Our weather has been all over the place lately. 70 degrees during the day, 27 at night. It’s temperature whiplash but it makes for some interesting foggy mornings.
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There’s something eerily peaceful about waking up to fog.
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It lets me ease into the day slowly.
In other news… my husband went searching for something without asking me the other day and tore everything apart in the process. He laid waste to our utility closet and was halfway though the kitchen junk drawer when I walked in.
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Ironically he organized said drawer in the process and now I can’t find anything.
Pulled it out from under the day lily undergrowth just as proud as could be.
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Not that he knew what to do with it.
We have a lot of mice here in the country, and yes… they’re sweet, but they also try to find a way in our nice warm house in the winter and that I can do without.
His Lordship’s mother would prefer he catch and quickly dispatch the rodents to Mickey Mouse heaven but Lord Dudley is a pacifist and prefers to make friends instead.
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He and his new buddy hung out like this for a while … and then went their separate ways.
I love finding new cocktail recipes but sometimes I wonder where the names come from.
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This is one of those times.
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And since I’m always posting photos of sunrises and sunsets, here’s a different spin.
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Moonset.
🌜
The mosquito is often referred to as the Maine state bird since our state has ample wooded areas and lakes for it to breed. They can get pretty large up north, but I have to admit the one we saw on someone’s front lawn the other day takes the prize.
Another beautiful fall day, another scenic drive in the never ending search for good beer.
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North to Bangor.
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To the Bangor Beer Company.
Hidden behind the mall, in the back of a Chinese restaurant… it was an odd little place.
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With a line of old pinball machines and some quirky art.
The beer? Maybe we’re too picky… we try a lot of craft breweries and may set our standards too high… but we found this selection dishwater flat and not at all interesting.
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Elderflower grapefruit martini for me.
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We expected the sesame chicken appetizer to be better seeing that it came from the large Asian restaurant in front, but it was so tough and stringy we didn’t bother ordering a full meal.
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The men’s room floor made my husband smile and snap a picture, but that’s not reason enough to ever visit this brewery again.
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Passing through downtown Bangor…
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We grabbed a quick sandwich and took the back roads home.
Leaving Sugarloaf without having secured a late lunch, we changed direction and headed for Rangeley.
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The town is named after the lake, one of Maine’s largest, and I felt sure we could find a decent restaurant there.
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Blog title aside, we parked next to some very green grass and entered a likely looking spot.
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With a welcoming front porch and some stellar trees..
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It was a bit brisk to sit outside so we ventured in.
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There were tables with nice views…
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So my husband headed straight for the bar.
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Where the view wasn’t as nice but the autumn sangria made up for it.
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The staff wore these shirts…
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But I didn’t, so we moved on to tater kegs with chipotle aioli.
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These were great but my husband wasn’t pleased with the pub food only menu, he wanted more of a meal.
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Next stop.
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The cranberry mule was lovely.
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And though I passed on the banana bread old fashioned? I thought of you Mark.
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Sadly, even though the loon/bear totem pole was interesting … the food was not.
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My fish sandwich was so thin it was flipping itself off.
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And not finding much more in the way of full meals here than he did at the first place, my husband’s chicken tenders were flat, over breaded and clearly frozen. He sent them back and we moved on.
Giving up on a good meal, we headed for home.
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Where it started to rain and pretty much put an end to our leaf peeping.
On our road trip to the Carrabassett Valley we saw a sign for a bridge.
But not just any bridge, no…
The Wire Suspension Bridge spanning the Carrabassett River in New Portland is a unique structure, the only survivor of four such bridges built in Maine in the 1800’s and probably the only such bridge still standing in the United States.
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Built in 1866, it’s definitely unique.
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The bridge was renovated in 1961, when the tower bases were capped with concrete, the towers were rebuilt, steel suspender rods were replaced by steel cables, and a new timber deck was installed. The tower framing timbers and main support cables are the original material. The span between towers is 198 feet.
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As you walk across it you can feel it sway .
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And when you watch a car drive across it the wood literally bends under the weight.
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Under the archway?
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Floor to ceiling graffiti.
Boo to that.
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Yay for autumn color though.
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An engineering marvel in its day….
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It’s stood the test of time and is still in use 158 years later.
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😊
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Where there's only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous.
River's world..... 