first thing I thought of was lighthouses. In anticipation of a day just like today, I purchased a variable neutral density filter. Today was my first chance to really try it out. It seems to work best on cloudy days and with long-ish lenses. It makes a mess on my wide-angle 10-24 lens except at the most gentle settings, darkening the corners dramatically. Works pretty well on the longer end of the 16-80 but works really well on the 55-200. I got a little buffeting from the gusty winds but a 3.5 second exposure like this one worked pretty well. I processed it using the Classic Chrome profile in Lightroom instead of my usual Velvia-based preset. I think it shows the raw power of the wind and surf.
We were very glad to have been on the water yesterday and on land today! Gusty winds and rough seas would have made for an unpleasant journey today!
Kathy & I made a last minute choice to book a coastal cruise with Capt. Fish out of Boothbay Harbor. The cruise took us past 3 lighthouses, including this one on Pemaquid Point. It is another one of the many iconic lighthouses along the Maine coast. I think today we’re going to drive there and see the other side of it!
I managed to haul my carcass out the door again this morning for the second time in a row. I’ve got a number of good results but will have to process them at a later date. So much to see and do here – no time to process photos. A good problem to have!
Kathy and I took a whale watch cruise this afternoon out of Gloucester, Massachusetts. We love seeing the big whales in person and were not disappointed with this trip. I have a tough time taking good photos on cruises like this, because there are so many people jockeying for position whenever a whale is spotted. I much prefer the smaller, more intimate vessels, but they are tougher to come buy and usually much more expensive. We did see some whales, and I got a few photos. Although I did decide to spring the $20 to but the photos from our naturalist/photographer on board!