The Whale watch and Old Sow

The whale watching trip was wonderful............not so much for the whales, though we did see quite a few curling themselves up out of the water.........but for the experience of being out on the water again.  I've loved it since I was a little girl, beginning with those days at Papa's camp on Cold Stream Pond.  There were a lot of boats there, small motor boats and Galen's racing boats.  We children, Mike and I, were always part of the hilarity brought on by the liquor consumed by all the adults.  The same went for my father's side of the family, Verona Island with the Fellows family on summer week-ends. In those days it was the norm for the adults to stay drunk from the time we arrived until we went home several days later.  For us kids it was just plain fun, whether we were thrown out of moving boats or holding up beer cans for the adults to shoot out of out hands.  We never saw it as dangerous.........it never occurred to us that we were in any danger.  It was all play.  But I digress..........

The most significant thing for me on the whale watch was seeing Old Sow, the second largest whirlpool in the world (I don't know where the largest one is).  I've always known it was there, but despite its reputation that brings tourists flocking to see it, I have never actually seen it myself.  It's just off Dog Island, down the street from my house, but a whirlpool is flat, a hole, seen basically from above.  The whale watching boat cruised all around it to the delight of us all.  I took many pictures, but the one I posted here is really the only one that really shows the center of the thing.  The water all around the center is churning and twirling, and it is really huge.  Our little boat whirled around with it and then took off, its motor impervious to the wayward currents.

We were on the water for over three hours, cool and happy, while people in town sweltered in the 90 degree heat. We saw Eastport from the a different perspective , saw the backs of our own houses perched high over the water.. We cruised around Campobello, oohing and ahhing over the huge cliffs with their incredible rock formations carved out by the pounding ocean.  High up on top of the cliffs were areas carved out by other forces of nature...human beings.  Giant houses, mansions, lawns, and formal gardens crouched on top of the rocks, most sporting some sort of comfortable deck or other elaborate platform from which to look out to sea.  Most of the land is still forest, though, with trees clinging to the cliff by gnarled roots.  On the way back we cruised by the small basically uninhabited islands that are directly across from my house.  I look at them a hundred times a day, but have never seen them up close.  Up until now they existed only as one dimensional beauty marks on a basically blue background.  Now I think about them in an altogether different way.......something solid and bulky with sand and rocks and trees, most of which are invisible to my eyes.  Same with Old Sow..........I know her now.

I think of myself as basically a loner........yet how I enjoyed being included in other people's celebrations.