First a shout out to a friend of The Yuppie Hobo crew, Ron. Dr. J is celebrating ice cream for breakfast two days early since we’ll be camping the next few days (more on that later). She got a small pint to go last night at Shady Glen but forgot a spoon. Never fear! Ron got her a travel ice cream spoon for Christmas that she keeps in her purse for just such an occasion. Let this first paragraph serve as a reminder for you to celebrate the day yourself.

The Best Stay Inn was perfect. As I mentioned it was clean, quiet, had 1 comfortable pillow, 2 passible pillows, and a fantastically warm shower. The guy who checked us in was a sweetheart and just down the street was the classiest looking adult store ever. On the outside it looked like a roman palace. I didn’t check out the inside, no penny machine.

Our first stop was the Wiggly Bridge in York, Maine. Google Map that, it’s an official name. If I gain anymore weight I’m changing this blog to The Wiggly Hobo.

It was on a beautiful lake and connected several walking paths. We chose the direct route, ran through traffic, and hiked down the gravel path connected to the bridge.

I’m not saying it was super wiggly but when I jumped around like an ass, it swayed and creaked.

From the bridge we traveled along the coast. It was gorgeous and reminded me of our time in Washington. It was at this time that Jen’s childhood dream of moving to Maine – based solely on reading “Sarah, Plain and Tall” and Stephen King books – was confirmed. I’m cool with it. We stopped at Pleasure Ground, a small park just off the water to look for a bunch of tiny people. Now this is what I’m talking about, “mini-Lincoln.” I could totally a squash these fools’ heads. Someone adorably made scarves for the little, bronze sunbathers. Even for the dog!

It’s a lovely little park. My favorite is that I have more followers than it has friends! Suck it, park!

We meandered through York and Wells, ME. They’re great little beach towns where I had a line on some penny machines. But like any good beach town, all of the businesses were closed for winter. At least the Ogunquit Trading Post was kind enough to leave their machine outside. They may be closed for the winter, but today they earned a good $2.04

The true goal for the day was a spot I’ve been eyeing for some time now. As the tag says at the top of the page “Adventures amidst tourist traps, tacky gift shops, and Americana.” We went to the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, ME. This place has it all! Sasquatch?

Check. Creature?

Yup. North American Trash Panda?

Dr. Jen acknowledges their shared enthusiasm for Jif peanut butter. I scored a shirt with the Loveland Frogman on it. Who’s that you ask? Probably a relative of mine as I’m from Ohio, my whole family has webbed toes, and some of the Ohio kin are…weird…

Beyond the spots where we took pictures, photography wasn’t allowed. You have to visit there yourself if you want to see a collection of pukwudgie statues (possibly my favorite part of the place).

For the rest of the day we meandered through backroads checking out the beautiful coast, forests, and wild turkeys. Below is a picture of Delaware turkeys at one of the stellar lakes, the wild turkeys were too fast to be photographed.

Jen wasn’t brave enough but I walked out on the lake! There were dog prints and an ATV vehicle track but I still had some trepidation. It wasn’t below freezing so I felt the lake might have thawed enough for my plump bottom to go through. I still went out for my dearest readers though!

We got kind of lost but found some very helpful sign posts! I’m just not sure the best way to triangulate my position via presidential grave.

And this didn’t help me at all. The numbers didn’t add up at all! There was a business card in the guest book box that read “Call me if you’ve seen bigfoot.” I didn’t so I shant.

There is little signal out here, so we reached out the old fashioned way to call our loved ones and say we were safe.

This giant phone is in the parking lot of the Bryant Pond Post Office. It was put in place to recognize Bryant Pond as the last place in the US to give up the hand crank phone. I’m not sure how great it is to brag about lagging behind but it still cranks and makes some sound!

Now we’re at Mahoosuc Lodge for the night. It reminds me of the cabin I stayed at on my cattle drive in Wyoming but a bit more updated furniture wise. It’s a big place with 2 bedrooms, each holding 3 sets of bunk beds.

The main room is enormous and holds two large tables, a loveseat, 2 couches, Dr. J on a recliner, and this lovely, saintly woodburning stove.

It’s perfectly cozy since the rain has now turned to snow. So what are we doing here? A nice, quiet relaxing stay in a ski lodge? Nope. As we get 8 – 12 inches of snow overnight, we’ll be resting up for our 3 days of dogsledding. I’m not sure where we’re sledding to but we will end up at some campsite where we will either have a great time or freeze to death. Two nights in a tent during a snow storm. What bad could happen? Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion Monday night when we will have electricity and internet again.

The end…?