Maine - The Pine Tree State

About Maine:

Trying to Find unspoiled landscapes or trying to get away from the holiday crowds is easy: just head for Maine. The PineTreeState is vast, it has mountains & valleys, lakes & rushing rivers guarded by those signature pine trees. Then there is the coastline, peppered with lighthouses, a Maine trademark. Here, the Atlantic surges past thousands of little islands to crash onto granite rocks. Invigorating, refreshing, and inspiring: that’s Maine.

As big as the other five New England states combined, Maine has barely the population of Rhode Island. In theory, therefore, there’s plenty of room for its massive summer influx of visitors, the majority of these head for the amazing coast. In the shoreline’s southern reaches, the beach resort towns of Ogunquit and OldOrchardBeach quickly lead up to Maine’s most cosmopolitan city, Portland. The Mid-Coast, between the quiet college town of Brunswick and blue-collar Bucksport, is characterized by a craggy, irregular seashore, with plenty of dramatic, windswept peninsulas and sheltered inlets to explore and be alone, though in the well visited towns of Boothbay Harbor and Camden, you’ll certainly have company on your wanderings. Down East, beyond the moneyed BlueHillPeninsula, Mount Desert Island holds Maine’s most popular outdoor escape, AcadiaNational Park, in addition to the bustling summer retreat of Bar Harbor. Farther still up the coastline, you’ll find less cooperative weather and increasingly uninhabited scenery, capped by the candy-striped lighthouse as Quoddy Head, the easternmost part of the country. You only really begin to appreciate the size and space of the state farther north or inland, where vast tracts of mountainous forest are dotted with lakes and barely pierced by roads. This region is ideal territory for hiking and canoeing (and spotting moose), particularly in BaxterState Park. In the northwestern part of the state, closer to the New Hampshire border, a cluster of ski resorts lie scattered about the mountains, highlighted by Sugarloaf USA, perhaps the finest place to ski in all New England.

The Southern Coast:

Stretching between the two shopping hubs of Kittery and Freeport, Maine’s southern coast is its most settled part, blessed with the state’s best beaches. The eleven-mile strip of sand at OldOrchardBeach is still one of the finest in the country, attracting correspondingly huge crowds in July and August. The other popular beach resort town in the area, Ogunquit is very attractive, with a long-established artist community and a collection of excellent restaurants.

You can find attractive old towns with plenty of historical interest, such as York, the first chartered city in America, and beautiful Kennebunkport, best known as the site of ex-president George Bush’s summer home. In the northern part of the region, the coastline becomes more varied and prone to peninsulas, harbors, inlets, and islands. At the mouth of the Fore River, Maine’s largest city, Portland, has experienced a cultural resurgence over the past few years, with a hip, twenty-something population, newly opened inventive restaurants, and a lively music scene.

Ogunquit:

Approaching the small ocean side town just north of York, it’s not difficult to imagine why Maine’s Native Americans named the place Ogunquit, meaning “beautiful place by the sea”. Ogunquit Square, along Main Street (US-1), is the centre of town, home to most of Ogunquit’s best restaurants, coffee houses, and quirky shops. East of the square, Beach Street leads over the OgunquitRiver to one of Maine’s finest beaches, three miles of sugary white sand. 

Perkins Cove, a pleasant knot of restaurants and shops a few miles south of Ogunquit Square, is best reached by walking along Marginal Way, a windy path that traces the crescent shoreline from OgunquitBeach. The two-mile trail offers unspoiled views of the Atlantic’s rocky coast, particularly stunning in fall when the ocean undulates alongside the fiery foliage.

Kennebunkport:

The recent history of Kennebunkport illustrates the truth of Oscar Wilde’s aphorism, “There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about”.   Kennebunkport has been blessed with beaches. The best is GooseRocksBeach, about three miles north of town on King’s Hwy (off Dyke Road via Rte-9). It’s a premium stretch of expansive sand.

OldOrchardBeach:

The main draw here is the beach, a fantastic seven-mile strip of white sand that competes with any in New England.

Portland:

The largest city in Maine, central Portland consists of two main districts. Downtown refers to the city’s business district, bisected by Congress Street, where you’ll also find several museums, the Civic Centre, and a smattering of good restaurants. The old Port, to the southeast, bustles with lively shops, bars and eateries. Commercial Street runs along the water’s edge, but Fore Street, just inland, has most of the area’s attractions.

