PART I: FALL
You know how the first half of
football season (and the school year) in the south still feels like
summer? It doesn’t in Maine! I am blissfully happy right now. The girls are in the camper because they are
cold (roll eyes here). Brad is in the
woods metal detecting. I am sitting in
the sunshine under a blue sky with bits of wispy clouds blowing by. The breeze is cool and bringing down tiny
leaves all around me. The sounds, the
smells, the signs are everywhere. It is
FALL. The trees have not started
changing color too much yet, but it is close.
Summer is over in New England.
And it is wonderful.
PART II: Wicked Whoopie Pie
I don’t think I have blogged about
Whoopie Pie. Let me tell you, this is
blogworthy. We first came upon this
magical little creation at the Lisbon/Littleton KOA in NH. They were sitting innocently on the counter,
a 4-inch chocolate cookie/cake sandwich filled with a large helping of thick, white
icing in the middle. It was prepackaged,
but made by a local manufacturer. Maybe
it was an early Halloween trick (or treat) or maybe it was just my ridiculous
lack of self-discipline, but it haunted me.
I kept thinking about it. I let
it get to me. I ate one. It was very good. As we got into Maine, we started seeing them
everywhere: gas stations, bakeries, grocery stores. The best ones are the smaller ones that are
chilled and made fresh in a bakery. There
are many variations such as choc cake with peanut butter filling, ginger spice
cookie with pumpkin-ricotta filling.
I’ve looked through a few Whoopie Pie cookbooks and the combinations seem
endless. One book declared it the new
cupcake. They started in Maine, spread
throughout the northeast and are making their way to a bakery near you! At least I hope so! Even though it started as a “Maine thing” the
South is gonna love this!
PART III: Our Day
I will try to be brief since I have
already been so wordy. We got a campsite
in Camden Hills State Park. It is a
lovely wooded campground with hot showers, electric and water hookups and wifi! We have not stayed in
a state park like this. After lunch and
a short rest we drove up to the summit of Mt. Battie (780’) which is a bit
smaller than what we were used to out west, but the view was amazing. We could see Cadillac Mountain (the crazy one
we climbed in Acadia), the town of Camden and its harbor along with many
beautiful houses, churches, islands and boats.
Oh – and the Atlantic Ocean. I
would have lingered, but the others were ready to see the town up close. We ended up in a used bookstore (Stone Soup) -
again. I need to stop going inside those
places. It was a tiny two-room store
with books shelved from floor to ceiling and stacks everywhere on the
floor. It felt wonderful. It was neatly organized though and I quickly
found some Jane Austen, Emily Dickinson and Ray Bradbury. (I have this memory of liking Dandelion Wine
that surfaced with the end of summer. I
don’t even remember what it was about.)
We bought some produce at the market and some fudge at The Smiling
Cow. Dinner at camp, a nice fire and now
bed. Good night.
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