Month: June 2022

Sunday, June 12th – Another beautiful day on Sunny Seguin!  Water was pretty calm and temp was feeling quite pleasant. Heard the Popham Chapel church bells this morning – the wind must be blowing in the right direction!  That happens to be the Church where we park our car.  We mowed the front lawn and around the house and we weed whacked all around up top here.  The house, around rocks, the signs, the steps, the bell (there’s a topic for a blog).  I’ve decided we’re going to use “whipper snipper” instead of weed whack, I’m tired of saying that!  A friend of Steve’s from Australia figured out, only after reading several blogs, what “weed whack” meant! In Australia, they call it “whipper snipper.” I kind of like better!”  It’s got a nice little ring to it. Thanks Myles! Oh, and here’s me with my “whipper snipper!”

Then on to finish cleaning the steps with my bleach wash and the white bench at the top of the tram.  We have three memorial benches here.  Nice way to commemorate special loved ones.  Then I washed one of my sun shirts in some Dr. Bronner soap as it got pretty dirty over the last few days.  I scrubbed the spots and viola; the shirt came clean.  Never heard of Dr. Bronner? Well check it out.  It’s one of those do everything soaps! The label is packed with all sorts of information.  It’s also supposed to be good if you come in contact with PI (Poison Ivy) and you scrub the area right away…..you might not even get a reaction.  Well, how about that!

Time to stop for some lunch but not super hungry.  Just made a little snack with some crackers, avocado, a roasted beet, chicken and a leaf of basil.  Yummy! I had received a text from my sister Judy a little earlier to see if I had time to catch up.  I called her back and she and Bill are heading up to Portland for a little getaway!  They live in the town where my mom lives and where we grew up, Woburn, MA (about 10 miles outside of Boston).  Had a great chat and she was wondering if we were still going in on Wednesday to shore and would we like to meet for lunch before they head to their cabin in NH!  Absolutely – that would be awesome!  I told her Diane and I had made plans to meet for lunch as well – WOW having lunch with my two sisters – how great is that I can’t wait!

We had a visitor come up the trail.  Jim from East Boothbay.  He is a chef at the Carriage House and this is his first time to Seguin.  Really nice guy and very interested in taking the tour and learning about the island and it’s history.    He was sailing by himself and commenting on how it was a challenging sail over – pretty windy.  Later on, we of course went down to the Cove.  Here’s a pic of his boat (no pic of him though).

We saw a family of ducks swimming in the Cove tonight and a Seagull just standing on the beach.  Both a little unusual.  The group of ducks had four adults and their little ones.  So, are they a family with sisters and brothers or do they just hang out together?  The seagull was just standing at the edge of the shore, not sure why.  It would be interesting to learn about their habits and the basis for some of their behavior.

When you slow down, you start to notice some of these oddities that occur rather randomly.  Came up from the Cove to start supper and it was just a pretty time of day, took a selfie. This picture passed the test so I included it – not like the laundromat one last week!

That’s all for today…..

Monday, June 13th – Today we had our first “paying” guests.  That means they have purchased a membership to FOSILS and have paid to stay here in the Guest Quarters which are above the museum.  They are from Pennsylvania and drove up here just to spend two days on the island.  They are professors from two different colleges on sabbatical.  I needed to finish doing a little tidying up on their side before they arrived.  They were supposed to come in with Capt. Tom, but turns out he had boat issues, so they arranged transportation with Capt. Ethan.   We rowed out in our dinghy to get them and bring them in.  They had done a good job of bringing all their own stuff, water, food, even charcoal for the grill to cook dinner.  When we walked up from the beach, we gave them a grounds orientation, helped carry up some items up the trail and then a tour of the Tower.  However, it was pretty foggy so you really couldn’t see much from the tower. Since they were here for two days, another tour during the day and one at night was on the docket. The weather didn’t change during the course of the day. 

I spend a lot of time on the blog.  Trying to catch up to current day – I always feel like I’m behind…. Which frankly I am!  Anyway, I sent out the email to my email group of all the peeps that want to know when the Blog is launched. Ta-da!

Steve worked on my towel rack.  I don’t have any place in the kitchen to hang the towels to dry (even the stove door handle is snug against the door) …. So, we came up with a plan – you’ll see pictures in a future blog.  It came out awesome! I made more rosemary sourdough bread today as we were getting low.  Plus, somehow it just seems right to be making bread from scratch here and it fills the house with an aroma of days past…The starter is holding up well even though the temps in the house are not conducive to fermentation (aka putting it in a warm, draft free place doesn’t seem to exist here)!

We had another couple of visitors arrive from Ogunquit, ME.  They were on their way home and stopped in.  Tower and property tour, the usual.  As dinner time was approaching the weather began to shift.  Sometimes we check out our couple of weather apps like “Tides” or “Windy,” it will say the rain, temp and wind direction.  Then it shows clouds and rain for an hour or two, the wind shifts and the sun comes out the next hour.  Darn if it isn’t right on the money!  But the pics today are of the crazy weather that came in.  I’m leaving them on the larger size as it was just amazing.  It started to rain and the wind she began to blow.  Here’s the sequence:

First around 4:32 pm, we had a rainbow in the east direction, a full rainbow and then a half. The half pic came out better than the full rainbow. 

A couple of hours later after the rain and wind died down a little, sunset at 8:17

but we could see a squall, with thunder and lightning to the East at 8:20,

another view of the sunset at 8:20 (zoomed in a little)

then a quick selfie (I am ready for foul weather) and a view of the tower, both at 8:21,

a black cloud to the north over land 8:23 (I’ve never seen a cloud that dark), and

the sunset is gone and replaced by more unsettled weather 8:33.

 It was wild to see all these within minutes of each just by looking in a different direction! We are definitely becoming more aware of our local meteorology – it’s a real live experiment!

We ate dinner and looked out later to see the full moon rising over the water!  This picture was with “night sight” on my Google phone (Not sure what the blue dot is in the pic – I”ll have to google it).

Tuesday, June 14th – Flag Day! Headed out to raise the stars and stripes and when I turned around it looked like an Osprey on the railing of the catwalk on the Tower – oh man – no camera!

Usually in the morning, we grab our coffee and sit on the front porch facing east and have out coffee/tea and assess the day.  Our PA guests Catherine and Elizabeth were out there so we asked permission to take their picture and then we joined them.  We chatted for a bit to learn a little more about their backgrounds, etc.  Quite fun and relaxing!  I shared some of our bread toasted and also on the plate was some jelly, cream cheese, sliced avocado, cucumber and a little smoked trout.  They were very excited and thankful for such a morning treat.    Well and this led to discussion on the bread making and I shared the story of Florida, Mike, starter, etc.  I offered to make some starter for Catherine to take home and experiment with this sourdough fun!

Well, I need to do some more starter so I figured it did so well yesterday, I can make another batch of bread, which means another batch of crackers (which we absolutely LOVE).  When you feed your starter, you take 120g out of the jar and add 120g water and 120g flour.  You then normally throw out the leftover starter…. That was what originally turned me off of bread-making (plus the carbs in bread…) But Bread Mike shared a couple of suggestions of things to make with leftover starter, one of which was crackers.  You just add some melted butter, a couple of tablespoons of your favorite seasoning you’d like in your crackers and a little salt.  Spread it out very thin on a Silpat or parchment paper on a cookie sheet and bake in a low oven (325 ish) for about 45-50 mins checking every 15 or so. OMG – they are fantastic!  I made a batch yesterday and today, but they do go fast!  Next time I make some, I’ll take a pic.

Gave Catherine & Melissa another tour since it wasn’t foggy today and then a stop in the gift shop.  Here’s Melissa sporting her swag!

I don’t see any mowing or whipper snippering in my notes so I guess we did other stuff.  We did have a group of three visit today.  Wendell (a FOSILS member), Duncan and Mike.  Wendell loves coming here.  Even though he has heard the spiel before, they all still wanted a tour!  Fun group, lots of questions and expressions of genuine interest.  After the tour, we walked around the museum and the gift shop.  Here is a picture with the swag they got.

Later on, we poked out heads out and the full moon was rising again over the ocean.  We both took pictures but Steve thought his was better…. here’s the pic Steve took.  Just incredible! This was at 9:47 pm!!!

Wednesday, June 15^th – Shore Day! Due to the full moon, the tides are super high and super low! Beautiful day – and we’re meeting my sisters for lunch.  The routine begins – get up and head down to the Cove to wait for Ethan.  We don’t usually get a chance to really eat a breakfast so we grab a banana or apple and we’re off.  Once on shore, we stopped at Winnegance (that should sound familiar from the second blog) for Steve to get a coffee.  We have the normal errands but today we want to be done by noonish as we’re meeting my sisters, etc. at Mae’s Cafe & Bakery for lunch.  So, I did the laundry and Steve headed off to Rocky’s for a few things, the fish store and the nursery to get some tomato plants and a couple more herbs.  Then we went grocery shopping together. We are becoming more familiar with the store and we each took a cart.  I head to produce and Steve gets most of the other items.  If we lollygag, we buy more so we try to be crisp and not buy off the list.  It’s very tough.

Right on time we pulled up to Mae’s about 12:15, and Judy and Bill were just walking in.  Since there was 5 of us (Dave wasn’t in Maine this week so he couldn’t join us) we needed a larger table so we had to sit inside.  I get very excited to see and hang with my sisters since it doesn’t happen very often, I was a bubble of chatter!  Here is our group pic the waitress took for us. Well 2 hours goes pretty fast as we were all chatting. We needed to get going to head back to Popham, Diane was heading back to Shrewsbury and Judy and Bill headed to Ossipee, NH.

One last stop for us as I had a few cards to mail and a package with some dishcloths for Lynn Murray (Steve’s cousin Mike’s wife who just retired), so we stopped at the Bath post office.  ‘Mail Mike’ helped me out, very friendly and is a member of FOSILS. By the way, my mail got to Massachusetts in record time – thanks Mike!