Old Port District:

For relaxed wandering, the restored Old Port Exchange near the quayside, between Exchange and Pearl streets, is quite entertaining, with all sorts of red-brick antiquarian shops, specialist book and music stores.

CapeElizabeth:

Across the harbor, in CapeElizabeth at FortWilliamsState Park, lies the Portland Head Lighthouse, the oldest in Maine, commissioned in 1790 by George Washington. An active light still in use by the coast guard, it also houses an excellent museum on the history of Maine’s lighthouses.

Freeport:

Sixteen miles north of Portland along the coast, Freeport owes virtually all of its current prosperity to the invention by Leon Leonwood Bean in 1912, of a rubber-soled fishing boot. The boot is still available, and

L L Bean’s has grown into a multi-national clothing conglomerate, housed in an enormous 90,000-square-foot factory outlet building on Main Street that literally never closes. 

The Mid-Coast:

Stretching from the quiet college town of Brunswick up to Bucksport, Maine’s central coast is a study in geographic, economic, and cultural contrasts. The shore here is physically different from the southern coast, with engaging peninsulas such as the Harpswells and Pemaquid Point, which provide divergent alternatives to well-traveled US-1. Much of this region prospered in the late nineteenth century as a major shipbuilding and trading center, as evidenced by its wealth of attractive old captains’ homes; today, only Bath remains as a ship manufacturer. Throughout, the focus is still unquestionably the sea, be it for livelihood, sustenance, or entertainment. Consequently, one of the best ways to see the area is by boat; from most coastal towns, you can catch a scenic maritime tour. RemoteMonheganIsland, a lobstermen’s hub and artists’ retreat eleven miles offshore, is accessible only by boat.

Lobsters are a way of life in Maine, and the alien-looking crustaceans are especially important to Rockland, home to the most active lobster industry in the state. Busy Camden, just beyond Rockland, is known for its fleet of recreational windjammers, while picturesque fishing villages such as Round Pond and Tenants Harbor – tiny windows into the real Maine – can be found throughout, somehow managing to coexist with overrun summer tourist resorts like Boothbay Harbor.

Down East Maine:

So called because sailors heading east along the coast were also usually heading downwind, Down East Maine has engendered plenty of debate over its boundaries – some wishing to draw its western line at Ellsworth, or Belfast, or even include the entire state in their definition. It’s all a matter of pride, of course; to be a downeaster means to be tough and fiercely independent – though it would be unfair to say unfriendly. We have defined “Down East” as the Maine coast east of Bucksport, including the Blue Hill Peninsula, home to several wealthy summer towns, extremely popular Mount Desert Island, the second most visited place in the state, and the nearly deserted shoreline that stretches a hundred lonely miles between the strip mall town of Ellsworth and the point farthest east in the United States at West Quoddy Head. As you make your way up the coast – particularly once you pass Mount Desert Island and AcadiaNational Park – the terrain and the population become more rugged and less prone to tourism.

Bar Harbor:

The town of Bar Harbor began life as an exclusive resort, summer home to the Vanderbilts and the Astors, but the great fire of October 1947 that destroyed their opulent “cottages” changed the direction of the town’s growth. Many of the old-money families rebuilt their summer estates in hyper-rich NortheastHarbor, southwest along Rte-3, and Bar Harbor is now firmly geared towards tourists – though it’s by no means downmarket. In high season up to 21 different sea trips set off each day, for purposes ranging from deep-sea fishing to cocktail cruises. Among the most popular are the whale-watching, puffin, and seal trips.

AcadiaNational Park:

AcadiaNational Park, sprawled out over most of Mount Desert Island, the SchoodicPeninsula to the east, and Isle au Haut to the south, is the most visited natural place in Maine. It’s visually stunning, with dramatic rolling hills carving smooth rocky silhouettes into the misty horizon. Dense stands of fir and birch trees hide over 120 miles of hiking trails that pop into view on the island’s 26 boulder-like summits. In fact, there’s all you could want here in terms of mountains and lakes for secluded rambling, and such wildlife as seals, beavers, and bald eagles is not scarce. The two main geographical features are the narrow fjord of Somes Sound, which almost splits the island in two, and CadillacMountain, an unbelievable place to watch the sunrise, though the summit of the 1530-foot mound offers tremendous ocean views at any time of the day.

Inland Maine:

The vast expanses of the Maine interior, stretching up into the cold far north, consist mostly of evergreen forests of pine, spruce, and fir, interspersed by the white birches and maples responsible for the spectacular fall colours.