Maine

Yes, Maine is the 6th American state I have visited. In Chronological order the others are: Washington, Ohio, Oregon, California and Michigan. If I visited American places associated with my ancestry, I should visit Schenectady and Staten Island in New York, North Bergen in New Jersey and Baltimore, Maryland. Other places of interest include Hawaii, Nevada, New Hampshire and Vermont.

The Alakai = Sea Path, in Hawaiian, was designed and built by Austal USA, a subsidiary of Austal, an Australian company that is the world’s largest builder of fast ferries. Construction began in 2004-06 in Mobile, Alabama. It was launched 2007-01. It originally cost US$ 88M. Originally Hawaii Superferry’s first high-speed ferry, was intended to operate between various Hawaiian islands. Unfortunatelly, the owners forgot to undertake an environmental assessment, and use of the ferry and its sister ship the Huakai = Journey, in Hawaiian, were banned. Both vessels are now owned by the United States Navy Military Sealift Command, bought for US$ 25 M, each. Officially, it is now named the HST-2, although Alakai still is painted on its bow. It is referred to as The Cat. The vessel is chartered by Bay Ferries to operate a ferry service between Yarmouth, Nova Scotia and Bar Harbor, Maine. It travels at a speed of 35 knots = 65 km/h, taking 3.5 hours for a one-way trip. Bay Ferries operates in eastern Canada with headquarters in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada. It is a subsidiary of Northumberland Ferries.

Long before a new American president had taken over, we had paid for our Maine accommodation. We had considered abandoning this part of our trip, but decided not to. We began to ensure a safe passage through the American border by eating the two bananas we had with us on board the ferry. No fruit is allowed to be taken into USA. The interrogation at the border was much more thorough than before. We were asked how long we were staying = three days. In addition to our Canadian passports, the guard wanted to see documentation for our rental car and its insurance. After learning that we lived in Norway, he wanted documentation for our exit from Canada. With those formalities in order, we were allowed into USA.

My son, Alasdair, could tell me that he wanted to visit Bar Harbor, because of Fallout 4: Far Harbor, an expansion pack for the action role-playing game. It is set 210 years after The Great War, which began 2077-10-23, and resulted in nuclear devastation across the United States. So the game is set sometime in 2287-8. The main difference between game and reality, was that while Far Harbor was depopulated, Bar Harbor was experiencing a summer tourism surge in population. It is located on Mount Desert Island. Samuel de Champlain (1574 – 1635) observed on 1604-08-06, that the summits of the island’s mountains were free of vegetation, as seen from the sea. This led him to call the island L’Isle des Monts-déserts = island of barren mountains.

After a couple of hours experiencing an overcrowded Bar Harbor on foot, I was happy to drive on. However, I appreciated the scenery of Acadia National Park. The park began as Sieur de Monts National Monument in 1916, but was reestablishing as Lafayette National Park in 1919, the first national park east of the Mississippi. The name Lafayette was changed to Acadia in 1929.

Belfast

The first place we visited in Belfast was the Public Library. Because we didn’t know we would be stopping here, we thought it would be a good location to find out something about the geography and history of the place. It was settled in 1770, and from about 1850 developed into a shipbuilding center, producing hundreds of schooners. Materials for wooden boat construction were shipped down the Penobscot River from Bangor, the lumber capital of North America during the later 19th century. Wooden ship construction faded by 1900, so the local economy shifted to distributing seafood for the Boston and New York markets. After World War II, the emphasis was on poultry production, but that died out in the 1970s. Fortunately, boomers started to invade the area wanting to live in more rural areas.

We learned that people in Maine choose Moxie over root beer. We had to try some, so we bought a dozen tins. One empty tin even made it back to Norway as a souvenir. It looked like rusty water, and the taste was similar, but it was an acquired taste, that grows exponentially. Yes, that means the second tin tasted four times better than the first one.

Bangor

Our accommodation was about one kilometer from the Maine Air Museum, in Bangor. Alasdair had originally visited it without me, but I caught up to him to appreciate it. Yes, rail and air transport related facilities are always high priority places to visit on our trips.

We also visited downtown Bangor, where its artwork was appreciated:

As in most places, we continued to eat. We had dinner at the Happy Chinese Buffet in Bangor. It makes a change from Pizza.

Biologically, I am the youngest of five brothers, four of which involve my paternal family. The next youngest is Brad, who was born in Windsor, Ontario, but who moved with his family across the Detroit River to Michigan. He discovered me, one month before I turned seventy. Soon after, he and Janice visited us in Norway, then we visited them in Macomb, Michigan just as the pandemic struck. On his way to Maine, he and his wife Janice had visited Dick, the adopted son of our father, who lives in Keene, New Hampshire. This was the last piece of the puzzle explaining my name at birth, Richard Edwin Salter.

We met for a third time in Bangor. This photo was taken at the Hilton Garden Hotel where Brad and Janice were staying. Alasdair and I were some kilometers away at a Quality hotel.

Note: Content about the Maine Air Museum along with other photos was added on Tuesday, 2025-08-05.