Today, Ethan had a helper with him, his three-year-old son Griffin, very cute!  Tides were in our favor so we were able to load from the floating dock.  Pulled up to the loading dock and there was a lobsterman bringing up his lobster cages full of lobsters.  I made a polite comment, like ‘wow looks like a good haul’ as the cages were full and very heavy.  He said nothing, not even an acknowledgement.  Ethan said, ‘oh you met Mr. Grumpy!’ Couple of pics of Griffin – I guess the hum of the engine was music to his ears as he started to doze!

Lather, rinse, repeat right…. We pull up to the mooring, the Wednesday Warriors come out in the dinghy, they share any nuggets we need to know about, etc., we load up the dinghy and row ashore.  Just like Michael rowed the boat ashore…. (whose singing….)  Unload, carry to the beginning of the trail, pull the dinghy up, cover the dinghy and start the trips up the trail. But neither of us had to stop at the bench or pause this time – yay!

The day was still pretty nice so we planted our tomatoes, rosemary and oregano.   Oh, and some cucumbers.  I think that is all we are going to plant.  It’s pretty windy today, so we put some stakes in for the tomato plants.  It will be interesting to see what makes it given the conditions, etc.

Phew – just tired typing it all up!  Another unique and beautiful sunset !

Thursday, June 16^th – Well today was a busy day all around.  Due to the weather the last few days, we need to catch up on our mowing and whipper snipping! The plan was to start with the Cove and Cobblestone Trails, then do the South Trail after lunch.  First a little primer on tides.  We use an app called “Tides” and here are a couple of screen shots.

The tides are currently extreme due to the full moon.  The screenshot on the left shows the low tide as -1.5ft.  That means it’s 1.5 ft lower than mean low tide.  The number on the right is the high tide at 11.3 ft.  It also shows the full moon was on June 14.  The next picture shows similar information in a slightly different format.  Very handy app plus you can click on the cloud/sun icon on the bottom and it will give you the weather for the location you have selected.  We use Hunniwell Point which is at Fort Popham (even though my screenshots show Boothbay – oops!).

We headed down to start snipping.  Oh, but here is a pic of the Donkey Engine House.  There is a diesel engine inside that they are trying to get working again….. Now you have a sense of where it is relative to the welcome area.

A family of four pulled into the Cove and came ashore.  They did some hiking on their own and said they would then come up for a tour.  Their plan is to stay overnight in the Cove as it is supposed to be a little stormy.  They were Eric and Valeska and their two boys, Theodore and Elliot.  Very nice folks and the kids were very well behaved and inquisitive!  Gave them a tour which they really enjoyed and the kids were fascinated. 

We took a break for some lunch and two guys came up, John and ? (drives me batty when I can’t remember their name or I didn’t write it down)! They were headed to Tenants Harbor / Rockland area for a race.  Very interesting as they had both worked on a restoration project for the Boston Harbor light a few years ago.  Someone was searching for parts to reconstruct a 1^st Order Fresnel lens.  That someone even went to Tasmania to try and get some of the sections.  One of these days I’ll do a blog on just the Tower, just as if you were here!

After they left, we decided to do the North Trail to get it done as the weather was starting to turn and the temperature was dropping.  A couple of pictures here of the local irises in bloom.  I think I mentioned them in a previous blog.  At first, I thought someone planted them, but it turns out they are local to the island.  And then here is a pic of the Cove from almost the end of the North Trail.  That means we did all the trails in one day!  Phew, I’m exhausted.

Next is dinner – salmon, roasted vegetables and homemade corn bread.  Yummy!  I know, where’s the pic.  I’ll work on that.  Pretty tired today!

Friday, June 17^th – Well today was a big Blog Day.  I am posting the blog now.  So I write it in Word, resize the pictures so it doesn’t take so long to load them and generate the post in WordPress on the actual site.  Here it is June 17^th and I’m caught up to May 29th – whoop-de-do!  I’m on it and I’m determined!

Crazy weather day as the wind kept changing directions and you can see the storms all around us.  Here’s the view from the front porch – the clouds were moving!

Then I took the next four pics one right after the other and you can tell the flag was confused!

We have a weather station that tells us all sorts of information including wind.  However, the speed of the wind part is not working.  So I called Davis Instruments in CA.  Guy was really nice.  We talked about how to test to see whether it’s the transmitter or something else.  He is going to send us a testing cable.  Gave him all the info and we hung up.  Then we checked the folder in the manual box and low and behold we found one of the test cables in there.  So I called him back to tell him we don’t need the cable. We ran the test and got nothing.  That means it’s the transmitter.  I took all the data from him and put it in an email to Cyndy so she can bring it to the Board.  There were a couple of options so it really depends on how much they want to spend.

Received a phone call from a Sailor John Stenquist.  He is a local sailor and was thinking of coming over late in the day after he pics up a friend, stay here overnight and head back to the mainland sometime in the morning.  He asked if I had anybody that wanted to come over as they could come with him.  We didn’t have anyone waiting to come over but it was nice he offered. He chatted with Cyndy and she suggested he reach out to me.  Thought that was nice.

The weather cleared up and the sun came out! Steve headed down to the Cove to try fishing.  Capt. Ethan gave him some fly’s and other fishing items.  He tried from the beach, the rocks and even rowed out and tied himself off to the mooring with our lobster cage.

No luck – not even a nibble! We watched a little “TV” meaning a Netflix series Steve has been downloading to his iPad called “Call the Midwife.”  Thanks Theresa, I think you recommended it.  We’ve enjoyed it, acting is good and the characters are interesting.

It cleared up so much that we decided to step outside and check out the stars.  Holy cow, with no light in the tower and no other light pollution it was incredible!  Definitely like the milky way level!!!  The longer we stood there, the more we saw.  As I watched, I believe I saw the ISS (International Space Station) go by!  Any other Space Cadets (you know who you are) set up to get communications for their summer residence?  I usually have emails or texts set up for NASA to notify me when I can view it in my area (either VA or Florida) and I thought I had set it up for here, but have yet to receive a communication (I checked later and I hadn’t completed the confirmation part).  Also saw a shooting star!  And off to the ESE, there was a storm of some sort with lightning in the clouds, yet straight up here on Seguin, it was crystal clear.  No pics though….. you’ll just have to use your imagination!

Saturday, July 18^th – Up early today, about 5:40.  Pretty cloudy and breezy (sure would be fun to have the wind speed working).  Although we are getting pretty good at estimating once we hang the flag.  As the wind blows the flag, the lines holding the flag are either close to the pole or when it’s > 25 mph about 6 inches away from the pole!  When I’m up this early, I think through my “to do” list and pick something that’s appropriate for 5:30 in the morning. Today it was to sand the pieces for the towel rack we’re making.  Then I can paint them and then we can hang it up!  After sanding them, I did some yoga to warm up the muscles and said “time to start the day.”

We walked down to the Cove to see if we had any visitors or if John Stenquist had come over.  Yep for visitors, there is a beautiful sailing vessel in the Cove, but no to John.  Two were rowing ashore.  Turns out they arrived late yesterday afternoon and stayed the night.

Some people you just click with.  We stood on the beach and chatted for some time as they answered our questions, we answered theirs!  My notes say Alex and Irene, but not 100% sure I got that right. Super friendly and very energetic.  They were just coming ashore to use the “facilities.” Here’s the crazy part.  Most of you know I grew up in Woburn, MA.  A small town about 10 miles west of Boston along what was once called the Rte 128 corridor (now it’s part of I-95).  They had 3 other crew on their boat and one of them, friend of a friend type of thing, was 66 years old (hadn’t done so well with the weather yesterday) is from Woburn, and still lives there!  At 66, she would be in-between my sister Judy and me.  So, she made a note of my name and was going to ask her if she knew either of us.  Pretty random I’d say.  Of course, they rowed back to their boat and I never found out.  We both remembered only part of their boat name, but not enough to look it up….. Bitter ”something.”

Two more guests, Chris & Ruth White in a powerboat.  Been here before, just a quick stop to get out and walk around.  Then John Stenquist came.  Super nice person.  He lives and works locally in Bath and has volunteered several times here on Seguin with some of the more major projects.  He brought food to share for lunch, which was super nice.  After lunch John and I took a walk to the North Trail and he was going to try and point out a special cove with some “hidden treasure” that is around north end of the island.  We couldn’t quite see it but in general I know where it is.  He suggested we consider checking it out during a low tide.  The seagulls are still pretty anxious with their new little babies so they were very noisy and today I was christened! 

We were waving our arms etc. but not enough to prevent them from relieving themselves.  Someone told me the other day they do not have a sphincter muscle which is why they poop all the time.  How about that for an interesting factoid today!!!  Don’t say you never learned anything from my blog!! A little more interesting was that he was supposed to come over with a co-worker that is about 30 years old as he was helping him check his traps.  In Maine, anyone can have a few traps (each person has told me a different number you’re allowed to have, somewhere around 5-7).  He said the persons name Wyatt and I said I think I know him through the Southport Yacht Club which is the one Diane and Dave belong to here.  Turns out it is the person I know!  Another small world.  We came back from the walk and as we were wrapping up because John needed to head back, he asked Steve about the fiddle / violin.  Steve picked it up and played a couple of tunes – his first attended concert! 

Down to the Cove for 5:00. Nothing of note today.  I just brought up some tumbled red bricks that I’m using to create some cairns for the footprint of the original 1795 Lighthouse.

Well, another week for the history books.

Sunday, June 5th – This morning we both spent some time catching up with our mom’s.  I try to talk to mine on Sunday’s as I know she’s just hanging by herself. I would love for her to see what I’m seeing.  We used to use House Party but now I have a Google phone so we try to use Duo.  Problem is I’m not sure what she is supposed to do on her phone to “answer” the call.  I need to call when my sister is there so she can help her.  Did some yoga and my PT exercises. Ready for the day!

Today was a beautiful day, so it was easy to sit on our bench and just enjoy the view.  Temperature is already warming up. Steve already enjoying the warmth.  Took a walk down to the Cove to see if anyone is here…. No one yet, but I did spot a snail sunning himself!  These are all over the place. Oh, and how about the view from our luxury bathroom down here. I’ve near been in a pit toilet with a view like this!

Finally, I arrived at the beach and it was very busy in the water fowl department. Everyone was in the water swimming, like they were all heading to an event or something!   And if you look at the eastern point, we had a seal sunning himself on the rock!

