due east

We just arrived home from our annual family trip to Maine. This year, because our usual rental house was unavailable, we decided to try somewhere new: Eastport. The town of Eastport is pretty remote—about as far east as you can go and not far from the New Brunswick border. It took us 9 hours to get there from Burlington.

If you're looking to get away from it all, this is the place to do it. The last hour and a half of our drive took us through a great pine forest on route 9. Nothing but woods and road for miles and miles. It was breathtaking and terrifying at the same time. Before we even arrived at our rental house, our phones switched into Atlantic time zone and started picking up the Canadian phone carrier, so we had to turn them off or else be charged international roaming fees. No cell service for a week. I was plenty okay with that.

The house we rented for a song was situated right on Passamaquoddy Bay (a smaller bay in the Bay of Fundy) overlooking Deer Island, New Brunswick across the way. The tides in the Bay of Fundy are some of the biggest and most intense in the world. When the tide was out, it went out far far far, leaving us with tons of muddy tidal flats to explore and find crabs. When the tide was in, it came in up up up, all the way up to the edge of the lawn leading to the house.

The tides factor in very much to what you can see or do in the area, a fact that is both interesting and irritating at the same time.

One day, we took a ferry boat over to Deer Island. We were hoping to catch a glimpse of Old Sow, the largest naturally occurring whirlpool in the Western Hemisphere. We caught the ferry at low tide, which meant we had to walk down a long beach to where the ferry was docked in the wet sand. It took us forever to even find the ferry, since it was not well-marked and the boat was just pulling away as we arrived. But the fine gentleman running the ferry saw us and had the captain come back to pick us up. We hopped on the boat, paid the gent our $3 and enjoyed a lovely semi-private boat ride across the bay. There were only 4 other people on the boat besides us.

About a half hour later, we docked on another wet beach, this time on Canadian soil. Before we could get off the boat, two border guards jumped on and approached us to do the usual border crossing questionnaire and presenting of passports. Colin wanted to ask for a stamp, but figured they probably didn't carry them! It was one of the most bizarre border crossings I've ever done. But also pretty cool. As we headed toward the beach, the ferry gent warned us: "When you get on the ferry to come home,  make sure you see me on the boat. Otherwise it's the wrong boat and you'll end up on Campobello Island!"

We didn't see Old Sow. The best time to see it is right before high tide as all of the tidal waters converge and bubble and swirl into a magnificent funnel. But we did see plenty of wild-life, making it some of the best $3 ever spent. Turns out, going at low-ish tide was a boon, because as the tides started to come in and the waters of Old Sow began to churn, the porpoises and seals gathered in large numbers, presumably to find their lunch. We sat by a small lighthouse overlooking the bay and Moose Island on the US side, as the porpoises danced and played right before our eyes. An eagle soared above us out and over the water. And even the cormorants had their fair share of fishies for lunch.

The Deer Island ferry ride was my favorite part of the weeklong trip, which included two more excursions to Canada—Campobello Island, where we saw more eagles and whales and picked a ton of wild blackberries on a hike, and St. Andrews by Sea, which you can get to easily by car. We explored the small town of Eastport, enjoyed some pretty delicious (albeit very rich) seafood and went hiking at Shackford Head State Park, where at the overlooks we could see many working fish farms in Cobscook Bay and also where we were attacked by stinging red fire ants (not a highlight of the trip, but a good story I guess).

We even visited a mustard museum at Raye's Mustard, the only stone ground mustard factory left in the US. Why mustard in Eastport? Sardines! There used to be over 20 sardine plants in Eastport alone, and all of the factories packed the sardines in Raye's Mustard. Now that the American sardine industry is no more (the last plant closed a couple of years ago), Raye's has entered into the specialty foods market and they make some pretty amazing mustards there. Being mustard people, we bought 4 large jars and probably would've been happy for more.

Back at the house, we enjoyed our daily explorations to the beach and every night the boys built a bonfire on the beach, which most of the gals passed up in order to watch some guilty British pleasures on TV—Sherlock Holmes and Fawlty Towers. But on the last night, we let the kids stay up late and we all went down to the fire after dinner to make s'mores.

