A Trip to Maine
With Allyson’s move on the horizon and an often discussed “literary girls trip” itenerary burning a hole in our Google Drives, we decided to visit our pal Julie on the East Coast.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Our first stop. Been wanting to visit this place ever since watching
This is a Robbery on Netflix. It did not disappoint and not for nothing: a pretty delicious restaurant
Through Boston, Concord, and Salem
Our trip took us from the Freedom Trail in Boston to Concord, MA, home of Louisa May Alcott’s Orchard House. This has been a long time wish of mine to visit the author of Little Women’s famous home and it did NOT disappoint. Came back with a reading To Do list that was pages long inspired by our visit to the home and Sleepy Hallow Cemetery’s “Author’s Ridge”.
We also managed to squeeze in a trip to Salem! While fun to explore, the cemetery was CLOSED (wtf) and we were late in our day, so I was there for the experience over the pics. Loved the vibes. And highly recommend A Circle Of Stitches yarn shop if you’re in the area.
Maine Event!
But the real reason for the season: to visit Julie in Maine! She’s a true local at this point and knew exactly where to take us at any given moment! We went to the beach twice, ate the world’s greatest lobster roll, never said no to ice cream, and got roughly 20,000 steps every day. A major success from start to finish.
Joshy<3
You may or may not know (but you should know) that I have a major Civil War crush on General Joshua Chamberlain of Maine. Because Allyson & Julie are very good to me, we took a brief detour to Brunswick, Maine, home of Bowdoin College and Joshua’s home and museum.
Joshua L. Chamberlain is best described by battlefields.org as “a veritable icon of Civil War legend”. He lead the 20th Maine at Gettysburg, defended Little Roundtop which helped to turn the tide of the war, and got severely injured during the battle. He lived with the wounds all his life, all while going on to become Governor of Maine and later president of Bowdoin College. And the most inspiring part to me is that he volunteered for service! He was exempt because he was a professor, but he felt compelled to support the union and enlisted knowing the dangers. He had no military experience but he said his best quality was that he ‘knew how to learn.’
And I just love that! He’s a true American hero and was also quite dashing:
I hope this will be only my first trip to Vacationland. I already have things on my To Do list for a return trip very soon.