Then I took a quick walk on the Cove trail, passed through the ‘campsite’ and the trail ends at the rocks.  I climbed around the rocks for a while, which is fun looking for any special treasure that may have become lodged between the rocks.  No treasure today.  Looked back up and you can just see the top of the lighthouse.

Well, we walked back up as it’s time to do a little work.  Sunny today, so we headed out to the North Trail.  About ¾ of the way out, the trail makes a loop.  Usually, we split and Steve walks out towards the end and I start at the beginning. We keep going until we meet each other.  Here is a view looking North and yes that is Steve (that little navy pin dot on the edge where the land meets the sky) and you can see some of the trail in the foreground.

Shortly after we got back to the house, a group of 5 came up the trail.  Very nice group.  I gave them a tour of the lighthouse and then a stop in the gift shop.  One of the women was Leeli and she has a place in Bath but lives in NH.  We kind of hit it off and she shared her email with me and suggested I email her sometime to meet for lunch on our trip ashore.  A new friend!

Nothing of note to report from the 5:00 trip to the Cove, so next on the list is dinner.  We are having lamb kidney chops – a little bit of an extravagance but just cause we’re on an island doesn’t mean we can’t live it up once in a while! Here’s Steve at the grill!  Sometimes it’s hard to keep the grill going with the wind!   Another beautiful sunset with Mount Washington.  I don’t think I’ll ever tire of this picture and it’s different every time!

Last note of the day is Cyndy called to let us know we’ll have to move our shore day this week up to Tuesday because a tropical storm is coming up the coast with winds and seas expected to pick up Tuesday afternoon.  Oh bummer, our friends Challie and Jeff are coming tomorrow (Monday) and they’re were planning to come in with us on Wednesday morning.  Now we’ll all have to go ashore Tuesday.  

Monday, June 6th – Today our friends arrive around 1 p.m. We need to be done with our tasks by then so we can enjoy the rest of the day with them.  I texted Challie as we asked her to pick up a couple of items for us.  Then Steve decided he wanted to borrow a pair of rain pants from Dave (my sister’s husband that is up here in Southport for the summer) as we may need them with the storm coming.  I put Diane and Challie in touch and they met in Boothbay to get the pants and some dishtowels she was giving me before they headed to Bath to meet up with their ride to Seguin.  They met up with Captain Chris Grill just down the street from Bath Iron Works and the Maine Maritime Museum. 

Here’s a pic of yesterday’s sea glass stash.  Some pretty pieces along with a few of those shells I wear on my earrings.  I’m going to keep a jar of those in the gift shop in case anyone would like a free Seguin souvenir! Steve continued to attack the weed overgrown garden.  He’s turning it over, let the area dry a day and then shake of the dirt and toss the weeds.  Seems to be working quite well!

While we were doing a few things around the house, the Coast Guard arrived!  Yay!  Maybe they can get the Light working.  There were three of them – Bob, Jonah and Steven.  They went right to work after they made a few trips up and down with their tools and equipment.  Turns out they were not able to fully restore the Light to operation.  One of the solar panels was totally damaged so they took that one with them.  They reattached the other two, but they are not producing enough power for the LED bulb inside the lens so they disconnected those panels. They mounted two LED auxiliary lights on the two platforms above the catwalk, added a little solar panel up there and two batteries as well to power those lights.  I’m not sure we’ll get to see the full brilliance of the light before the end of our tour here.

Challie and Jeff are due to arrive around 1ish.  I knew we’d be busy with them since they will only be here the one day.  I baked some birthday brownies for Challie, she just turned 50.  She donated her long locks and went super short.  Can’t wait to see it in person!   I rowed out to get them in our dinghy as well as to bring in the lobsters we had Ethan drop off for dinner tonight.  It’s always an interesting challenge rowing the dinghy out, with the waves, the wind and we’re trying to look like we’re old hats at this!  Yipee – they are here!! I was like a bumble bee just showing them around the property, the house and of course the Tower.  Another opportunity to practice my tour speech!

Once they got settled, we decided to take them on a hike down Cobblestone Trail, along the rocky shoreline and come back in on the Cove Trail. I took the previous picture of the island map and marked up our route, along with a blue X marking the house and tower. Challie said it was like doing a rock scramble. It was super fun and reminded me when we would come up with our sons, Gary and Colin to York, Maine and climb around all the rocks at low tide looking for treasure.  One time we did find a huge lobster claw.  Ooops, I digress again!!

A few pictures to share. First one is a picture Steve took of the three of us on a “waterfall” of quartz and then I took a picture from our perspective.  Once we noticed this vein of quartz, we found a few more on our scramble.

Here’s a view of the Tower from the “beach.” And here’s some seagull eggs in their nest.  Turn 180 degrees and you’ll see Canada geese (mom and dad) with their goslings – standing perfectly still…. Oh, you blend alright!

Well after our big hike and seeing all the sights, we had some delicious ‘sters’ (aka lobsters).  Challie has had lobster before but not just getting in on your plate where you need to crack it to eat it.  It was fun showing her the ‘ropes’ for eating lobster.

They brought us a gift (how sweet) – it was a game that we can play called Pandemic.  And guess what, it came out years ago – how bizarre is that.  It’s a very cool game as you work collaboratively with each other to beat the game.  I don’t think I’ve ever played a game like that before….. We played for a while, but there’s a lot too it.  I’m sure we’ll get together with them on our return to play more with them.

Tuesday, June 7th – Well, today is our onshore day…. We got up around 6 and got our stuff together to head down to the Cove.  We packed as much in with them as we could!  Here we are heading down, Steve rowing them out first and then our ride in.

Now what do we need to get done as we have a short day!  Winds are expected to pick up this afternoon so we need to be crisp in our errands.  Stopped at the “transfer station” but we never noticed that it is closed on Tuesday.  Oh well!  Actually, Challie & Jeff offered to take it with them and leave it at the Airbnb.  We don’t have much trash as we recycle/return what we can and we can have a “burn” pile on the island which takes care of a lot of the trash. Next, I was dropped off at the laundromat.  As laundromats go, this one is very clean and Amy is always tending to the floor, or folding, etc.  She is very friendly with the patrons.  I changed my mind on adding the selfie in the laundromat – not a very attractive pic!  I’ll include one another day that’s better of Amy and I!

Ok, we wrapped up the laundry and Steve had already done the grocery shopping, now we needed some lunch.  Stopped at Best Thai II (should sound familiar).  I had Panang Curry and Steve had the Evil Tofu this time.  Both yummy – we talked a little with the owner Juianda (I’m sure I’m not even close here to her spelling), but that is how it sounded.   We stopped at a little roadside stand to get a few plants for the garden (green and yellow squash) and we headed to Fort Popham. We checked and it’s low tide (which means what everyone?  Whose been paying attention).  It means we have to climb down the ladder to the boat and load our stuff which thankfully this time wasn’t too heavy. 

Here we are waiting for Ethan to tie off the boat. And we’re on our way home….(yes that is a Beatles song). Saw lots of seals on the way back, but it’s hard to see them in a picture. Since we’re back on the early side we opted to do some more work due to the pending rain the next couple of days.  We worked on mowing the area under the tram (near the donkey engine house) and then more clearing of the garden.  I was beat.  Took a shower early and then I, yes Carol Pietryk, took a nap!!  Sorry no picture.  We had cod for dinner and watched Pirates of the Caribbean (the last one).

Wednesday, June 8th – Stormy weather…. Lots of rain and wind but not too cold.  Pretty much an inside day.  Plan was to cook some bacon, make some sourdough bread, some sourdough crackers and turkey meatballs.  On the menu plan is a Chicken Roaster for dinner.  Spent the rest of the day down in the whistle house (where I can be on the internet) working on the blog, resizing pictures, paying bills and going down a worm hole on two on the internet.   What no pictures?????

Thursday, June 9th – Same storm still lingering, so another inside day.  I worked in the gift shop, putting out inventory and organizing.  Then I took a pic of the sign where our plaque will be as Caretakers for the 2022 Season!  Pretty cool to be part of history.

Later on after it stopped raining, we opted to take a walk down the Cobblestone Trail to look at the waves crashing in.  I love it when the ocean is angry like that!

However, by the evening, the sky’s had cleared up.  I went out to take a picture of the lighthouse with the auxiliary lights on.  I used the ‘night sight’ on my phone.  Pretty cool picture!! I thought it deserved the whole width of the page!!

Friday, June 10th – Well today I’m making up for no pictures on Wednesday!  I warmed up the day with some yoga stretching.  Always feels great, but I’m also pulled in several directions when I get up early, write blog notes on previous day, write up the blog to try and catch up, pick up around the house, make oatmeal for breakfast and the list continues.

We had some early visitors – a group of four, Colin (Portland), Airie (originally from Japan, now in NJ), Greg (lawyer from Portland and boat owner), and Conrad (Germany).  Greg is taking several groups on sailing weekends ultimately ending up in Nova Scotia, I think!  Gave them a land and tower tour.  Very nice group!

Wind and tides creating quite the surf down in Cobblestone beach… Steve worked on the South Trail and we did some more work in the garden including planting our first two plants, the yellow / green squash. 

Then Steve and I headed down to the whistle house to work on the internet. I sit in the battery room with my laptop and connect to the router there via an Ethernet cable. The router sends data to “Solar” Rick on the mainland. It works pretty well. However, I only have a window with glass blocks and during the late afternoon or evening, which is when I’m usually here, it’s not very bright.

There are three overhead fluorescent lights in the room but everything except all the solar stuff and a room fan is disconnected.  The room does get warm with the batteries so the fan just exhausts into the rest of the whistle house (aka maintenance shop).  I mentioned to Steve, can you get me some light in there?  Well, he took a look at the lights and we decided to reconnect them to the power used to run the fan. In the picture, to the left is the solar related instruments and electrical connection “stuff” and the plywood you see to the left is where the bank of batteries for the solar system is. After taking out some no longer needed conduit and connecting the wires – we’re in business – let there be light!  Now we just need to clean up and put all the ceiling tiles back.