The next morning, we headed home. We were ready. I think if I didn't have a child and I really did want to get away from it all, I could have spent days and days there happily writing and painting. But with a 1 1/2 year old, by the end, we were all ready to get back to our routines—and civilization.

a pregnant pause

Where have I been the last 9 months? I've been pregnant. And something about the experience has caused me to direct my focus inward, rather than to externalize. I haven't been drawn to my writing for some time now. But I know that my writing is a part of me and as I near the end of my pregnancy, I feel the pull to my keyboard once again. Perhaps it's the knowledge that this little rumbling, tumbling meatloaf inside me will not be my own anymore as it leaves its world of one (me) and comes outside for the first time.

When that happens, I hope that I will want to write even more. For now, I am writing to use up time. Isn't that terrible? I never have enough time, it seems, and now that I've stopped working, and have all the time in the world to myself, I wish I didn't have soooo much free time.

Anywho, all the veterans say to make the most of these quiet, restful days alone before the baby comes. So I'm doing my best. I will go to as many yoga classes as I can. I will get a massage. I will get my toes done. I will bake cookies.

I most certainly will not vacuum or mop or clean the tub. Well, maybe I'll clean the tub. We'll see...

Since I haven't been posting, I thought I'd do some highlights over the next few days if it's still just me and the couch. Last month, Col and I took a trip to East Hampton, New York to surprise my friend Brooksie at her baby shower. We called it our "baby moon—the last hurrah—and got a nice room at an inn in town. We visited the beach and just enjoyed ourselves. Col convinced me to dip my feet in the water (in November!). It actually wasn't that cold when it was just my feet, but then all of a sudden, a big swell came in and soaked me up to my knees. Kind of exhilarating actually (thank goodness we weren't too far from the car).

whirlwind Austria weekend

Colin was in Austria for work last weekend and our luck so aligned that I had the chance to fly out and meet him for a long weekend. I took off Wednesday afternoon. Ran into some minor travel troubles, which resulted in an unexpected detour to London and some uncomfortable negotiating with a German shuttle driver. But finally, three flights and a 3-hour shuttle ride later, I made it to Innsbruck Thursday night just in time for dinner.

It was dark and cloudy when I arrived, and so I didn't really see the breathtaking landscape around me till the next day. Innsbruck is an old European city tucked amidst the looming, jagged Alps. The peaks are soooo high, they took my breath away.

We went snowboarding at Stubai Glacier. We had to take a gondola ride up and up and up over 9,000 feet just to get to the base lodge. There was powder, powder everywhere! My thighs were burning, but it was so amazing.

When we got back into town, we went to visit the Burton store in Innsbruck and went and settled in to the apartment we were staying in above the store. Then we went into Old Innsbruck to explore the Christmas Market. Let's just say we went a little crazy with the ornaments.

On Saturday, one of the highlights was having sausage for all three meals. Amazing. And we walked up to the Alpenzoo and saw tons of amazing Alpine creatures—wolves, brown bear, otters, eagles, vultures.

And then it was time to go home.

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who's afraid? not me

This week is the week of overcoming fears. Why now? It just so happens I have the opportunity to go outside of my comfort zone. So I am going to break my routines and try some new things. Some big, some not so big. This is going to be life-changing, whatever the outcome. Anyways, I started small today with a couple of things...


Fear #1: Car Repair
Status: Conquered squarely
Okay, so I know that my engineer grandfather is going to roll over in his grave when I admit this, but I have this strange fear of fixing anything on my car myself. It took me years to even feel comfortable pumping gas. I think it stems from the fear of doing something wrong and causing the whole thing to blow up. Any-who, speaking of blowing things up, I have never even blown up the tires myself. Until today, I didn't even know how to figure out what pressure they were supposed to be. But one of my tires was low and Colin is out of town. So I thought to myself, "You know, this is one thing I can probably do."

I looked in my car manual to find out the pressure. It told me to look inside the gas flap. And, tad-dah! There it was. There were two sets of numbers, 1 for front, 1 for back, 1 for heavy load, 1 for light load. Well, the first one was easy: Front! The second one I just picked one: that part caused my heart to beat a bit faster. But not nearly as fast as when I drove to the gas station, turned on the air pump and tried attaching the dang thing to the tire. (Again, I was picturing explosions left and right.) But finally I got it to work. I even figured out how to use the pressure gauge. And I did it! Done! Cross that one off my list.

