A Different World in Maine

We left the Boston area and headed for Maine. Maine has a beautiful coastline with many lighthouses and of course, World famous lobster. We booked into an RV park called Wassamki Springs for the 4th of July weekend. The campground was inland a few miles just south of Portland, Maine. This was a very nice place with a private lake, large campsites and lots of activities for the 4th of July celebration, including a breakfast, a pork and chicken dinner, games for the kids, a rock concert and more. Even though the park was packed for the weekend, you still had your space.

We went for a drive into Portland and discovered it to be a quaint old town with some nice green space along the water. We drove out to one of the city parks that had one of many lighthouses in the area. It was well preserved and the park was very nice. We drove down to Orchard Beach and found it to be like so many other beach towns that we have visited; lots of bars, restaurants, souvenir shops and it also had an amusement park on the beach complete with a ferris wheel. The next night we went out to Pine Point and found a lobster joint right on the beach. As we ate we watched boats coming and going and we had a nice view of the ocean.

July 5, 2010 We drove up to Bar Harbor, following the coast all the way. We drove through many small, fishing villages and beach towns. In almost every town there are beautifully restored old Victorian homes and a Main street that is made up of brick buildings, which are pretty much the way they were 100-200 years ago. We stayed at Hadley Point Campground which was only a few miles from the town of Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park. On our second day there a big “toy-hauler” pulled in beside us and we were happy to discover that it was the same couple from N. Vancouver (Dave and Brenda) that we hung out with at Virginia Beach. What are the chances of them ending up in the same location as us for a second time. We still had only seen one other BC license plate (in Boston) in our entire travels. We had no idea where each other was headed when we left each other in Virginia Beach. Since then they had travelled up to Ottawa and then headed into the States again, putting on many miles. We were happy to see them and we had a couple of good nights around the camp fire and talked about the differences between Canada and the USA.

The next day Laurie surprised me by suggesting that we rent mopeds to cruise around the island. This came out of the blue as Laurie has always said that she would not get on a motorcycle because she had known people in high school who had been killed on them. We rented the mopeds for 3 hours and we both had a blast. We toured around Acadia National Park, which is beautiful, and we drove up to the top of Cadillac Mountain, which is right in the park. It is the highest mountain on the Atlantic coast. Laurie said that she would like to ride a moped again.

The last night in Bar Harbor we went out for dinner to another lobster joint with our friends Dave and Brenda. Tomorrow we head for Canada!

Oh CANADA!!!

On July 8, 2010 we left Bar Harbor and headed north along Hwy 1 which follows the coast to some degree. It was slow going as they slow you down in every little town, plus we hit road construction in a few places. We decided to head inland and get to a main highway. We crossed into Canada at the Calais/St. Stephen crossing in New Brunswick. The crossing is fairly new and it seems huge for the trickle of cars that actually cross the border there. The Canadian Customs officer was a nice, young woman who was very friendly to us. Unfortunately, she told us that the computer had chosen us for an inspection and we had to pull over. It felt odd because there was no one else around and the nice new customs office was empty. The inspection was a piece of cake; it was just weird to get pulled over when the place was dead. Laurie and I joked that the reason for the inspection was that they were bored and needed something to do.

We continued on Hwy 1 and stopped in Saint John, NB for a few groceries. We pushed on to Fundy National Park which is 45 kms off the main highway but it is really a nice park on the incredible Bay of Fundy. We found out that at Canada’s National Parks you not only pay your campsite fee, and your reservation fee, but each individual has to pay a daily user fee ($7.60/day) on top of that. In the end, we paid about $52. per night to camp there. That is one of the highest costs per night that we have ever seen in our camping experience, in either Canada or the USA. In Oregon for example, if you are camping in the National Park your campsite fee includes your daily user fee. I recognized that they

do a nice job of developing and maintaining our National Parks, but come on people??? At the edge of Fundy National Park is a little village called Alma that has most of the things that campers require and there are few restaurants.                                           Watching the Fundy tide come in!

I feel like the Government is like the Pirates of yester-year, they seem to always steal from you!!!


One of the things that strikes you when you enter Canada is the high cost of everything. Fuel costs are about a $1/gallon more, pop is 2 or 3 times more expensive, and beer…… oh my God!!! In New Brunswick a dozen beer cost me $22.90 and I have been used to paying $10/dozen in the USA, or $11.50 for a premium brand. I guess it’s the cost of living in such a wonderful country?