Cove time! – No water fowl birds/ducks etc.  Just a calm rolling sea into the shore. Oh, but wait, what’s that bobbing to the left? It’s a buoy from one of the moorings!  Might be hard to see in the pic.  Yikes, hope it doesn’t float away – mooring peeps coming tomorrow!

We made plans to have a beverage call with my sister Diane and her husband Dave. It’s fun to chat with folks while we are down in the Cove. And they just live across the way a bit in Southport. Kind of fun! We headed back up to prepare dinner.  Oh, and the garden is all cleared and we’ve planted basil and the two squash plants. Next trip ashore we’ll pick up some tomatoes and a few more herbs….

Today’s final picture, at dusk, the Tower!

Saturday, June 11th – Well I woke up kind of early this morning, around 6ish.  I tend to walk around, put dry dishes away, tidy up blankets on the futon if it was chilly last night, just general straightening up.  I had a bucket of bleach water I was using to clean some of the stairs up to the front porch as they were a little moldy yesterday but decided a few needed another round.  No time like the present to finish that up as the stairs were in the sunshine so they would dry thoroughly.  As I’m scrubbing, I hear a gentle “Hello?”  It was a nice man named Martin.  I didn’t have my camera on me and forgot to take his pic…. He had kayaked over from Perkins, he said he left about 5:30 this morning!  Yikes, nothing like getting your exercise in early!  I asked him if he wanted a tour and he said sure if it’s no trouble – that’s what I’m here for!!!  We had a wonderful time and he was a very pleasant person.  Steve finally came out a while later and could hear our voices but didn’t know where we were, the he looked up and we were at the top of the Tower!

We decided to walk down to the Cove to see what was going on down there and the mooring peeps were busy working on putting in the rest of the moorings.  Steve rowed out to Jim and Hazel to give them some mooring balls that we had on shore. Martin had brought in the one that was bobbing around in the west side of the Cove last night (the previous pic with the yellow arrow).  Jim was dressed in full wet suit dive gear (water is like 50 degrees – burr) to return us to a full 5 moorings status, Yay!

While we were down at the Cove, I decided the side of the trail just as you come up the stairs from the beach is starting to grow into the trail so I clipped lots of branches to widen it a little. As all this was going on we could see a group of kayakers coming into the Cove.  There was 5 of them – a professor from University of VT and 4 of his students.  They are in an Ocean Expeditions Program. Steve, the professor, brings a group here every summer.  I gave them a tour of the Tower.  There is a platform at 28 steps up the tower and today, as it was early, the sunlight from the lens created a prism on the wall as it shone through the stairs. Once we finished our tour, they decided it was time for some food. Here they are in full dry suits and opted for the picnic table as their lunch spot.

We had another couple come up the trail Kathleen and Don.  They were from NH and were on the boat with his sister.  The sister and husband stayed in the Cove as they are avid sea glass fans and were panning for it down at the beach.  Since they had been there before, our tour part was brief, but Kathleen came into the gift shop and purchased two hoodie sweatshirts.  She was so excited to get them as they are usually here later in the season and there is none left.  Glad we could make her day.  Spent a bunch of time chatting with them about some history, our garden, their property in NH.  Really nice, down to earth people.

After they left, Steve and I decided to have lunch. It was a warm day so we decided to eat on the porch on our side as it was in the shade.  After eating, we headed back down to see if anything else was going on in the Cove and cover up the dinghy.  When then headed off to clip (not mow, not weed whack) the Cobblestone Trail.  Again, some of the plants and shrubbery is starting to grown into the trail.  When we returned to the beginning, we met Dave and Cynthia.  As we came back, we saw their boat in the Cove.  A beautiful 47-foot Gozzard named S/V Dreamwalker.  They had been up top when we were eating lunch and somehow, we missed each other!  Note to self to eat lunch where we can see if someone comes up the trail!  Long story longer, they asked if we wanted to have a beverage and snacks on the boat.  We said sure, that way we wouldn’t miss if someone new arrived!!  Here are a few pics of the boat, them and even one of us!

Last pic, decided to make the Garlicky Shrimp Tomato Stew that Mary Rose (and her husband Frank) made for the Cousin Fest in Florida this past winter.  It was super yummy and it has lots of flavor. Then once you add a toasted piece of homemade sourdough bread – it’s a full meal.  Also, a shout out to Mike Martin (Steve’s cousin Cathy, who just had the birthday in last weeks blog, her husband) gave me the starter for the bread!  Well the real story is I had the stew recipe from a previous text but it was missing ingredients and some instructions.  Since it was Americas Test Kitchen, you can’t see the who recipe on-line without paying for a subscription.  Eventually, we made it work and Mary Rose sent me a new pic for the stew and here it is…. Should have taken a pic of the food gosh darn it!

Well that’s a wrap for this week! Stay tuned, more to come!

Sunday, May 29th –Well it’s Memorial Day weekend, it’s a beautiful day and we’re ready for visitors….. and visitors we got!

Today, Cyndy, our lightkeeper “trainer”, heads back to the mainland.  She says we’re good to go!  We carried all her belongings down the trail to the Cove.  While we were waiting for Capt. Ethan to arrive, we brought the chainsaw down to the beach as a large driftwood tree was in the way of walking up the stairs from the water.  Steve made 6 different cuts and then we had to roll them end-over-end to get them out of the way and high enough so the tide wouldn’t take them back out.

Just about the time we finished, Capt. Ethan arrived so Steve took Cyndy and her stuff out to the boat and we waved goodbye! However, we asked Ethan to leave us 3 lobsters in our floating lobster cage for dinner!!

Since it is such a beautiful day, we’re expecting we’ll have some visitors.  We are excited to start our “job” sharing the beauty of Seguin Island and it’s history with our visitors.  Not sure how many boats we’ll get as we currently have only 2 moorings + the Coast Guard mooring. That’s the interesting part here, is we don’t have any idea how many may show up!  They lost a couple of moorings over the winter and the mooring peeps will be out soon to re-find the anchor points so they can attach some mooring balls to them.  We’ve heard that many folks will raft up on one mooring if it gets busy.  Time to walk back up the trail and have some lunch.

We were continuing to do some work around the place when some visitors came up to the house!  It was very exciting.  First it was a group of 3 – a family stopping by to walk around the place.  I began to give them a tour / orientation of the property and then up the lighthouse.  With that, a group of 5 or 6 with a pair of dogs came up the trail.  Others in the group came up the tram which is a no-no!  The tram is old and not safe to walk.  We shared that with them as well as the rule is all dogs must be on a leash.  Not sure they were very happy about either of those rules!  As I finished up, another group of 4 came up.  So now Steve was headed up the tower and I gave a land orientation.  As we entered the tower, another group of 4 came up!  WOW, all these visitors at once!  It was a great way for us to sample what is coming during  July and August.  Looking at the guest records from last year, they had one day where there were 80-90 visitors!  Tag teaming seemed to work very well, but with 80?  I’m sure we’ll figure it out.  The afternoon sure flew by and we figured if today was busy, it’s likely tomorrow will be too. 

We decided tonight would be a great night to have our lobsters to celebrate our visitors today – so we broke out the lobster pot and steamed them!!  They were definitely hard shell as they were chock-a-block full of meat.  I picked the bodies clean! Dad would have been proud of my efforts.

Monday, May 30th – Busy day as we continue to work around the house and the lawn, weed whacking etc. At this point I think I have typed weed whack at least 100 times!  We have been going non-stop for several days and today, Steve, I think his body is still recovering from COVID, needed a nap.  I suggested he take a blanket and lay down on the leeward side of the house.  He did and he took a nap for at least 2 hours!  Good for him!

Once he woke up though, he felt the need to make up for that time.  I had asked him to build me a spice rack of sorts so I could put out all my spices on the shelf, see the labels and yes, put them in alphabetical order!  Most of you that know me know that’s how I roll!  But it’s perfect. Simple, yet very functional.  Then, he fixed a kitchen chair.  One of the chairs looks like it has a solid seat, the other looked it was made of pieces for the seat and one of them fell out.  He glued it together, put some clamps on it and we’re back in business.  As I write this blog, weeks later, the chair it holding its own.

Well, here we are at the end of another day, but no additional visitors, oh but wait!  We like to walk down to the Cove around 5 just to enjoy the scenery, talk about the day and discuss what’s on the agenda for the next day and low and behold Greg and Jan walk up from the Cove.  They are on their way home to Portland and decided to stop and give the dog a little exercise.  They have a very cool boat that is made in Finland, it’s called “Axopar.”  They were very nice and have been here many times, so no tour needed.  They walked a trail for a bit then headed down to the Cove and on their way.  Here is a pic of their boat.  

Tuesday, May 31st – Weather today was pretty cold and a little rainy to start not much to do except work inside.  I attacked our Dining Room.  

Cleaned the window frames to get rid of those tiny little brown dots that spiders leave behind, cobwebs in the corners, dead fly’s, etc. – no one has been here for 8+ months. 

I then cleaned those same spots off the walls, dusted, cleaned the floor (which has the little white dots from spiders) and vacuumed the rug.    I took the books out of the bookcase, vacuumed the top of them, looked at what they were in case I’m in need of some reading material but that would require me to sit still! It’s that wonderful feeling when you’re done – it just feels clean.

While I was cleaning the DR and other spots, Steve was practicing his violin. He is working on the Lighthouse Keeper’s Waltz. It’s sounding pretty good!

Late in the afternoon, the sky cleared and the sun came out, so we ventured down to the Cove.  Steve took this cool photo as late in the afternoon there is often several contrails from planes flying overhead. After the sun passes down behind the trees of the Cove, we walk back up as the temperature starts to drop.  But once we got back by the house, the sun was still pretty high as it doesn’t set until after 8:00 p.m. We took this pic of the house / tower, just a different angle.

Wednesday, June 1st – Hope you all remembered Rabbit, Rabbit – if you don’t know what that is, remind me next time I see you and I’ll explain!  I can already tell this will be a big blog day, so grab a beverage and maybe even a snack!  Started off with another Seguin Sunrise.  This picture was a little after 5:00 a.m.  It was just beautiful and the way it shined into the LR.  Oh, the living room, I don’t think I’ve shared a pic of that, so here is what our “office-computer-music-“TV”-library” room looks like!