Fear #2: Home Repair
Status: Still out to jury
Again, I think this one stems from the fear of doing something wrong and causing the whole house to fall down. But is a crack in the tub really that scary? Only if I do nothing about it and it starts to leak and cause the entire floor below it to rot. So I went to the hardware store and got a tub epoxy repair kit. Ok, the "epoxy" part sounds scary, but I'm planning to do it tomorrow night. Fingers crossed.


Fear #3: Traveling alone in a foreign country where I don't speak the language
Status: It's all happening
Let's get one thing straight: I am proud to say I've done quite a bit of foreign travel by myself. But it's always been to a country where I spoke the language. If not, I've always been with someone who does. Well, I'm going to have to just get a little brazen and assert my English, because soon I'll be going to Austria for a few days. And while I will be meeting my lovely husband on the other end, I first have to arrive in Munich, Germany, find the shuttle that goes for 2 hours to some tiny village in the Alps, make sure they have my reservation and get on the dang thing. Then I have to find my husband in that tiny village. But that seems like the easy part somehow.

Fear #4: Wild card
Status: Still to be determined
While I'm in Austria, I want to do at least one, maybe two things that really make my heart beat. What will they be?

end-of-summers

When we were kids, I remember being on the road a lot. On the road to visit family. On the road to move. On the road to visit old places we once lived. Oftentimes, those road trips happened towards the end of summer. At this point though, my memories of those hours upon hours of riding in the car sort of blend together into one long road trip. On that road trip, Mummy points out the flowers growing on the side of the road. "End-of-summers" she used to call them. They were a soft periwinkle and waved to and fro in the breeze, still warm from the late summer sun. Tilting softy leaving a long shadow in start contrast on the gray pavement below—a still-life paradox that evoked joy and melancholy at the same time.

Only fitting, then, that to this day, my summers "end" in a road trip get-away. It's bittersweet. Only this year, we had two trips: one to Maine and one to Cape Cod.

Last weekend was Maine, Hannah, Brian, Isaac, Kevin, Emi, Sapphire, Colin and I hit the road on a Wednesday night and headed back to our old stomping grounds: Boothbay Harbor. We rented an old 1800s house on an inlet on Southport Island, just off of Boothbay. It was right near Hendricks Head beach where Mummy used to bring us girls as children. (Hendricks Head is where she brought us to see the jellyfish spawning at night and where we played "let's pretend" on Commercial Rock.) I haven't been back there since I was 7—over 20 years ago. Can you believe that not much has changed?

It was quite something to bring Colin to that place to experience with him some of those old memories—the handmade taffy machine in Boothbay Harbor, the sour apple flavored popcorn, the town trolley, to watch him jump off Commercial Rock into the seaweed beards below. We made new memories. Here's my favorite: the house where we stayed was called Watersong II. It was over 200 years old and still had a lot of the original plaster and wood work. It had character for sure! Hannah and Emi were convinced that there were ghosts in the attic. Any-who. The house sat perched on a slope leading down to a dock right on an inlet that led on one side to the little bay at Hendricks Head and on the other side towards Boothbay Harbor. There were two kayaks that we were welcome to use so long as we wore life jackets.

On the last day of our stay, Hannah and Brian had left early, but the rest of us decided to go to the little beach down the road from the house. Colin and I took the kayaks there. It was low tide and as we maneuvered toward the beach, through a maze of rocks and seaweed beards, we arrived at a place maybe 5 feet deep where the water was so clear and crisp and cold that you could see every living thing at the bottom. It was mostly rocks and mussel shells. But I spotted an empty sea urchin shell that was just gorgeous and pristine. I wanted it. But it was impossible to pick it up with the paddles and we decided to keep going and try for it on the way back.

We hung out at the beach for a while. The tide came in. By the time we got back to the place where I had seen the sea urchin, the water was so deep that we couldn't even touch bottom with the paddles. But we could still see the shell! All of a sudden, Colin did something that really surprised me. He handed me his phone, paddled up to one of the rocks, used to ledge to hoist himself out of the kayak and dove into the frigid water clothes and all. He did all of this before I even had time to react and resurfaced with the beautiful shell in hand.

