Day 5 - 30/30 Challenge & Pemaquid Light and Back to My Real Life.

Pemaquid Lighthouse, Watercolor, 6" x 6" $45
Woohoo! SOLD!

I started this EARLY this morning (Thursday) and had every intention of finishing it right up, but real life and emails, etc. took over. I will do better on Friday.

It occurred to me last night, as I travelled home, that my day had a parallel quality. Up at 6 am, I saw the dawn break. I pack, walk and explore during my final hours on this beautiful little island. (Even more beautiful when the sun is out and I realize that there are other islands around and - shocking - you can actually see the mainland!)

I take some pictures up on Lighthouse Hill, at the school house, up Horn Hill, and hurry back to the wharf to catch a (very small) ferry. (I am the ONLY person leaving the island. How sad.)

The ferry captain stops at two small islands (barely more than rocks - do those count as islands?) to look at some grey seals. We look at them, bobbing about in the water. They look at us, bobbing about on a boat, and after a few minutes, we carry on. 

We see some porpoises surface and dive as we make the hour-long trip back to New Harbor. Muscongus Bay is prussian blue and fairly calm as small trawlers and lobster boats cruise about. Monhegan, Allen, Burnt, Matinicus, Metinic, Ragged islands and lots of other little islands, get smaller and smaller.

Once on the mainland, I make a quick stop at Pemaquid Lighthouse, just down the road a bit. The rock formations on this shoreline look like huge fossilized, eroded logs, as if someone had dropped an gianourmous load of lumber. It's very beautiful. 

I took a quick walk up the lighthouse, and took dozens more pictures. There was a group of painters set up in the picnic area. The light was sparkly and the colors were just saturated. I wish I had the time to join them.

Back in the car and on my way home. I reach New London early enough to make the (very large) 6 pm ferry. I take a few pictures of lighthouses as we leave Connecticut. 

The Sound is prussian blue and fairly calm, small working boats cruise along in the evening, sea gulls swoop overhead and the mainland gets smaller and smaller, becoming a sliver as it reaches west. Islands pop up on the left - Fishers, Little Gull, Great Gull, Plum Island, and finally a very big island – Long Island. Orient Light winks hello as we push through Plum Gut and the sun sets – stunning. The lone cloud reaches across the sky as a sort of mirror image of Long Island.

I'm nearly home...