Au revoir Maine!

 We have been anchored in Seal Cove the past two nights, and some of the pictures below will validate the name! After Castine, we travelled to Southwest Harbor, in the heart of the Acadia Mountains.  We were surprised at the car traffic in the small town of SW Harbor, but it is at the crossroads to Acadia National Park, and hikers, canoers, and nature lovers of all types were headed to the park.  SW Harbor has had the most mountainous scenery of this trip, and is as far north as we will go.  From SW Harbor we were either jumping over to Nova Scotia, are heading back, which is the option we have chosen.  

We would not have had enough time to enjoy Nova Scotia, so will add it to our bucket list.  Instead we will head south stopping at a few ports we missed on the way up.  Stanwood and Janet will join us in Newport, RI and ride with us to NYC.  We are looking forward to their visit.  Before that, we will spend labor day weekend in Boston, and enjoy that city.  

We will stay the next two days in Rockland, ME to provision for our trip south.  The weather looks agreeable so fingers crossed the forecast holds. Alexis likes the marina at Rockland as it has a nice SUV we can use to grocery shop, and a laundry where she can do large loads (we have a mid sized washer dryer on board).  So we will provision, and head south Tuesday.  Maine has been absolutely spectacular.  The rugged coastline, the wildlife and the cool temperatures have been great.  We have had to run the heater the past few mornings to warm up the boat!  I can now understand why it is such a summertime destination.  Here are some pics: 

Moonrise Seal Cove.

Sunset Seal Cove. 

The next few pics are among hundreds I took of seals.  The rock in the above pic only comes out at low tide (12' tides here!).  This family of seals would show up at low tide and play king of the mountain!  They would try to push off whoever was on top and take his/her place.  Lots of barking and hissing, sort of reminded me of my grandsons at play...........

A channel in Seal Cove that only has water at high tide. 

The tundra would change from rock to marsh in an instant. 

The above pics were taken at Seal Cove; the below at SW Harbor. 

Acadia National Park mountains.  

SW harbor. 

High tide at the dock.

Low tide at the dock. 

High and low tide at the jetty. 

We walked to town, and this park was on the way.  Tons of mallards in the background, taunting me.

Geese too...

Squirrel!

These woodpeckers are sculpted with metal. 

This small museum was in SW Harbor.  Mr. Gilley was a decoy carver, who branched out into nature carvings and became quite famous in his day.  

This was a painting in the museum which reminds me of my sister's art. 

Notice the flounder in the osprey's talons. 

More of SW Harbor. 

I'll end up with this seal video.