Big day for us today as it’s our first trip ashore.  We need to bring our trash, recycle and laundry along with our grocery store, Rocky’s ACE Hardware, goodwill and fish store lists!  But it’s very exciting to see how all this will work! Last night we took some time to menu plan, look at what we still have, what do we need and try to buy just those supplies.  Why?  Because we have to carry it up the trail when we return.  It’s a little bit of a challenge to not over buy or say “hey let’s get some of this to have around.”  We try very hard to just buy what we need for the next week.

Down we go to the Donkey House (I need to take a pic of that one day, maybe I should make a post that is just the buildings, etc. of the island….) I digress!  When you walk up the stairs from the Cove (or in this case walking back down to Cove), you come to our Welcome area. It has a map of the island, rules while on the island, a pic of the New Caretakers Newsletter, etc. plus lots of random lobster buoys that wash up around the island.

We have our stuff down by the water already to go. Capt. Ethan will pick us up and drop off the Wednesday Warriors (the group of volunteers) who trade places with us each week to work on other projects here on the island. It’s the same group that came over on the 1^st boat trip on the day we arrived.  They bring supplies like gas for the lawn equipment, gas for our cooking stove, inventory for the gift shop and material they need for their projects. 

I’m ready and I have my special boots on to keep my feet dry when pushing off the beach. At least that’s what I had hoped.  I miss calculated a little wave as I was pushing the boat out and swish – up and over into my boot!  Well, at least I had other shoes to wear when we got to shore.  Capt. Ethan was setting his lobster traps on the way back so we got to see the fish head being loaded in the trap and then dropping over the side.  I found it interesting as I thought each trap had a buoy but he would string three traps together with one buoy.  Efficiency!

Another view of the Cove from the water side.  We don’t see this view very often so on a beautiful day like today, time for a pic!

When we arrived on shore, it was low tide. Oh no – we can’t use the floating dock, now we have to climb a ladder up to the pier and pass up our gear – just another part of the process of going ashore!  Too afraid of dropping my phone, so no picture! We bring it all up, walk to the parking area at Fort Popham and Steve heads over the Popham Chapel to get the car. I proceed to empty my boot full of water and dry off my foot. However, when carrying our bags up the ladder, we noticed the backpack was all wet on the bottom and this is where we carry our electronics, aka mainly our laptop!  I start to panic as everything I’m doing (writing blog entries and pictures) is being stored locally on the computer because of our limited internet access!    I take the laptop out and the ports were facing down, but the inside doesn’t appear to be wet.  Won’t know till I get to the laundromat and use their Wi-Fi. 

Our first stop is the transfer station for trash, recycle, etc.  We drop off our stuff and there is a little “free / exchange” area.  Items that still have useful life are left there for people to take.  I actually saw a Brother sewing machine – I was tempted but Steve said no!  Found a few cute little glasses – that’s for my B&B, sea glass collection, etc! We headed to town (Bath) to get a coffee at Café Crème.  Steve got a cappuccino and a cinnamon bun.  Pretty yummy (the bun, not the coffee – I do tea). Off to the Garden Island 24 hr. Laundromat.  Well first time for everything, as now you need to look at all the machines and figure out what’s what. Then, I’m trying to get on their Wi-Fi so I can do some bill paying, etc.  The computer doesn’t respond immediately, but eventually, I got there, phew! While I’m doing laundry, Steve heads to Rocky’s ACE Hardware for a few light-keeper items, the water place to fill our 5-gallon water jugs and then to the fish store to scope out what they have.  Nothing too exciting in the picture department here. Maybe a pic of the fish store would be fun, it is Maine after all!  Steve returns and we head to Goodwill again to look for a few specific things.  A few more small glasses, a couple more wine glasses as I already broke one, some fun place mats and a cute little lighthouse-stained glass candle holder of course I had to get that!!!!

We grab some lunch at Jersey Mike’s then went to the new Hannaford’s supermarket in Cooks Corner.  This was a big trip for groceries as we only bought what we needed for the first 5 days and we were sharing food with Cyndy.  Now we are getting some additional staples. Supermarket was beautiful, a little bit more expensive than Shaw’s but it has the draw of being the new supermarket – so people tend to go there cause it’s the new shiny object.  Checking out was a challenge as we’re packing all our stuff into a few bags. Again, trying not to over buy, but $300 later we walk out of the store and loaded everything in the car.  Then we stopped back at the fish store and got some salmon, swordfish and smoked trout!  Yummy.

Before you know it, time is up and we need to head back to the dock to wait for Ethan.  Except now the tide is high enough to use the floating dock.  Yay!  Here’s a pic of my sweetie on the ride back followed by a pic of our goodwill finds!!

We each made three trips up the trail to bring all our stuff up. We leave our water in the Donkey engine house (there it is again – I need to take a picture of that building) and then walk down to refill 1 or 2-gallon jugs to bring it up to the house.  I’m getting tired just typing all this up!  It was a busy day for sure.  Fresh swordfish for dinner.  While we are cooking, we found a plug-in heater and decided to have that by our legs in the dining room.  Hasn’t really warmed up yet and the house is not much different in temperature than the outside – did I say we have no heat or ac?  Anyway, dinner was fabulous and we’re both a little tired.  I head up to take a shower with our cistern water, which is pretty high in iron and not really potable, but you can wash dishes in it, shower, brush your teeth etc. 

While I’m in the shower, we lost power.  Wasn’t sure if it was just the light bulb in the bathroom or the whole house.  I yelled down to Steve to see if he lost lights and he did.  He unplugged the heater and I was done in the shower, but it was VERY DARK!  A few minutes later, the house lights came back on.  Found out that the heater was a huge load on the house load circuit and my shower had kicked on the hot water heater – oops!  Oh well, now we know.  We’ll just make do without the heater.

Thursday, June 2nd – Good Morning – today started out pretty cloudy and a little chilly so we’ll be doing some inside tasks at least this morning.  We have a picture of Steve using his new mug!  In case it’s hard to read, his coffee cup says “YOU are my sunshine…. my only sunshine.”   That’s my “B+” husband Steve!  If you see him with his buff on his head – it means it’s chilly in the house! We opened up the futon in the LR because it was all wet!  Best we can figure is one of our bags coming up from the boat yesterday had a wet bottom!  Wet doesn’t dry too quickly here.

Today I started to clean up our guest quarters as our friends Challie and Jeff arrive next Monday for two nights, very exciting! I started to do a linen inventory as some items get mixed up between the caretaker guest room and the paying guest quarters over the museum.  I hung a few linens out on the line to freshen them up as the sun is shinning and the wind is blowin’.  Since it has warmed up and sun is out, we moved the futon mattress to a railing outside and unzipped the cover – now it can really dry out. 

I needed to walk down the main trail to the Cove to get a few items that didn’t need to come up yesterday plus my wet boot!  Trying to strategically place it in the sun to get a warm breeze to help dry out the inside.  On the way back up, I decided it would be fun to share some pics of the trail so you get a feel for the terrain.  There are five pictures.  First one as I’m walking up, second one is about halfway up looking back down at the trail, third one is looking up the trail from the same point, fourth pic shows the steepest part before you go under the tram and arrive at the lawn in front of the house, last pic.

Then I figured, since I’m here I would take a couple of pics of the unsafe, not working tram.

Well before you know it, it’s the end of the day.   Dinner becomes the next order of business.  Put on some music and begin to prepare Chicken Stroganoff over “fake” pasta.  My go to recipe is in my GE Food Processor cookbook at home. I have a few recipes from this cookbook, but no longer have the food processor! So, Steve looked up one or two on the internet.  He stood near the front window where he can get a little service.  Fake pasta is the pasta made with chickpeas…..It’s really pretty good and very filling.  It turned out delicious!  It had a few different ingredients, which fortunately we had, compared to our go-to recipe and we may even like it better!  I know your salivating and I should have taken a picture – sorry didn’t think of it!

I did think of taking a picture of the lighthouse though tonight. Oh and in case you’re wondering, the futon did dry out and we remembered to bring it in!

Friday, June 3rd – Well let’s see …. On today’s docket is to do the deep clean in the guest room, work some more on the blog, possibility the Coast Guard will come today after they go to Boone Light to assess the situation at that lighthouse.  Well to start our busy day, we need some solid nutrition.  For breakfast we enjoyed some smoked trout we picked up at Plant’s Seafood when we were on shore. We had some homemade rosemary sourdough bread, greens, tomato, a little cream cheese, homemade basil-parsley pesto and blueberries!  We are livin’ large here at Seguin!

Off I went to clean the guest room.  I spent the good portion of the day moving furniture, vacuuming cobwebs, cleaning the floor around the legs of the furniture, wiping everything down and making the beds!  Oh, so maybe a picture of guest room would be appropriate here!

It’s pretty chilly today and all our mowing and weed whacking are done for the week.  Steve spent part of his day just checking the systems (cistern, sump pump, solar battery) and reading his current book.   The one he is reading now is Pieces of Her by Karin Slaughter.  I saw a boat out in the water going by the island and though that would be a lot of guests to visit Seguin as it was a little cruise ship that leaves out of Portland.   Then I headed off to the whistle house (the original fog signal building, that would make a good post) as I needed to get on the network and send Cyndy my blog and some pictures.  Coast Guard did not make it today.  Oh well, they will get here eventually, I’m sure.

We watched the movie Dunkirk in the late afternoon as all our work for the day was done.  It was towards the end of WWI.  Pretty depressing actually – the story followed a few people throughout that phase of the conflict.  Then we prepared dinner and had a “picnic” (that’s what our kids called it when they got to eat dinner and watch TV at the same time)!  We pulled out an electric blanket as it is still pretty chilly in the house and watched Aladdin on our laptop, we love the adult humor.  Eventually the house will begin to warm up once the air temp warms up which will be when the ocean starts to warm up a few degrees, so it could be a while!

Saturday, June 4th – Busy day around the island today.  For some reason I was awake at 5:00 a.m. again.  I do love to see sunrise if there is one – can’t remember if there was as I don’t have a picture!   I worked on a blog post and the corresponding pictures.  We are making some progress but still haven’t been able to post one to the website. From there, on to cleaning our stairs to the second floor and a small enclosed porch on the front of the house. 

