Birthday Festivities

Wallace's brother Louis, and his wife Deanna, along with Travis and LaJuana, flew in to celebrate my birthday and to see this part of Maine. The traditional pose in front of the visitor cabin at Moosehorn National Wildlife Refuge.

August 1, my birthday, they arrived here at 7:00am.  I prepared a breakfast with hearty breakfast casserole, biscuits and hot coffee which we ate at the picnic table outside.  After gifts and their birthday song, we loaded up for the day with our first stop at headquarters for introductions.

Day one...was a trip to Campobello Island, Franklin Delano Roosevelt's "beloved island," and summer home.  We needed to drive to the top of the island to catch the Bay of Fundy's 28' high tide.  This is where the East Quoddy Lighthouse is located and I wanted them to see it surrounded by water.  After viewing and picture taking, we backtracked to tour the cottage where we spent time waiting for low tide.  You will see why later.

At the visitor center, notice the logo, middle top.  The letters FDR form a sailboat, his favorite pastime.

This is inside, up and over the counter, a young FDR in his canoe that was given to him by the Pasamaquoddy chief.  Click on any picture to enlarge.

This is a photo of the whole family that was taken in 1920.





We watched the 15 minute introductory film and visited the exhibit room.

Then we walked over to the cottage (back view) where we toured the 34 room memorabilia filled home.  Franklin came to the island in 1883 at the age of 1 and spent most of his summers on the island.  The summer of 1921, he contracted polio-myelitis at the age of 39.  After five weeks, he was carried off the island on a stretcher where a boat took him to Eastport, Maine and he was put aboard a train for New York.

This is a view from the back yard.  Friar's Head (tiny rock formation at the base of the ledge) and fish weirs (the circular enclosures in the water) are for fish farming purposes.

We also toured the Hubbard cottage that is next door.  A beautiful window from the dining room looks out on the bay.  That is Louis, the person in the window, who was outside looking in.

Now we travel back toward the lighthouse where we came upon this scene and just had to pull in the driveway for this picture. The owners were very gracious to these friendly Texans who invaded his yard (we asked first).  This is something we all enjoyed, visiting with the locals.

By the time we got to the lighthouse, it was low tide.  This is when you have access to the lighthouse by hiking down two flights of these stairs, and walking on the ocean floor.

Going back up to go down again!!!

Here we are surrounded by rock weed.

After the lighthouse, we crossed back over the FDR International Bridge that took us back into Lubec, Maine.  After a tour of the town, we drove over to visit the West Quoddy Lighthouse.

Lighthouses were requested and today we showed them 4: Mulholland, the Spark Plug and both East and West Quoddy.

We stopped at Uncle Kippy's for chowder before calling it a day.

When we pulled in the driveway, there was this surprise placed by the front door from "Moosehorn Folks!"

Day two and three will come later.

Until next time...