"My hero!" I proclaimed. "But how on earth are you going to get back in the boat?" He managed though and we paddled back, me with the sea urchin nestled between my knees. My heart was throbbing with a new kind of admiration. The whole thing was just so romantic—like out of a cheesy rom-com. And now I have my beautiful shell to prove his most amazing manliness.

Still no sign of the End-of-Summers though. That didn't come till later...

hamptons, friend time and some magic party fun

I realize that if I'm not careful this is going to become the blog of Penelope posting her pictures from different beach locations. So be it. It's summer, we're not taking a real vacation since we had the honeymoon and so to the beach on the weekends we go!

Our latest weekend trip was more than just your typical car-ride to visit friends. For one, we went a little further to East Hampton to visit my friend Brooskie and her husband Chris. For two, we didn't drive. We flew to New York and then took the train out to the Hamptons! How very grown up of us.

We brought the sun gods with us. And spent hours upons lovely hours lounging at the beach, dipping in the ocean, people watching. There was a lot to see, that's for sure. And on Friday, after a day soaking up sun and salt water, we were just craving some fresh seafood.

So we went to a local chowder house, ordered tons of yummy takeout and brought it to the beach where we built a fire, ate our dinner and sipped on champagne all under a beautiful moon with the waves crashing nearby. Yes, very magical! Afterwards we made s'mores.

Saturday: more beach, more swimming. Later, Chris busted out his Shelby Mustang and took us for a ride. Holy Cow! We rode that baby to their friends' house. The friends with a ton of kayaks. They took us out on the bay where we watched fireworks.

Could this weekend get any more magical? Why, yes it could!

Turned out that our friends Becca and Henry were out in East Hampton the same weekend. Becca was there for work doing some PR for Paul Rudd and his new movie Dinner for Schmucks. She put us on the guest list for the premiere afterparty, so after kayaking, we tailed it back to East Hampton in the Shelby, threw on our party outfits and showed up at an oceanside mansion UNfashionably late since the party was almost wrapping up, but we got a good hour in catching up with our friends, drinking free drinks and spotting celebrities (none of whom I knew or recognized, except for Paul Rudd who was sporting a gnarly beard).

The next day, Col and Chris woke up early, since there were finally waves and got a good morning in surfing. Meanwhile, Brooksie and I drove to Amagansett to the Hampton Chutney Co. and got breakfast dosas (an Indian crepe-like wrap with egg and cheese and lots of goodies plus chutney inside). For a drink, I got an iced cardamom coffee, which was pretty much one of the most amazing coffees I've ever had.

On the way back, Brooksie pointed Kelly "NYC Housewife" Bensimon's house (we saw her in person downtown just a few minutes later). Did a teeny weeny bit of shopping. Then went to Georgica beach to get a few more sun-hours before hopping back on the train to go home. Col and Chris surfed some more. I tried to read, but really all I wanted to do was lay there and soak it all in—how lucky we are to have such great friends, to be in such a beautiful place, to have the means and the time for little weekend get-aways like this. Amazing.

Here are a bunch of pics that Brooksie & Chris took. We were took busy doing nothing to take any of our own:

cape cod pics

We went to Cape Cod for 4th of July weekend to spend time with our friends Mark & Kathleen. What a beautiful weekend: got lots of beach time, biked from town to town, cooled down with shaved ice, finally met M&K's dog Miller who is awesome, saw The Graduation for the first time and saw this gigantic moth by the front door.

family weekend

Colin and I just got home from a weekend visiting his parents in Katonah, NY and the rest of the fam in Fairfield, CT. We try to get down there a few times a year, which never feels like enough. Because every time we go down, it feels like so long since we've all seen each other. And the kids are so much bigger than they were the last time.

Still, I always think that one benefit of those trips is that we get to see everyone all together in one weekend. It's like a big family reunion every time and feels so special.

And here is little Lily, our newest niece, who last we saw was just a little lump and is now a little person (mistaking one kind of bottle for another!)


I think I take for granted having my family so close. My sisters and I live in the same town, just streets away. Because I have my family nearby, I forget sometimes that Colin doesn't. It means so much to him to makes these trips to see his family, to show me the places he used to hang out with his friends. To invite me into his favorite childhood memories.