Mostly clearing cob webs, cleaning windows, sweeping, etc. you know the drill.  Since it was such a beautiful day, I hung some additional towels and two bedspreads out on the line to freshen them up.  As well as I’m still drying out the inside of my boot – I’m almost there!

Then I was off to the “paying” guest quarters to start looking at those rooms and inventory what they have.  You can become a member of FOSILS (Friends of Sequin Island Light Station) and then book those rooms to stay overnight.  So far there are three potential groups coming this summer. 

Steve mowed the main property around the house.  He does like riding the mower!  I worked in the gift shop, setting things up, folding the swag, putting them in bags, etc.  As I was pulling out the inventory for the shop, there was this gray plastic thing…. Any guesses what it is?  I finally had to text Cyndy as I couldn’t figure it out!  Had to pause my efforts in the gift shop as a group of four guests came up the trail, a set of parents, their son and his girlfriend.  She had not been to Seguin before, so it was all new to her – time for a tour!  Fun group. Trying to remember to take a few pics of the guests as we are meeting people from all over.

Last activity today was to start clearing the garden of the weeds, etc.  Next thing you know, the 5:00 whistle blows and we stop for the day, grab our beverage and off to the Cove to watch mother nature! Before I sat down though, one last task.  I needed to rake the Clivus, that is our public “bathroom.”  It’s not really a bathroom, but I agreed to do the maintenance for this building.  Today, we saw a group of ducklings, I counted 10, swimming with Mom and Dad.  As the evening progressed, the sky remained clear for another spectacular sunset, including Mt. Washington – just beautiful

Well, that’s a wrap for this week. Oh, and by the way the gray plastic thing is one of those widgets that help you fold T-shirts the exact same size every time!!!  Who guessed it?

Sunday, May 22nd – Well the plan still looks like we’re going tomorrow.  We understand that Cyndy will be joining us till Friday but we won’t be coming back in until the following Wednesday – June 1.  Holy Cow June already?  Since we had only planned to be in the hotel a couple of days, we now need to do some laundry and get some clothes out of the “island” bags.  While doing the laundry I thought I should reach out to our friends Sharon and Brent, who live in Norway Maine (NW of Bath) and see what they were doing for dinner.  They were available so we made plans to meet them in Freeport for an early dinner as we really, really are expecting to head out to the island tomorrow!

It was a beautiful day so after laundry we decided to walk to town and become more familiar with what is actually in Bath.  It’s a very quaint little town with a lot to offer.  I had suggested yesterday that maybe we should go to the Maritime Museum, but then totally forgot!  We walked down by Bath Iron Works and saw this framed entryway, like you’d see in the front door or a local home, just propped up along the side of the road.  Kind of odd, but kind of cool at the same time. 

As we walked into town there was an organic grocery “Bath Natural Market” we noticed they had lots of potted herbs for sale – figured we’ll pick one up on our way back.  We walked down to the park along the waterfront, lots of people out and about.  The park is full of pairs of Adirondack chairs so you can just sit and read.  Walked by a blooming cherry tree and Steve shook the tree.  Looked like it was snowing!  Kind of hard to see in the pic, but very funny in person. Well time to turn around and meander our way “home.”  We headed back up Front St and walked by the “Friends of Seguin Island” office.  We stopped in to see if they had any maps outside the office, but no luck.  Took a pick of their sign as I thought it might help me with my tattoo design.

Here is the Crazy Story part!  We have walked around a couple of times and have noticed that many of the homes with a small front porch are supported solely by metal rods.  We’ve walked by a particular home a couple of times over the last few days, that is redoing their porch.  Neither of us could figure out why there wasn’t any footings as these rods surely weren’t strong enough to support the porch weight along with people sitting on it!  So, we decided to walk back by the house where the two guys were working on it and ask them.

As we started the conversation, one of the guys was looking as us and said, “well that’s interesting, what do you do?”  We explained that we’re retired engineers and have a construction background.  Then, are you ready for this – he asks us if we were in St. Thomas (STT)!  He says, “I’m Bruno.”  I’m sure I screamed!  He was our sailing instructor at the St Thomas Yacht Club which we had joined while we were there. OMG can you believe that! As we were talking, he looked familiar but with a hat and glasses on, I couldn’t connect the dots fast enough. We all couldn’t believe it – he was helping his son Sean put a porch on a new deck while he was taking a break from STT.

We chatted for a while and caught up, explained why we were in Bath Maine.  He shared he is picking up a boat in MD later this summer and would definitely come out to Seguin.  How random – they were working, we chose to walk down that street and strike up a conversation.  He actually brought us to some neighbors two doors down to explain who we were – we all still can’t believe it.  Even now that I’m typing this up, it seems very incredible!

We wrapped up the day with driving down to Freeport (about 22 mins) to meet Sharon & Brent for dinner.  We had such a great time and it was fun to see them.  I met Sharon in the STT airport in October 2018 when I was on my way home to see my Dad.  His health was failing.  She is a PT and we just struck up a conversation in the airport and immediately connected. We ran the 8 Tuff Miles (a run/ walk race in St John) with her and hitched up with them again when Brent came to Saint John’s in March.  Very genuine, down to earth peeps!  We had a wonderful meal at Linda Bean’s Topside Market – some local brews, fresh fish tacos, sandwiches and a wonderful beet salad.  And guess who had the salad?  Steve !!!  I had the fish tacos with Sweet Potato Fries (yum, yum)

Lastly before I forget, a shout out to Paul, Joan and Betty at the Marriott Residence Inn in Bath.  They were fantastic people and as our reservations kept moving out, they were very helpful.  Betty ran the morning breakfast and she was on top of it!  I’ve never been at a hotel that included some many toppings for either oatmeal or yogurt! Besides fresh pineapple and strawberries, she had walnuts, pecans, almonds, brown sugar, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, raisins, cranberries, granola, and more.  But everyone there was great!

Monday, May 23rd –  Yay!  Departure Day has finally arrived!  We got up at a reasonable time and left the hotel about 6:45 a.m.  We needed to be at the dock by 7:30 as some of our stuff was going on the first trip out to the island.  There were 6 other people going out who were going to work on “their” projects out there as well as assisting us in getting acquainted with the various systems on the island.  As we left the hotel, we got behind a school bus, stopping every ¼ mile to pick someone up!  After they turned off, we were behind a large dump truck that appeared to have asphalt in it.  Then we came upon the paving operation!  Yikes – It was like we couldn’t get there!!!!  It should have only taken us 20 mins to get there…… Finally, we arrived at Fort Popham and unloaded our stuff onto the floating dock!

The first crew left.  Lots of tubs containing items for the museum, equipment, supplies, food, tools, gas etc. 

As we were driving back to the Fort, Captain Ethan called to say he was on his way back.  Popham State Park has this amazing stretch of beach.  I’ll try to remember to take a pic when we head in some time – It goes on for miles!

We’ve arrived at Seguin! The plan is when we get into the Cove, someone from the 1^st group needs to row out in the dinghy to pick up us and all our gear, tubs, supplies, food, etc.  After four trips in and out we have everything on the beach…. Now everyone pitched in to carry our stuff up the steps from the Cove beach to the “Donkey House” (that has the engine that used to run the tram).  Two of the guys on the first boat trip are engine mechanics working to try and get that engine running again.  There are 7 of us making trips up to the Lighthouse!  It’s about 200 steps on the path, first some grassy trail, then some with rocks here and there, till you walk up under the tram, and turn to the right and there she is!  The light keepers house and the Tower! Love at first sight!

Well, we all had our jobs. Where to start! There’s cleaning and sweeping, carrying our bags up to our room on the keepers’ side of the house, then I emptied the tubs, coolers, etc. and started organizing our kitchen.  Steve was getting his training on the solar and water systems and power equipment in the maintenance shop (also known as the whistle house).  Then he was off on the zero-turn riding mower!    About 3:00 we started to help carry down empty tubs and other supplies that were going back with the crew on the 1^st boat trip.  In the pic, we have “Water” Greg, “Solar” Rick, “Project Guy / Historian” Chris, “Roof” Tom and Scuba (oops, guess Steve got cut out of the pic).

Cyndy is staying with us for “training.”  Steve made a couple of trips out to Ethan’s boat rowing them and their stuff in the new dinghy.

While he was rowing them and their gear out, Cyndy came down to the cove with the cover for the dingy. She definitely looked like royalty in her cape (the dinghy cover)!

Now it was time to switch gears as the sun was setting.  We had a beautiful sunset.  I don’t think you can zoom in on the image but to the right of the rocks in the water in the center of the picture is the profile of Mount Washington – 90 miles away! When the sun sets, it’s behind the mountain and it silhouettes it.  It was gorgeous!!!

Then the strangest thing happened, as I walked towards the north side and looked towards the mainland.  I couldn’t believe my eyes.  It looked like a fire!  The smoke was very black and you could actually see flames!  We couldn’t quite figure out where it was.  The next day, my sister Diane that has a home in Southport (pretty close by), found out the fire was in Boothbay Harbor.

The Boothbay Register (newspaper) serving Boothbay Harbor, Southport and Edgecomb since 1876 reported on the fire. (Beach Cove inn fire cause undetermined | Boothbay Register)

Let’s wrap up our 1^st day…. After we saw sunset, it was time to prep dinner.  Cyndy brought some delicious cheese and crackers.  For dinner we had little falafel patties mixed in with my quinoa that had peppers, onions, and zucchini topped with toasted pine nuts.  Cyndy brought some sweets from the Bath Sweet Shop.  Then we played 3-way cribbage and called it a night.  Busy, busy, busy!

Tuesday, May 24th –  Guess I’m excited to be here – I woke up about 4 a.m.  Tossed and turned for a while and got up at 5.  Before I start my day, let’s check the sunrise.  Not sure what time that happens but low and behold.  There is was! 

Time to pause for just a minute to reflect on where we are and how lucky to have this adventure ahead! 

We were having trouble with the battery sleeve that you insert in the gas stove so you have a “clicker” to light the burners and the oven.  So, I attacked that first.  Put in 2 new batteries and reinstalled worked!  Yay!  Just where is the multi-meter now so I can check the batteries I took out as well as check the 30+ batteries that will go in the smoke alarms!  Don’t need one to start beeping, as they “talk” to each other and if one starts, then they all follow suit. 

