Episode 65 | Camden, Maine
I decided to stay another night.
Somewhere between setting the alarm and walking down to the harbor at first light, it became clear that a single night in Camden was not going to be enough. Six nights into this New England leg, moving town to town, I’d been traveling the way you do when you’re trying to cover ground instead of actually being somewhere. Maine was asking me to stop that.
I got to the harbor before most people were up. The schooners sitting still on the water, the early walkers and their dogs, a few other photographers already posted up looking for the same angle. The light was doing what October light does in Maine, which is arrive low and golden and make everything look like it was composed on purpose.
The Meteorologist
I stopped recording because a man was coming down the path and I didn’t want to be in his way, and that turned into a half-hour conversation.
He’d lived in Boston, moved up here full-time with his wife, semi-retired now and working from home. A meteorologist, it turned out, which is a useful profession to have in a place like Camden. He told me things I hadn’t thought about: that up until about ten years ago, this harbor used to freeze in winter. You could ice skate on it. That the docks get pulled every fall and most of the boats leave with them. That recent winter storms had sent waves crashing up over the hill where I was standing, pulling benches into the water and flooding the restaurants below.
I mentioned that the same thing was happening in Cinque Terre in Italy — cruise ships parking in La Spezia and busing hundreds of people up into Vernazza, a village that was never designed to absorb that kind of volume. He nodded. Camden was dealing with a version of the same thing. The ships dock in Rockland and run shuttles up. On those days the town fills beyond what its infrastructure can handle. One public restroom. Half the businesses closed because it’s shoulder season. He said there were people here trying to put a stop to it. I told him I’d seen the ship offshore on the drive up the coast.
Good conversation. Didn’t get the camera out. Some things are better that way.
Camden Hill State Park
After laundry and a slow morning walk through town — past the little footbridge, Riverducks ice cream, the bagel shop where people watched me through the window like I was doing something mildly suspicious — I drove up to Camden Hills State Park.
The view from up there stops you. The harbor below, the islands offshore, the Penobscot Bay spreading out in every direction, and just visible to the right, the cruise ship I’d been talking about all morning sitting offshore at Rockland. I understood in about thirty seconds why people move here and don’t leave.
A woman up at the overlook had done exactly that. She and her husband relocated six years ago. We talked for a while. She gave me a few recommendations for other spots along the coast. I may add a third night. I hadn’t decided yet.
Laite Beach
I wound down from the park and found the south side of the harbor, a small beach area called Laite Memorial Beach Park, rocks and tidal flats with the water way out at low tide. The tidal range up here is something Florida has no equivalent of. The ramps on the boat docks pivot on hinges to accommodate the swing. I stood on wet rocks that would have been underwater a few hours earlier and thought about that.
The leaves were just beginning to turn. Another week, maybe ten days, and this whole coast would be doing something spectacular. I was slightly early but not by much. On the drive back down the hill I passed a yard with turkeys in it and deer just beyond them disappearing into the tree line. Maine keeps handing you things.
The Evening
Simple dinner at a casual place in town. A fire pit out back at the inn. I took some iPhone shots through the day — the harbor at first light, the view from the hilltop, the beach, the inn itself — and they’re worth more than what I captured on the camera, honestly. Sometimes the phone sees things faster than the camera can get ready for them.
I’ve been letting this one breathe a little more than usual. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t. But sixty-five episodes into this project, I’ve earned the right to slow down for a day in Camden, Maine and just let it be what it is.
