Jules’ Journal: Maine is my FAVORITE!
By: Julianne Lillie
8/7/22: We had a 20 minute drive into Bar Harbor from our campground (Trenton, ME) and got to the church parking lot by 9:45am. We parked and walked around downtown and went in a few shops. Maine is known for their blueberries, so we decided to buy some blueberry herbal tea from the Bar Harbor Tea Co. (btw – It was absolutely delicious!) We then made it back to the church for the 11am service at St. Savior’s Episcopal Church for worship. The congregation was smaller than usual as this area was experiencing a heat wave (upper 90s) so many of the local went to the 7am service. You see, there is no A/C in the church (or really anywhere on Mount Dessert Island) as they hardly ever experience this type of heat. The church had 3 fans going which didn’t do much in that huge cathedral. But they thankfully did provide hand-held paper fans. Despite the heat, the congregation was extremely welcoming! And the church was breathtakingly beautiful!
They had over 30 stained glass windows and at least 6 of them were Tiffany’s stained glass. Worship was very formal, different from what we’re used to. But it was very good for the kids to experience a different flavor of church. I taught Jett how to read a Hymnal. And he later mentioned that there was a lot of standing, kneeling, and reading aloud that he wasn’t used to. I’m so glad they were able to experience it. It really was a special time for me to be able to worship amidst such beautiful art and rich history.
After the service was over, one of the Parish ladies, Diane, introduced herself and asked if we’d like a tour of the stained glass windows. We of course said, “Yes!” We learned that Diane is 82 and was baptized as an infant in that church. It’s been her home church her whole life and she vividly remembers when many of the windows were commissioned as memorials of a loved one and donated to the church. She walked us all around and shared the stories and pointed out why Tiffany’s stained glass was so different and special. The technique he used was less painting and more layering of glass with pearlescence and shimmering streaks which is much more time consuming and skillfully difficult. And I must say, his pieces truly do stand out as so much more stunning! See below examples:
The Last Supper Window & Joseph's Window:
Memorial Window - this particular window uses the angles of the light. From where I was standing his robe looks red. But stepping just 5 paces to my right the robes look black.
Look at these 5 windows in a row below: Can you spot the 3 Tiffany's windows? (Answer at the end of the blog!)
We were so thankful for Diane taking her time to share her knowledge and passion with us. What a treat! We learned that she hadn’t given a tour in over 2 years (since COVID), but on a whim she decided today to reinstate the tours… so lucky us!
After church we went home for lunch and we enjoyed some much needed “down time” for laundry, cleaning, chores, grading schoolwork, etc. Jason made smash burgers on the grill for dinner and we celebrated his 43rdbirthday with homemade cards and a gift!
Jaycie made a homemade pop-up card for daddy.
Jett's card was an illustration of him and daddy as gnomes.
8/8/22: We woke up super early so we could enter Cadillac Mountain at Acadia National Park at 7:30am. (Timed entry) We drove to the summit & hiked the loop for incredible views. The fog obstructed some of our views, but thankful for what we could see!
View from the Summit of Cadillac Mountain:
Panoramic:
After that, we headed to Jordan Pond & biked around there a few miles. Then had some blueberry tea & “popovers” at Jordan Pond House.
Popovers were new to all 4 of us, but we all ended up liking them! They are made from eggs, flour, and milk and are baked in muffin tins in a very hot oven. Air trapped in the batter makes the inside hollow and doughy while the outside bakes to a crispy, flaky perfection. Served at the Jordan Pond House for over 100 years, they are traditionally eaten hot with strawberry jam & butter. See photo below:
Then we headed to the Wild Gardens of Acadia where we got to see some carnivorous plants such as the Pitcher’s plant. We also saw lots of frogs in the bog.
Pitcher's Plant - Carnivorous. If you zoom in closely... you might be able to see some of the bugs its trapped for lunch.
Frog in a bog. Sounds like the title of a new Dr. Suess book!
We then drove by Sandy beach (too crowded) & stopped at Thunder Hole. We bouldered all in and around it while checking out tide pools filled with small crabs & snails. It was so fun!