Next task was, now that I could get the oven to work, to make my favorite “Honey of an Oat Banana Bread.” This comes from a Bed & Breakfast Cookbook a friend gave me over 30 years ago – but it’s a fun cookbook.  But one note, it’s not a very “healthy” recipe which means it’s awesome!  It comes from Aunt Polly at The Cornell House in Lenox, Ma.

Yowzah does it smell and look good!  Today we mow, weed whack and mow some more.  Lots and lots to mow!  This is the first cut of the season and some of the grass is 12-18” tall!  Steve did the South Trail, Cyndy did under the tram and the ‘campsite’, yes we have a campsite!   

Then we had to mow the “front” lawn, which has a slight hill.  If you use the tractor, you can’t stop, the pull mower is difficult, weed whacking – grass is too tall.  Steve use the weedwhacker to take some of the height down, then I mowed with the push mower R->L.  Took a long time.

We came back to the house to have some lunch – got to feed the help as we’re burning calories for sure. 

We headed back to the South Trail as Steve had only been able to weed whack so far as it was difficult to tell where the trail went,  but we walked the rest of the way.  Saw some Canada geese and their gosling – trying to teach it to fly!  Ultimately, he/she made it down to the ocean to join Mom & Dad.  The geese have hatched but now comes Seagull mating and hatching season so on both the North and South trails, we’ll NOT go to the end as that is their area now.  This will last till about mid-June.  Next, we walked down the Cobblestone Trail.  If you come up from the Cove to the donkey engine house and the welcome sign you’ll a sign for the Cove Trail (which passes through the campsite) or the Cobblestone Beach Trail which takes you to a rocky beach.  The pic is Steve walking towards the “beach” part – it’s all rocks but the rocks here are different, rounded and very smooth….

Well, that’s all the mowing, weed whacking for today.  Went down to the Cove to just sit and watch the waves lap at the tiny beach that is now home.

Just to get a sense of where we are when I talk trails, check out the pic of the trail map

Wednesday, May 25th – Today we slept in a little longer – like maybe I made it to 6 or 6:30!  Got up, had some breakfast.  Off to mow again – now Steve is mowing over some of the areas he already mowed to mulch the cut grass.

It was so thick and tall.  Time to weed whack some more as there are always places you see that need a little trimming! 

Talked to my sister Diane for a little bit.  She is trying help me find a captain for our first guests.  They arrive in Maine June 4 and planning to come out to the island sometime during the week they are staying in Boothbay.  I spent some time in the battery room as we’re trying to figure out the wi-fi associated with the router that is used to send data from the solar system to the mainland. We even called US Cellular – not very much help.  We’ll figure it out eventually but with little cell service, all my pics can’t get to google photos!  I’m working on trying to figure out a new process for writing the blog and including pics.

Next was to move out the various benches on the property.  One at the top of the tram, a couple facing due west for sunsets and one facing east.

Then Cyndy and I walked around the tower (aka the Lighthouse) a little bit.  Here is a pic from the catwalk facing north.

Did some minor work in the Museum getting a few things ready, learning a little about tours, cleaning the shelves for the shirts, learning the process for sales, etc.

Well, we had dinner and enjoyed chatting with each other, learning more about each other’s background.  I decided to go out and take a peek at the night sky.  The lighthouse isn’t working as the solar panels that power the light had some damage over the winter.  Hoping for a star-studded sky, I walked out and saw the light was lit!  It was pretty dim, but it was still lit.  I texted Cyndy and she was surprised and came out to see.  It was like a nightlight!  Still kind of cool. 

Thursday, May 26th – Kind of cloudy this morning and breakfast was scrambled eggs with bacon this morning.  It was yummy – something a little different.  Today’s mission, whack the North Trail.  This is the longest trail and has a couple of loops.  Weather not the best but good working weather.  No need for suntan lotion today.  We made great time and finished in about an hour and a half.  

On this trail there is a path that is over some areas that can get wet, so you walk on boards that have been mounted to another board.  Kind of a boardwalk but the boards run parallel to how you walk.  And all along this path there are some irises just starting to come up!  Can’t wait for them to bloom – think we need a little warmer weather.    When whacking, you have to shut off the machine to change the line as they are not self-feeding.  We had pre-cut several to take along with us as well as a pair of plyers to pull out the nubs.  Anyway, as Steve had stopped to change his, I moved my weed whacker out of the way, but didn’t do a very good job with situational awareness and wacked his chin!  Ouch!!!! Even through his jeans there were still marks!  Sorry honey! 

Also, while on this path, we came across a small rock wall.  This wall marks the last 10 acres that were deeded from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (yes it included a good portion of lower Maine) to the Federal Government for the building of the lighthouse. They only thought the island was 20 acres when in fact it was 65!  A little nugget of history!

Took a break for lunch, but not for long – off to more ….. wait for it….. you got it weed whacking!!!  This time Steve headed off to finish the Cove trail and I went off to finish the South trail out as far we can go being mindful of the seagulls and they DO NOT like humans very much!  Cyndy and I started working on the weather station.  We checked the battery and it was till good.  Had to pull out the good old manual and read the steps.  We made it through all the setup but it’s still not showing the wind speed – and that’s one of the most important items we’d like to know.  It’s still not registering as I type this and one of these days I’ll give them a call to find out what we missed. 

I think I’ve mentioned that the lighthouse is not really working up to full brightness.  Cyndy connected with the Coast Guard and they are stopping to repair a few other locations and plan to be here on June 3.  So we’ll see.  She went off to sweep the tower (lots of dead bugs, etc.). But here are some cool pics of the lens and the view and the not so perfect solar panels that power the light

There will be a post for sure talking about the lens as it was a revolutionary development in lighting the shores of the U.S.  The design made the light (whether from a flame or a bulb) shine 500 times brighter.  Before the LED, the bulb used was a 1000-watt bulb and it would shine out to 20 miles.  I digress….

Dinner was our Tofu sausage crumbles (compliments of our friend Caroline!) on Mediterranean Spaghetti Squash boats.  One of our favorites and now one of Cyndy’s!!! It requires lots of chopping and everyone pitched in.

To wrap up the night, we watched “A Knights Tale”, thanks to Kate and Steve!!!  Cyndy said it was a special event as she had not only not seen the movie, but had never watched a movie on the island!  Well leave it to the P’s to go out there and do something crazy!

Friday, May 27th – Started out pretty clear and as one might expect in Maine, you could see the fog rolling in. 

  A very “Maine-u-lar” day! We had a treat though as we were celebrating the completion of Round 1 of all the mowing and weed whacking!  Cyndy made special blueberry pancakes for us.  Delicious – didn’t even need syrup! 

Steve worked to fix some balusters on the front porch on both sides that were loose and started posting some trail signage.  Cyndy and I headed to the Museum and gift shop for more learning and the deep clean. Yep, sweep, vac and wash the floor, clean up all the little white dots you get from spider droppings in the corner, vac up cobwebs off the brick, etc. – by the end of the day the placed looked awesome!  Then she showed me all the things we sell in the shop and their prices.  Took a pic of the price list as she needed to take it with her and update it. 

And as the day rounded up, Cyndy noticed 2 people coming off the North Trail.  Well wait a minute, where did they come from!  Our first guests of the 2022 season – we’re officially open!  

 Turns out Don and Pam are from Biddeford, Maine on their way to Boothbay and then onto Robin Hood (a common well-protected spot to hang out).  They have been here many times and were very familiar with Seguin.  Rough sail getting here though as seas were 8’+ and wind in the not-so-good direction.  But warm and friendly folks! 

For dinner we had a vegetable quiche Cyndy made and it was a special 2 for 1 as she made an extra one to freeze!  That will come in handy some night.  After dinner, Cyndy and I finished our Rummy 500 game and Steve read his book. Feels like we are starting to settle in a little bit!

Saturday, May 28th – Little chilly today.  If I don’t make any notes on what we did that day, I rely on my pics.  Didn’t take too many today.  Steve finished up putting the various signs on the trails, things like “Vista”, The Cove Trail, directional arrow signs, Poison Ivy!

In the afternoon, Steve and I re-walked the North Trail as there are a couple of loops and as he was posting the signs, he wasn’t sure where the trail went.  We figured it out. I did a Map My Run of the north trail – was curious to see where it went.

Again, we are steering clear of the very north and south tips of the island because of the seagull mating and nesting season.  Per Cyndy, this should last till about mid- June or so. 

After lunch, I got on my clean kick again.  I noticed some water had dripped down to the floor in front of the kitchen sink.  Well in wiping it up, I decided, alrighty then – time to scrub the floor.  When I saw how clean the spot was, I just had to do the entire floor!

 Of course once you look down, I then looked up and Steve and I both decided to vac the rafters of the winters decorations (cob webs, dust, etc). 

Busy first week!  Feels great to be out doing physical work as then there is no need to do any other exercise!  We’ve both been tracking our steps and Steve’s also been checking how many calories he’s burning.  Thanks for hanging in there and reading this blog – it was a big one!

Week of May 15 – The Journey North and Prep for Departure, T-minus  7 days and counting…..

Time to rally around the new plan!  Luckily, we did get to see Colin before we left.  We met for lunch outside and he filled us in on his clinicals for the fall and spring, all very exciting for him and us as his fall one is in Short Pump!  And it looks like his Spring one will be in CA in San Diego!   Yup – not too far from Steve’s family! 

The new plan has us leaving Wednesday, May 18 to head North, taking the Northwest route to avoid the usual crazy spots – DC, Baltimore, NYC, etc.  We’ll stay overnight in a town called Clinton, NJ.   

Then Thursday, up to the Tappan Zee Bridge (which is now the Governor Mario Cuomo Bridge), through Danbury CT, Hartford, CT, Worcester MA, Portsmouth NH and on to Bath, Maine.  We’ll get there a day early and spend the day Friday orienting ourselves on the grocery stores, laundromat, dump, etc.  All those places we’ll want to know where they are so we can maximize our time when we come to the mainland each week.  

