Sears Island, Maine

An experienced cacher recently suggested that I check out Sears Island for its caches and scenery.  I expected tourists, summer homes, and nicely groomed walking trails but upon arrival, I realized how little I knew about the area.

There is one road that leads to Sears Island from the mainland.  It is blocked with cement barriers preventing any traffic from traveling on the island's one "road."  The first thing I learned about this place was that they mean business when it comes to dog business.  It must be a popular place for pups and their owners to walk because not only did I see a few, but there are doggy waste bags and trash cans available. 

I parked my car on the dirt pull off with two other vehicles and grabbed my geocahing bag and a bottle of water.  It was early in the day but looking like it would turn out to be a hot one.  Behind the cement barricade is the one strip of pavement on the island.  Only having walked about fifty feet from the entrance, I started to get a very eerie feeling about the place.  The road hasn't been a road in so long that grass has started to invade some of the cracks in the tar and there are only a few barely noticeable flakes of yellow paint that used to line the road. 

I put on my brave face and set my GPS to the coordinates of the first cache.  I had to take a path off the main road to get to my destination, which made me less than comfortable.  The other two walkers chose to stick to the pavement.  It wasn't far before I turned off this path and into the woods to find my destination.  I quickly found the cache, and a swarm of mosquitoes, in the crook of a tree.  The contents of the cache, which included an old cassette tape, were pretty wet, making it difficult to sign the log. 

The next cache was down the same trail and off into the woods on the right.  Several times while looking for this cache, I walked face first into spider webs.  I couldn't bare the thought of how many bugs were probably crawling one me at any one moment.  I stopped to look under a pile of logs, and when I did, I heard something or someone crashing through the woods in front of me.  This noise was followed shortly after by another something or someone crashing through the woods.  I decided to abandon my search for the cache and got back to the main trail as quickly as possible.  I looked both up and down the path expecting to see a dog and its owner but instead I saw nothing.  My friend had told me that there were ten caches on Sears Island but at this point, I knew I would not look for them all.

The next cache I dared to do was a two stage multi cache.  A multi cache is where you have to find one or more caches that give you clues or coordinates to the final cache.  The clues were found on a telephone pole next to a sign naming the former residents of the island.  After doing some calculations and putting the numbers in the correct order, I started bushwhacking my way to the second and final stage of the puzzle.  At the posted coordinates were the remains of the foundation of a house, which was now a pond.  It had the same feeling as a cemetery. 

These were the only two geoaches I found on my trip to Sears Island.  Walking here is unlike any other place I've ever been.  I've read the expression "deafening silence" in books but experienced it for the first time here.  Not to sound like a coward but more than a few times I checked over my shoulder to see if anything was there.  Although I never saw anything, I'm not positive that there weren't eyes peeking at me from the thick woods. 

I planned on leaving as quickly as I could get myself into the car but that was before I noticed the beach.  Just as on the island paths, I didn't see anyone out on the beach.  I walked along the damp sands of low tide and collected a few shells and sea glass to take back to show my students.  Listening to the waves lap the beach, I thought wistfully of my childhood growing up on the coast.  My mom often took my sisters and I beach combing at Sandy River or Batson's Beach. 

The ocean breeze helped counter the affects of the hot summer sun.  A sea gull took the opportunity to go bobbing for some lunch, something I had never seen in my years as a Downeaster.  I then got sniffed by a soggy puppy who was doing some beach combing himself and chatted with her owner. 

Although I didn't find many caches, going to Sears Island was a nice experience.  I found some great information and history about Sears Island from this link.  I ended my day by driving into Belfast to get some lunch and stopped at Perry's Nut House, another place I hadn't been since I was a kid.  Thanks to Masterson of the Universe for the recommendation. 

**Belfast Pictures**



Quite the Quarry

On our way back from a Mother's Day celebration in Belfast, hubby and I set a course for a few geocaches to pick up on the way home.  We picked up a few easy park and grabs before arriving at the quarry in Frankfort. 

We parked at the gate at the bottom of the road and the compass showed a mere .33 miles to the destination.  The day was beautiful so we decided to take the short hike up the hill.  We took the wrong trail more than once but finally got back on the right track.  I might not be out of shape but I'm definitely out of condition.  Thankfully there were lots of views to stop and take in so I could catch my breath. 

When we got to the top of the hill, we quickly found the cache.  The disappointing part was that the cache was in a plastic zip bag.  The contents were completely soaked and I couldn't sign my name to the log.  Directly behind us was a small lake surrounded by high walls of granite painted with graffiti.  Oddly, the graffiti was somehow pretty.  The description of the geocache said that some of the granite used at Fort Knox was probably used from here.   Although we didn't find a great geocache, we did find some great views and learned a neat history lesson.

Witch's Leg, Bucksport, ME

This past weekend I decided to take a field trip to a nearby coastal area to find some geocaches in what I hoped would be picturesque locations.  My expectations were met with beautiful blue skies mirroring the sparkling blue ocean.  The day started off with a extreme wind but turned into a mild and pleasant day. 

My first set of geocaches were in the ocean side town of Bucksport.  Here I set out to find my first virtual cache.  A virtual cache is where the hider expects you to visit a location and answer a question or accomplish a task; there is no actual container to find. 

Upon arriving at the coordinates for Witch's Leg, the seeker finds a small and weathered cemetery.  After taking the stairs up to the viewing platform, I found a large monument with the name Buck etched into it.  To the left is a plaque explaining the significance of the monument.  The story goes something like this:

Jonathan Buck, founder of Bucksport and war hero, accused a woman of practicing witchcraft.  She was condemned to death by burning.  While she her body was going up in flames, her body started to disassemble.  Her son, a social outcast, ran up to the body and grabbed her leg from the ashes.  He ran into the woods with the leg.  Buck eventually died and had an ordinary stone placed to mark his grave.  Many years after his death, a new monument was erected to honor him.  One morning, passersby noticed a blemish on the stone in the shape of a leg.  The monument has been polished although it has not helped remove the outline.  The plaque also notes that there were executions due to witch craft and that stone tends to have blemishes.  What do you think?

I shared this story with my fourth grade students and asked them same question.  Some believed it was a curse and other attributed the mark to imperfections in the stone.  They had fun sharing ghost stories of their own, many of them more unbelievable than Buck's.