Small crab & snails in a tide pool:
We dropped the bikes off at the RV and then headed out to find a nice restaurant to treat Jason on his actual birthday. We ended up eating yummy lobster at the Chart Room out on the patio overlooking the bay. Kids played on the beach while we waited on our food. It was a beautiful evening and perfect ending of our day.
8/9/22: We arrived to the pier at 9am and it was raining and super dreary! But we geared up for the rain & were ready for a day on the water! We had a private boat tour just the 4 of us and Captain Kelly on the "Jennifer Ann."
Miraculously it stopped raining once we boarded the boat and never rained on us again! (Thank you, Lord!) We boated all throughout Bar Harbor, the Acadian Islands, Frenchman’s Bay & Schoodic Peninsula.
We saw 2 lighthouses: Egg Rock Lighthouse & Winter Harbor Light.
Egg Rock Lighthouse - Voted Maine's ugliest lighthouse 2 years in a row! You can see a juvenile bald eagle flying in in the photo.
Winter Harbor Light - now its s a privately owned residence.
We also saw a TON of wildlife: Gray seals, Harbor seals, School of porpoises, 1 huge Mola Mola (Ocean sunfish – google it!), 2 juvenile bald eagles, 1 mature bald eagle, & lots of loons, ducks, Auks (1st cousin to puffins), and seagulls. We even saw 1 seagull swoop down and steal a fish right out of a loons mouth! It was like national geographic… I couldn’t get my camera in time! It was wild!
Looks as though these seals are posing for the camera!
Is it a Shark? No, it's the Mola Mola fin we saw. We tried to stalk it to get a better look, but ended up scaring it off. (Seriously... google this fish. It's super weird looking and HUGE!)
After the boat tour, we got our Jr Ranger badges and set out to explore the underwater cave at low tide. We ended up seeing several starfish & sea cucumbers. I ended up slipping and falling on the slick moss covered rocks. My right hand braced my fall and got all cut and scraped up. (It still hurts!) I’m just glad it wasn’t any serious injury!
Got their badges:
Exploring the underwater cave at low tide:
Starfish we saw in a tide pool:
After the cave, we strolled along the Sand Bar (at low tide) that connects Bar Harbour to Bar Island. It’s only accessible 1.5 hours before and after low tide. It disappears underwater after that! Jett built a tower arch thingy out of rocks. Jaycie and I collected shells, a few stones, and some driftwood for art projects. (The sand bar is not managed by the National Park.)
Sandbar connecting Bar Harbor to Bar Island. Bar Island is a part of Acadia National Park and the boundaries are identified once you reach the island.
Sand bar:
Found some pretty shells and even found a whole one:
Jett's stone arch/tower:
Jason found a whole crab in tact that was dead. It was neat to see it up close without risk of being pinched! Jaycie enjoyed watching all of the snails and hermit crabs in the tide pools.
On our stroll back to the truck we came across an interesting store where you can pick an oyster & they open it for you to retrieve the pearl inside. Then you can pick out a cage charm to house your pearl on a necklace. Jaycie and I decided to do it! I let Jett pick out my oyster for me. After we used the long grabber to get them out of the tank, the lady cut them open & searched for the pearl. The one Jett picked out for me ended up having 2 pearls inside! One was 6.9mm & the other 6.2 mm. (Average size is 5.5mm) The lady said my oyster was her first “twin” of the day! Then she opened Jaycie’s and low & behold she also had twins! Both of hers measured 6.5mm. I chose a swirl cage charm. And since I had 2, I gave my smaller one to Jett and he picked out a nautical cage charm. Jaycie chose a sea turtle cage charm. It was a very neat, unique, & memorable experience to commemorate such a special trip! Jaycie later said that the pearls were the highlight of our whole trip so far! Here's a photo with all of our new pearl necklaces on:
8/10/22: We decided to sleep in a tad this morning! Left at 9:30am & headed to the College of the Atlantic Museum of Natural History. It was very informational about all of the animals native to Maine. The college students actually created all of the exhibits & dioramas complete with taxidermy and all! At the entrance there was a giant sperm whale skull - see photo below:
Jaycie spent 2 hours taking notes at each and every exhibit!