Leaving on Sunday is always difficult—and always comes too soon. So we try to pepper the journey with fun and interesting things. This time, Colin brought me to one of his favorite pizza places Portofino's to get a slice before the drive. I've never seen such a humongous pizza slice in my whole life. They were at least a foot long. This is just two slices but they had to cut them in half so we could eat them.



As we neared Burlington the sun was just about to set over the Adirondacks. A beautiful view to welcome us home.

montreal lunch

Well, we didn't get up at sparrow fart, but we did go to Montreal for a late lunch yesterday. We arrived around 1 and went straight to Rue St. Denis for lunch at L'Express. I've always wanted to go there because I've heard such great things about it. The ambiance is like a traditional French bistro—we felt like we were back in Paris. And just an hour and a half drive away! The menu offers all of the classics: croque monsieur, chevre chaud salad, steak frites... but we weren't blown away by the food. In fact, I think the best part of the meal was our espressos at the end. But we didn't really care. It was the perfect getaway.

Did a little shopping after lunch, hopped in the car and we were back home before 8pm.

Seriously, I don't know why we don't go there more often. It's so close and so refreshing. Every time we go, we say, "We should do this more often."

our pei road trip

We just got back from a long weekend road trip to Prince Edward Island in Canada. That's right I said, long weekend. We must be insane—the drive is about 14 hours—we were on the road for 3 out of the four days. But that's why I called it a road trip. And it was all totally worth it. I had some of the most amazing food I've had in a long time. And so much fresh seafood! Mussels, lobster, crab, oysters, shrimp, trout, salmon, tuna... the seafood was endless and delicious.

Here's the Google map we followed:



The drive was half the fun. The first day, we drove to St. Andrews in New Brunswick and stayed at the historical Fairmont Algonquin. The St. Andrews By the Sea is a cute town, but there's not much going on. Or maybe it's because it was later than we thought. Nobody told us about the time change, but we finally figured it out on the second day. We ended up eating a late dinner at the Algonquin and I tried their Passamaquoddy Bay Beeze, it was good!

On the second day, we drove to PEI and to our inn—The Inn at Bay Fortune. We loved our little room, which came with its own fireplace. That came in handy during the chilly evenings.

The Inn apparently has one of the best restaurants on the island, so we ate there on Friday night. Lots of the ingredients were right from the island, except for my trout, which was from across the water in Nova Scotia.

The chef sent us a little nibbly while we perused the menu. It was a creamy cheesey type thing with trout on top of a homemade potato chip.

We started with fresh oysters that were out of this world. Instead of being served on the half shell, they were served in a briny cold broth with crunchy vegetables. The salad was picked from the garden out back right before dinner. The trout was served with the most amazing baby vegetables and the most delicious and tender potatoes I've ever had in my life (PEI is famous for their potatoes). They may have been poached in butter... Colin had seared tuna.

We drank a local white wine with our dinner from the PEI Rossignol Winery. It was surprisingly good, crisp and apple-y and went amazingly well with the seafood. I tried to bring a bottle back, but we couldn't find a liquor store open on Sunday morning and that's the only place they sell wine there.

Dessert for me was a truffle chocolate tart with roasted pear and Colin had homemade ice cream sandwiches. Mmm, I'm getting so hungry writing this!

By the time dinner was done, 3 hours had gone by and we were ready to crash. Luckily, our room was just steps away... and the fire was ready to go.

On Saturday, we went to Nicks & Sam's wedding at Red Point a little way up the coast. The ceremony was on the beach by Sam's family's property and it was just so perfect. There was a bagpipe player leading Sam to the beach. Nicks wrote the best vows I've ever heard. I definitely cried. I always cry at weddings.

We had starved ourselves all day, because we heard the food was going to be amazing. And it was. Full raw bar with mussels, oysters, lobster, crab and shrimp. Sushi, dumplings, scallop ceviche and more of those potato chip type nibbly things. We were like vultures—we ate so much! Dinner was awesome and there was even a cheese plate course. But at that point we were stuffed and had to dance it all off.

We never did make it to Anne of Green Gables country, it was too far away from where we were staying. But I have no regrets.

Next morning, we headed back to Vermont. It took us all day and into the night. A whirlwind! But worth trip.

Prince Edward Island Road Trip

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