ONBOARD INDEPENDENCE-As our whirlwind week of cruising along the Maine coast nears an end, I want to take a moment before reporting on day 6 activities to tell you some things about our little ship – American Cruise Lines’ Independence – her officers and crew and the services they’ve provided during our all too brief voyage. Built in 2010 by ACL-affiliated Chesapeake Shipbuilding Corp. in Salisbury, MD, the 194-foot, 104-passenger Independence (one of a 6-vessel ACL fleet) …
ONBOARD INDEPENDENCE-Boothbay Harbor goes by the slogan “Boating Capital of New England,” and the sprawling harbor does indeed bustle with fishing vessels and pleasure craft alike. But the town is also becoming known as home to New England’s finest botanical gardens. Some experts name it one of the nation’s best. We visited Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens on an ACL tour (a $45 option) with no idea of what to expect. After all, we’re in Maine – which …
ONBOARD INDEPENDENCE- Known by its slogan “Where the Mountains Meet the Sea,” Camden is yet another quintessentially pretty New England village. Set against the backdrop of the Camden Hills, the town’s busy harbor is well-known as home to a fleet of tall-masted windjammers that ply Penobscot Bay for both day-trips and extended excursions. A large group of passengers chose to join a narrated bus tour (a $55 option) featuring a visit to Camden Hills State Park where …
ONBOARD THE INDEPENDENCE –– Castine (pop. 1,400) is today a serene little village, shaded by leafy elms and lined with lovely old buildings, but it has a long and tumultuous past. Owing to its location at the tip of a cape, surrounded on three sides by water – including the entrance to the Penobscot River – it was a strategic defense point and thus the object of geopolitical squabbles among several nations, including France, Britain and Holland …
ONBOARD THE INDEPENDENCE — Clearing weather and the excitement of our first day ashore for tours brought out nearly all of the ship’s 90+ passengers to join a two-bus convoy in Bar Harbor for a morning spin around Acadia National Park. Our driver/guide, Roger Keene, is a jovial, highly energized fifth-generation resident of Bar Harbor – or, as he phrases it in the local dialect, “Bah Hahba” – who has been leading tours of Acadia for 40 …
ONBOARD THE INDEPENDENCE –– Melinda and I are happily aboard American Cruise Lines’ Independence for a 7-day cruise along the Maine coast but I must first backtrack a bit to recap our pre-cruise visit to Portland, July 3-4, which unfortunately was accompanied by Tropical Storm Arthur. We didn’t let the foul weather derail our plans to explore Maine’s largest and most dynamic city, showing up at the Old Port ticket office of Portland Discovery Tours at 9:30 a.m. …
Like some of you, I hold fond memories of trundling along the cove-indented, granite-strewn coast of Maine where waves crash ashore beneath picture-perfect lighthouses…where one quaint and pretty little town, with its snug harbor chock full of classic schooners and lobster boats, seems to beget another. And, of course, there’s nothing quite like the taste of a tender morsel of lobster, fresh from the briny deep and dunked in drawn butter. While few pleasures can match it …
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