Pemaquid Point  June 17

I’m in a tent at a campground a mile north of Pemaquid Light, the lighthouse I’m told that is reproduced on every Maine quarter in the U.S. Mint’s salute to the 50 states. I’ll see what it looks like tomorrow morning.

What a lovely time of year to be riding in this landscape. Wildflowers in blue, yellow, white, pink, and purple paint the fields.  Smells, some offensive, others sweet, sweep across the nose, sometimes momentarily, others lingering to give me a heady ride. I feel the undulations, twists and turns of the land, something you can’t get from the concrete ribbon that is I-95.

As I rolled into Wisscasett a long line of people around a small corner building with a sign declaring “Red’s Eats” couldn’t be missed.  Jane, a graphic designer from Camden, said that some publication judged Red’s to serve the best lobster roll in the state. “That line is short compared to summer,” she said. “And this traffic is nothing compared to what’s here in the summer,” she added as a never-ending line of cars and trucks rolled past.

I opted to sit on the banks of the Back River and eat my picnic lunch while Red’s line got longer.

After crossing the river, I decided to get off the busy US 1 onto something calmer. I turned south onto SR 129/130 outside of Damariscotta. I also wanted to experience what one of Maine’s fingers had to offer. In Maryland and Virginia there’re called “necks”; geographically there’re peninsulas.  Maine has scores of them hanging down into the Atlantic. This one ends at Pemaquid Point Lighthouse.

A sign at the end of a driveway stated “model ships.” I’m in Maine, the home of great sailing vessels with men who built ship models on long voyages. Maybe this is one of them, I thought.

Nope. Henry Musser has been building boats, some from kits, others from scratch, in miniature for 25 years. A quarter inch to a foot. They can take up to a year to make. “I don’t know why I do it,” he said. “I think I like to be in myself,” he said, referring to the solitary nature of his hobby.

He was born, raised and educated in State College, PA. “We didn’t know there were any other colleges,” he said with a laugh. Musser also taught at Penn State and other universities after receiving his MFA.

He also flies a private airplane, paints watercolors and makes miniature toy soldiers. After thinking about what attracts him to all of his interests he supposed it is the exactness that’s demanded of each one. “You really have to focus when you’re doing each one, you can’t be distracted,” he said. “Plus, each one just involves me, so I guess I like the solitary nature of what I do.”

He’ll sell a model but “I don’t do this to sell them; I make them because I like making them. I don’t do it every day but just when I feel like it.” 

To understand why I'm riding and raising money, please go to the first post--April 26.
To make a donation to the ALSA, please go to: http://web.alsa.org/goto/deirdresride