Repairs and more repairs

Lake Sebago, Maine

Last night we went with Gordon and Barrie to Rick's Place. They have a statue of Humphrey Bogart at the front door dressed in a white Tuxedo. The restaurant is right on the lake and very busy this time of year with seaplanes and speedboats. We'll play some more tennis with them today and then head south.

The Toyota braking system now has over 160,000 driven and towed miles in four years. Dragging it 200 miles last week with the emergency brake on didn't help. We drove it into the Bangor Toyota place Saturday and they gave us $770.13 worth of new brakes in 3 hours on a slow Saturday afternoon.

We set the GPS controls for the New Balance outlet store in Skowhegan on Monday. I think New Balance might have its corporate headquarters there. I got some shirts and new tennis shoes. On Thursday they are starting the big tent sale where you can get $100 shoes for $20.

Last night I stepped on my lower dentures...don't ask... and bent them so they they didn't fit any more...I got an immediate appointment with a young Maine dentist who was greatly impressed with the precision work. He asked my permission to take pictures and refitted them.

I found a used bookstore and purchased seven paperbacks for $14. They were mostly old friends like "From Here to Eternity" by James Jones and "Fields of Fire" by James Webb. As you get older you can reread books from 30 or 40 years back and enjoy them again. I make break out a few boxes of books from our storage unit when we return to Florida in December or whenever.

I've taken Gordon diving over on Palm Beach a couple of times. We're parked by their boathouse and had a fun couple of sets of doubles tennis with them .

Nigel is a Portugese Water Dog. He's very friendly. They got him before Obama picked out one as the First dog. I made that blueberry pie with some of the blueberries we picked in Nova Scotia last week. It was good. I used corn starch instead of flour to thicken the blueberries.

The boathouse was built in 1921. I think it's on the local registry of historic places.

The Campfire

We build a campfire in Bangor. I start singing a song until Mrs. Phred gets embarrassed about the neighbors. I have cod and beer batter for dinner tomorrow and everything for blueberry pie.

They asked me how I knew
My true love was true
Oh, I of course replied
Something here inside cannot be denied

They said someday you'll find
All who love are blind
Oh, when your heart's on fire
You must realize
Smoke gets in your eye

The Platters

Damn! I Love it Here!

Bangor, Maine

Yesterday we spent our last day in Canada for a few weeks, until we cross back over in Niagara falls to see Toronto.

We went to the Fundy National Park in New Brunswick and drove the Toyota up to see the Hopewell Rocks.


We cleared American Customs about noon. The customs lady takes our peppers this time and leaves the beef and potatoes.

We pull into Bangor and get a solid line of services. Look! There's a Dunkin Donuts...and a Toyota place...an oil change place...a bank with an ATM...a drug store...and a pipe tobacco shop that sells Pinot Grigio...I love it. I love it.

I like to be in America
Okay by me in America
Everything free in America
For a small fee in America

Skyscrapers bloom in America
Cadillacs zoom in America
Industry boom in America
Twelve in a room in America

Life can be bright in America
if you can fight in America
Life is all right in America
If you're all white in America

Everywhere grime in America
Organized crime in America
Terrible time in America

- from West Side Story

Rafting the Shubenacadie River Tidal Bore

Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia

Tidal bores occur in areas of the world where tides are unusually large and are funneled down into a narrow bay or river. For example, the Qiantang River, which flows into the East China Sea, produces the bore shown below on the Vernal and Autumnal equinox. It can produce a huge wave front from the ocean which flows upriver at an average speed of 40 kilometers per hour and with crests reaching up to nine meters at its banks,

Cook.s Inlet in Alaska also produces impressive tidal bores. Here's a picture of one from Turnagain, about halfway up the long inlet.

The height of the tidal bore depends on the height of the tide, which depends on the phase of the moon. We draw a very unimpressive tide, but we take what we can get.

We approach the Zodiac down a long, very slippery mud bank. My dive booties are not ideal for traversing slippery mud. I end up on my butt twice, covered with mud. Take the boots they offer if you try this yourself.

Jeff drives us to a sandbar. The river is flowing out strongly at 4:10 PM. Suddenly, a small wave front approaches the sandbar and within a minute the bar disappears as the river rises.

The incoming tide creates standing waves about five feet high and five feet apart on sandbars. Jeff drives the Zodiac though the waves. The Zodiac swamps and fills with water repeatedly. Everyone is drenched by the waves breaking over the bow. We have a "man" overboard. We stop and pull her out. When the tides are really strong the standing waves reach a height of 15 feet.

Eventually, we return to base to get more gas. I store my camera to keep it dry. We go mud sliding for awhile down a slippery mud bank and then hit more big standing waves. It begins to rain. I'm impressed with the ability of the Zodiac to fill completely with water and accelerate and drain itself.

We return eventually for hamburgers, hot dogs and hot chocolate provided by the tour operator. It was a good time.

Blueberries and The Bay of Fundy

Grand Pre, Nova Scotia

When we arrive in Windsor. our friends, Gordie and Cappa. have arranged campsites in Windsor and Grand Pre for our weekend visit. The Windsor campsite is interesting. It's the town fairgrounds with a water slide, Go-kart track, a field full of antique autos and the Antique engine and tractor association.

This is the most fruit Mrs. Phred has picked since she went to Israel to work on a kibbutz and pick apples.

Gordie and Cappa feed us some great dinners (steak one night and cedar planked salmon another day)and Gordie invites us for his "Sunday breakfast feast. The picture below is from a famous "look-off" on the Bay of Fundy that they took us to look at..

They have a very busy weekend with a committed garage sale to raise money to maintain the local tennis courts. We play a couple of sets of doubles. Gordie has become very proficient and Cappa makes some great returns at the net. We go to a big U-pick blueberry farm. It only takes about an hour to pick gallons of huge blueberries. They run us out to the fields in a bus.

We tour about and meet this fisherman who runs a snowplow in the winter. His boat is sitting in the mud waiting for the tide to come back in.

In the morning, we'll be rafting on a tidal bore that generates fifteen foot waves when the big fifty foot tide rips back though a narrow river to a huge lake.

This picture is called a rose between two thorns.

and a thorn between two roses...

This guy is doing some serious flower farming.

We haven't seen apple trees for many years.

The tide is out.