We also explored the college grounds… learning garden, old castle (supposedly haunted), etc.
Turret's Castle:
Chipmunk seen in the garden:
After a quick lunch at the RV, we headed to explore more of Acadia over on the Schoodic Peninsula. We drove the scenic byway & stopped at all the lookouts for the beautiful views. We visited the Rockefeller Welcome Center that used to be an old naval communications station. We got to try out sending & receiving morse code signals to eachother and decoding them. It was pretty fun! Then headed out for some bouldering at low tide. We made it all the way across to Little Moose Island & trekked out to the tip of the island. Here's some of our views while bouldering to and around Little Moose Island:
We encountered a wild porcupine walking near the road on our way back. We watched him for awhile – so cute!
We’ve never seen one in the wild before! Ended our day with tuning into Cedarpoint students online to get a good dose of God’s word! And looking forward to new adventures ahead in a new state… Massachusetts!
Jaycie’s Bunny Hoppin’ News: Church & Museums!
By: Jaycie Lillie
8/7/22: We went to this church with pretty stained glass. There was a lot of praying together and singing together. And also standing up and then sitting again. [It’s hard to believe how all these old people stood up so many times without trouble!] It was a work out! Not to mention it was 98 degrees without air conditioning.
We also went shopping downtown. Momma got a sweatshirt and some yummy blueberry tea with Maine blueberries. [It was very good!] My favorite part of the whole trip was getting to pick out an oyster then make a necklace using the pearl from the oyster. I got a turtle necklace. It is super cute!
Then we celebrated Daddy’s birthday for dinner. We gave him gifts and sang to him. No cake though. [Boo! Daddy doesn’t like cake.]
8/10/22: On the last day we went to a cool Museum of National History. It had displays of all of the animals in the area and state of Maine. Then after some detailed note taking [by me] we came back to the trailer for lunch. We ate fast then left to go to another Rockefeller museum thing. I got to play with morse code! We then drove around to the Schoodic Peninsula. After finding a parking spot, we bouldered and hiked over to an island at low tide. We took lots of pictures. We saw a porcupine on the side of the road on our way back. Crazy! [we didn’t get too close to it!] After our hike, we were all tired and came home. Those were some highlights of our Maine/Acadia Park trip!
Jett’s Wild Flight: Boats & Pearls!
By: Jett Lillie
8/9/22: We all woke up early and we got layers on that made us look like marshmallows! In the car, we looked out of the window until we got there. Then we went to the dock and got on our boat, the “Jennifer Ann.” Our captain’s name was Kelly, and we saw two lighthouses. One was really weird, where the other one was more normal. We saw a lot of playful seals that were flipping up and down and looked like a “wack-a-mole” game in the water. Kelly, our captain, said there was a giant sunfish called the Mola Mola that was spotted earlier this morning. My mom looked it up on google and I recognized it because I caught one in my Animal Crossing video game before. Later we ended up seeing the Mola Mola’s fin in the water. On the boat tour we saw a cave, which we later climbed and mommy hurt her hand. After the cave we walked the sand bar, which is where you can walk across to another island [Bar Island] when it is low tide. My dad and I skipped rocks and built rock towers. We had fun but it was time to head back before the sand bar is under water. On our way back we went to a store and I got a color changing shirt. My dad found a pearl store. My mom and sister wanted to do it so I picked out mommy’s oyster and the lady opened it. Inside there were two pearls! The lady said it was her first twin of the day! She cleaned the pearls and opened Jaycie’s oyster. She got twins, too! My mom picked out her necklace cage and with her other pearl I got one too. My mom got a spiral cage while I got a pirate steering wheel cage and my sister got a turtle cage. I hope I find more states like Maine!
8/10/22: The last day we went to a museum and learned about animals and history. My sister took notes while I looked at all the exhibits. We learned about foxes, birds, and bones. After that we went to a haunted Mansion, then we left. Later that day, I beat my dad in putt-putt golf for the first time in my life!
Happy belated Birthday Jason, we also loved Acadia🎂 let us know when you guys are heading to NC😀