We are in the very early stages of planning a 25th wedding anniversary (August, 2004) trip to Maine for some lighthousing. Kind of the honeymoon we never got to have.

Anyway, we are looking for your suggestions on must sees, places to stay and things like that. Any and all suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Tom & Diane

Tom & Diane,

The first thing to do is to get yourself a good book- like Courtney Thompson's Lighthouses of Maine or Kochel's Lighthouses of the Atlantic coast.

These two have great directions and Courtney's has great photos also. You can also find directions scattered around the web- www.lighthousefriends.com is a good place to start.

As for must see's- Portland Head (Museum), Cape Neddick, Pemaquid (now open to climb)(Museum), Marshall's Point (Museum), Owl's Head, Rockland Breakwater, Spring Point Ledge (Museum), Portland Breakwater, Portland Observatory,Cape Elizabeth, West Quoddy Head, the Shore Museum, the Bath Boatworks (Maine Maritime Museum),L.L Bean (Freeport), Acadia National Park (Bass Harbor) and about a million other places.

You'll probably be coming in from the south so include Whaleback and Portsmouth Harbor as your first stops.

I've stayed at two nice hotels in the Portland area- a Fairfield Inn in South Portland and the Marriott nearby (both have pools- FI outside, Marriott- inside).

We ate lunch twice in a little town called Damiriscotta- once at the restaurant at the Marina in town. Your right on the river and the food was good. The other one was at a nice little restaurant (name escapes me, but it's on the left hand side of the road going north right in the middle of town. Also very good food)


Hope this helps. I'm sure others with more specific info will chime in.

Dennis

I'm going to Maine in two weeks.

Dennis has listed the lighthouses that I am making a point to visit. We are going to try to stop by some others as well.

I've already photocopied pages out of Kochel's book to use.

I'll have a better idea about things to do once I get back.

http://www.lighthouse.cc/me.html also is a good site. It provides a south/north listing of the lights (both dead and alive)with fairly good directions. Lighthouse Friends has better maps, I think. The best directions I found were on a handout available at some motels. I think it was state produced. I went after Labor Day but before it got cold and stayed at some fairly empty places on the beaches/harbors at off season rates. Good hunting.

I'm off in a couple of hours on my "Excellent Lighthouse Adventure 2003."

Hope to hit a bunch of Maine lighthouses, a few in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut.

I've got my fingers crossed that the weather will be (somewhat) cooperative!