Reaching Into Casco Bay
If you follow Route 24 as far south as possible, you get to the end of the road on Bailey Island. It’s a spot with a barricade so you don’t drive into the ocean, a parking lot, and a huge gift store.
Here at Land’s End, you have a vantage point into the middle of Casco Bay. Cottages sit perched just above the rock outcrops on the shore and islands. There are a few small islands off Bailey Island’s southern tip, but past those is pure ocean – well, first there’s Casco Bay, then the Gulf of Maine, then you get to the Atlantic Ocean.
Land’s End’s biggest feature is a massive gray building holding a gift shop. Upon walking through the door, you are hit with a wall of the sweet fragrance of balsam. Everything has lobsters: pajamas, mugs, stuffed animals, magnets, and more. There are shirts everywhere you turn with “Maine”, “Harpswell”, “Orr’s Island”, and “Bailey Island” printed on them. The shop is a decades old family run business featuring the wares of over eighty Maine crafters.
Below the gift shop and above the shore, is a man cast in copper crouching among the bushes. He is handling a lobster’s claw and stands atop a coil of rope. A plaque below his feet reads, “A memorial to all Maine fishermen who have devoted their lives to the sea.”
Past the cement barriers at the end of the road is a small beach between rugged rocks. It is low tide, and two women with two young children wade into the water. Their light pink skin starts to red in the sun as they search the water below their feet for hermit crabs and shells.
There’s a thin channel to the east between land and a small island. Seaweed covered rocks indicate the channel is much wider at high tide. One lobsterman has claimed this channel with three buoys in a row. Each a mustard yellow with red stripe around the top, says “the lobsters in this channel are mine” and possibly “I really like McDonalds too”.
A cormorant flaps its wings rapidly, each wing hitting the water a dozen times before it finally lifts far enough above to water. A heron takes off, majestically flapping its huge wings, just a meter above the water.
If you follow Route 24 as far south as possible, you get to the end of the road on Bailey Island. It’s a spot with a barricade so you don’t drive into the ocean, a parking lot, and a huge gift store.
Here at Land’s End, you have a vantage point into the middle of Casco Bay. Cottages sit perched just above the rock outcrops on the shore and islands. There are a few small islands off Bailey Island’s southern tip, but past those is pure ocean – well, first there’s Casco Bay, then the Gulf of Maine, then you get to the Atlantic Ocean.
Land’s End’s biggest feature is a massive gray building holding a gift shop. Upon walking through the door, you are hit with a wall of the sweet fragrance of balsam. Everything has lobsters: pajamas, mugs, stuffed animals, magnets, and more. There are shirts everywhere you turn with “Maine”, “Harpswell”, “Orr’s Island”, and “Bailey Island” printed on them. The shop is a decades old family run business featuring the wares of over eighty Maine crafters.
Below the gift shop and above the shore, is a man cast in copper crouching among the bushes. He is handling a lobster’s claw and stands atop a coil of rope. A plaque below his feet reads, “A memorial to all Maine fishermen who have devoted their lives to the sea.”
Past the cement barriers at the end of the road is a small beach between rugged rocks. It is low tide, and two women with two young children wade into the water. Their light pink skin starts to red in the sun as they search the water below their feet for hermit crabs and shells.
There’s a thin channel to the east between land and a small island. Seaweed covered rocks indicate the channel is much wider at high tide. One lobsterman has claimed this channel with three buoys in a row. Each a mustard yellow with red stripe around the top, says “the lobsters in this channel are mine” and possibly “I really like McDonalds too”.
A cormorant flaps its wings rapidly, each wing hitting the water a dozen times before it finally lifts far enough above to water. A heron takes off, majestically flapping its huge wings, just a meter above the water.
Continue around Harpswell to the one peninsula of the town: Harpswell Neck