Wednesday, May 18^th – Leaving a little later than planned.  As we headed slightly NW up towards Front Royal / Strasburg area to pick up Rte 81.  We traveled the Blue Ridge Turnpike, yes turnpike not the Parkway.  It was a beautiful ride and we decided to make a brief stop before we got on Rte. 81 as the rest of the day would be spent on the highway.

We stopped at Rappahannock Cellars, in Huntly, VA.  A winery and a distillery and an event space!  We enjoyed some snacks we brought and actually relaxed for a bit.

Also saw a hot air balloon. Took me 6 pictures to actually get one where you could see it – kept getting the trees!

We arrived about 7 at the hotel and had checked out a few restaurants on line. Found one and made a reservation but forgot to check their closing time! Kind of silly they would let you make a reservation at 7:45 if they closed at 8 right? When we got there, they said as long as we ordered by 8 we’re good to go.

Ordered small Caesar salad, mussels, oysters and tuna tartare.  All was delicious – I was scarfing up the mussels as the liquid they were in was fabulous!!! (that’s my food word). Room was great and we slept very well.

Thursday May 19^th – On the road again. Got an earlier start today which was good.  Thought we had stayed about half way, but turns out it wasn’t quite halfway, plus we ran into construction around Hartford, so we took a different route and drove by where we used to work for Northeast Utilities in Berlin, CT.  A little bit of a memory lane drive. Then we ran into some congestion/volume issues around Merrimac, Lowell and Lawrence when we were on 495.  Just too many cars trying to get on the highway and it was only 3:30!  Then we had some rain, needed to get some gas etc. More rain etc. as we entered Maine – couldn’t see the Lobster Tank (an oil tank on the side of the road just after the Maine/NH bridge that has a big red lobster painted on it), so I took a photo of our exit off the Maine Turnpike.

Arrived at the hotel around 5:30 – phew, little bit of a long day, but it’s done!  The trip odometer says 800!

Tomorrow will be an easy day, explore and orientation.  During our conversation earlier with Cyndy about trying to get some of our stuff to a person heading out tomorrow, who is scoping out the roof replacement on the main house, we all agreed it would be best if we did a COVID test tomorrow to ensure that we’re negative for the ride out on Saturday.    Makes sense, but we were a little nervous as Steve was not yet back to his usual happy-go-lucky self.  I still had no symptoms.  We picked up a couple of tests for tomorrow.  Couple of beers to celebrate we are here!!!

Tonight, we decided to grab some take out from Best Thai 2 in Bath.  We’ve eaten at Best Thai in Boothbay and its good.  No one else was in the restaurant so we decided to just eat there.  I had Evil Tofu and Steve had Red Curry with Tofu and wide rice noodles instead of rice.  Yummy! While we were waiting, I went next door to Old Bones Tattoo as guess who is looking for a tattoo before this trip is over????   Turns out they weren’t open.  A little bit of TV and we were off to sleep.  Hotel (Marriott Residence Inn Bath / Brunswick) was a great room.  Full fridge with icemaker, little LR area and our bedroom and bathroom had a door to separate.  Really nice!!  

PS – Shout out to Cathy Martin (Steve’s cousin) today is her birthday.  I had made here a birthday gift but had to send it to her because we didn’t see them cause of the COVID thing.  But her husband Mike sent a photo of her in the birthday present. 

Friday, May 20 – Alright so today is explore, grocery shop and meet Diane and Dave (my sister and her husband) for dinner at Bath Brewing Company. Right across the street is a Shaw’s.  Before we head out shopping, Steve thought we should do our Covid tests.  Might make a difference on what food we need to get.  Steve did his first…. Drum roll please.  Yippee!  He’s negative and me too. 

Now we can continue with our plan to go shopping.  We’ll be sharing our meals with Cyndy.  Earlier, she and I chatted about what each of us would bring.  So off we went to grocery shop and brought our big canvas bag.  We needed to get food for about 4-5 dinners plus breakfast and lunches.  We were very impressed with the selection of food available, but there is the challenge of figuring out what’s where when you’re in a new-to-you grocery store!  Steve got the app for the Shaw’s Loyalty Program since this will likely be our main stop for groceries.  Wow!  All of our purchase fit in the one bag we brought (which was pretty big).  Then we stopped at Rocky’s ACE Hardware as we needed to get some RV TP for the bathrooms on the island.  They have an account there so we just charge it to them and Cyndy gets an email!   Back to the room to put away our food and got ready for dinner.  Plan is to meet Diane and Dave around 6 at Bath Brewing since we’ll be up and out early.  Supposed to meet at the dock in Popham Beach at 0730.   

In the car leaving the hotel, we got a call from Cyndy.  Weather delay, not heading out tomorrow! Oh no!  May move to Sunday or Monday!  Another flexible opportunity, what else can you do right?  But we decided to meet Cyndy for breakfast tomorrow at Winnegance Restaurant & Bakery.  We actually had lunch there last August when we came up for our “interview.”  Well, we’ll hear what the new plan is then, maybe!  So we had a great dinner and listened to some good music at the brewery.  It was great to see both of them again having just seen them a couple of weeks ago at James’ (their sons) wedding.  I usually only see them a couple of times a year.  Diane and I had the Quinoa Bowl – I added the tofu, she went solo. Yummy!!  Just finished those leftovers as I’m typing this too.

Saturday, May 21 – So we met Cyndy this morning around 10.  Steve and I shared the lobster omelet (yes we’re in Maine).  She had the seafood medley omelet.  But first I had to get the blueberry granola scone.  It was so yummy and I ate it so fast I forgot to take a pic! 

We met Mark, a friend of Cyndy’s that works at the local ReStore. Then we met Michelle and Bob, also friends of Cyndy’s.  Nice people that live locally and also in Florida. 

By the end of breakfast though, we learned we’re not going out tomorrow, but Monday morning! We are so anxious to get started on our adventure, but each day we are still learning about the area.

Today we opted to head towards Brunswick (south on Rte 1) to see what else is nearby.  Stopped in at GW (Goodwill) there and bought a couple of wine glasses, a flannel shirt for Steve and some muck boots for me!  Crazy cool waterproof lined boots, should be good for climbing out of dingy into cold water with stuff and they were my size!!

Then down to Bath to walk around, listen to a little band, met Irene in the Made in Maine store, Reny’s for warm socks and water shoes for Steve. We then met Amanda Director of Main Street Bath. We talked about captains to help, she shared her contact information and I said I would share with Cyndy and be back in touch.  I realized a little later I had left my water bottle somewhere.  I retraced my steps and though it might be Reny’s.  I called and I was right. This time though I decided to walk down and pick it up.  Turned out it was only 2 miles.  I passed the time by chatting with my Mom (Anne) who lives outside of Boston and will be 95 in the fall.  An amazing person! As I was talking to her, I came to this plaque in the side walk on the corner of Front and Centre Streets.  Rather interesting I thought as my maiden name is Thompson. How ‘bout that!

We decided to have pizza for dinner tonight.  There are 3 local pizza places and we selected Bruno’s Wood Fired Pizza on Front Street.  It was hoppin’!  We took a seat at the bar and ordered a couple of local draft beers and some pizza.  Yes, mine was cauliflower crust, with pear, fig drizzle spinach and just a tiny bit of cheese!

Hello and Welcome to the Seguin Island Blog!!!

We are Carol and Steve Pietryk, the 2022 caretakers for Sequin Light Station.  We are very excited to have the opportunity to experience life on an island and take care of this precious piece of history.  First, just a little background on us.

We are both originally from Massachusetts, lived on the eastern shore of Connecticut for 15 years and have spent the last 20 years in Richmond Virginia.  We have two grown children; Gary, currently living in Colorado Springs and Colin who lives in Richmond while attending a graduate program at Virginia Commonwealth University. We are both mechanical engineers (very – MacGyver-like individuals), and worked in construction and the power generation industry. We chose to retire in 2018 when we found an opportunity to caretake an estate in St Thomas, USVI. We applied and were selected as the caretakers for the 2018 – 2019 season.  That year long experience was an extraordinary way to begin retirement!!  Our family and friends shared in the adventure through our extensive blog.

We are soooo excited for this opportunity to experience living on an island (slightly smaller than St. Thomas) and one that has a lighthouse!  Thank you to FOSILS (Friends of Seguin Island Light Station) for this awesome adventure.   If you’ve not met me (Carol), I write like I speak.  We try to capture the everyday nuggets so you can experience this adventure just like we are.  There’s a lot that goes on everyday – we hope you enjoy reading our journal and participating with us all the little details!

The Packing!

Well, we’re almost off again. This week the focus is packing, not really packing but pre-packing.  Where do you begin? We begin with our “Packing List – Extended Stay.” From here it was whittled down as the Lighthouse already has lots of stuff.  Just like St. Thomas – once it arrives on the island, it doesn’t leave!  There is a picture of the packing list, all marked up of course. Some of the notes may seem silly, but there is a lot going on in our minds and it’s best to have it written down! The back of the list had many notes too, but you get the idea!

Now on to the actual packing.  Here’s a couple of pics around the house!  The dining room table gets stacked with items, the bedroom has piles and then there’s the pile of bags.  We need to be able to carry these items so we’re trying to keep them on the lighter side vs a “tub” which can get pretty heavy pretty quick. 

But wait till you see the car all packed up! It won’t look like so much stuff.

Tomorrow is Friday.  So I’m off to the Goochland Animal Shelter to volunteer then the weekend to wrap up a few more “friend” visits, we’ll see Colin on Sunday and then we leave Tuesday mid-day to drive to Steve’s cousin who lives just outside of Philly.

Humm, that was the plan, but as we know we need to be flexible as the plan can often change.  Ours did. We attended a fund-raiser on Wednesday (5/9), I went to the Shelter on Friday.  However, come Saturday, Steve was not feeling himself.  He did an at home Covid test and it was negative.  Ok…. plans to meet friends at our golf club for dinner was on.  Sunday, different story.  Really didn’t feel well. Went to CVS and guess what, yep he had Covid.  So our plans to hang with Colin and go golfing, and all the family and friend visiting on the way up  – now a no go….Spent the day figuring out a new plan.