I was recently in Maine. I spent 4 days in Acadia National Park. Through those days, plus another spent driving, I saw a total of one other Z, an old 240. Actually, for part of that extra day, I was in NYC. No Z's there either.

You might ask what kind of jerk brings a Z to go camping. Well, somebody like me. I don't particularly trust my Accord to go that distance, and honestly, it's no fun driving the Accord. So, pack the Z up, and away we go. Actually, every road I drove on was paved, and while some were a little bumpy, they were better than the roads I had driven in NYC.

Acadia National Park (ANP) is dominated by Cadillac Mountain, named by the same guy who eventually founded Detroit. It's the highest spot on the Atlantic coastline, which really isn't saying much as it's only about 5000 feet tall.

Here's a pic of the Z climbing the mtn.

 

Up at the top, you can watch for hawks/eagles/falcons and other migrating birds of prey. I sat there for about 1 hour, didn't see anything other than a busload of Chinese tourists, straight from NYC. The wind whips up the mountain, so it was pretty cold. I had to change from shorts to jeans in the Z. Now, a quick side note as there's always some thread about people having sex in the Z. More power to you, I thought it was hard enough using the passenger seat as a changing room.

So, I left and headed down to the campground, which was nicely situated a short walk from the coast. There is only one beach in Acadia, and I'm not sure anybody really uses it, as the water is about 50 degrees, even in the midst of summer. Most of the rest of the coastline is rocky cliffs.

The first thing you notice is that there are thousands upon thousands of lobster trap buoys floating out as far as the eye can see. I wish I had a good pic demonstrating this, it's really amazing. You wonder how in the world there can be any lobsters left.

Lobster "fishing" consists of dumping the baited traps overboard, waiting a day or two for the lobster to crawl through the one way door, then pulling the trap up. It does look like pretty strenuous work, seeing as there are thousands of traps. Supposedly, each boat is limited to 100 lobsters a day. Still sounds like a lot.

 

All of this lobster watching made me hungry, so I went to Thurston's lobster pound, located fairly nearby. Let me tell you, I've had a few lobsters in my day, but NONE of them compares to the ones I had there. Maybe it's the fact that just a few hours ago, these guys were out swimming in the Atlantic, I dunno, but the lobster was really good. Good enough that I went back the next day. I was dismayed to find out that lobster isn't any cheaper in Maine. They are a lot bigger though. I saw a 4 lb one there. I also learned that the biggest lobster caught was over 4 feet and weighed about 40 lbs. Wow.

This is the bay near Thurston's. The actual restaurant itself isn't much to see.

 

Oops, here's the pic.

 

While coming back, I ended up meeting this fellow photographer from MA, who told me about the Bass Harbor lighthouse, apparently the most photographed site in Maine. Well, I had to give it a try.


Tough shooting conditions. You have to climb onto some rocks, which isn't a big deal except when you're carrying over $2500 of photo equipment. Then, there are enough mosquitos to pretty much guarantee you a case of West Nile. Finally, the available shooting positions all face the setting sun, so exposure gets tricky.

I have since discovered that PhotoShop really allows you to make significant changes and "save" bad pictures. I'm not sure how I feel about this, it kind of diminishes the skill required at getting a good exposure.

 

Here's another one more directed towards the coastline.

I fulfilled my two basic photography rules during this session.

1) Take lots of pics. Unless you're good enough to guarantee quality, go with quantity. Of all those shots, one or two might be decent.

2) You can't take a bad picture of a great subject. Particulary, babies, puppies, sunsets, and of course, naked supermodels. Alas, I have not had the opportunity to shoot the last. Here, the combination of sunset and lighthouse are pretty good.

 

The clouds were very nice also.

 

Just for a change of pace, here's a church in Bar Harbor.

Bar Harbor is very much a confluence of yuppie and crunchy. It had the benefit of being the only place I could find with Internet access. Seeing as my cell phone (stupid Sprint) had no coverage in almost all of Maine, that Internet Cafe was my only means of communication.

 

This is some little cove near Bass Harbor.

It's boring in terms of originality, but hopefully it's decent in terms of the technical aspects.

I'm a big convert to digital cameras. I probably took about 300 pictures over 4 days. I took four or five shots of the same subject, trying different exposure times, just to see how they would look. I never would have done that with film, it would have been to expensive.

 

Here's a final Z shot. It's actually my favorite of multiple Z shots I took.

Needs a little PhotoShopping, but the raw image gets the idea across.

 

I guess this one should have been posted earlier, but a good tripod makes a huge difference. I never really thought about it before. This shot is about a 30 second exposure, and it's pretty rock solid in terms of focus.

It's lower Manhattan taken from the Brooklyn side.

 

Finally, this was really a screw around shot. It's rough, but I'm surprised at how well the idea came out.

Now if only I can get it worked out a little bit, it'll be a nice shot.

Gives a good sense of speed.

 

That's all for now.

Fellow mods, I just realized that this thread could very well fit in either "Off-topic" or "Gallery." If anybody feels strongly about moving it, please do. I just put it here without much forethought.

 

Nice pictures! Sounds like you had a great time.

 

You got some great shots Andrew. Glad to hear you had a good time.

 

Andrew those pictures are fantastic, each one different in it's own way. Really great job!

PS Did you make it to Beans?

 

Oh yeah, I did. Those shops are pretty crazy. I really couldn't believe they had actual trout swimming around.

I didn't spend a lot of time there, was in a rush to get back home.

Their prices didn't seem any different than what you would get in the catalog, but it was nice to see everything laid out before you.

 

Nice pictures and story Andrew.

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So are you telling us that the lighthouse picture was photshop enhanced? What, it started as a large dark shadow, and you enhanced it so we could make out the image of the lighthouse?

It's people like you that really get my goat! (j/k, of course)

I'm sure there are some ethics regarding this, but on a car forum, where people just want to 'see what you saw' I wouldn't sweat it. Composition in my 'I-have-no-photo-skills-whatsoever' opinion hopefully accounts for something!

Last evening I took some decent shots of my Z in the foreground, and the waning (or waxing, you choose) moon in the sky beyond. The result was a blurry light bulb hovering over my car. I was tempted to take a second shot of the moon alone, and then photoshop the moon over my Z. I think I would've have been in my rights to do this, as I would have just been trying to show everyone what I saw. But alas, my photoshop skills are even weaker then my photography skills, so I decided to just resize it to an avatar. The 4 pixels that now make up the moon, kinda-sorta look like a moon.

I'm sorry for hijacking the thread, but it was the above comment of yours that spurred me to post. < - (My attempt to blame you for my evil ways).

 

No, there's no photoshopping in any of the pics above. I really like the lighthouse pic, but I think that if I put some photoshop time into it, it could be even better.

The thing that gets me is that I spent over 45 minutes being eaten by mosquitos and shot over 100 pics of that lighthouse to find that I liked one of them. With good photoshop abilities, I could have spent 10 seconds, taken one picture, and then played around with it until I got what I desired.

Ah, such weighty ethical decisions we deal with on a daily basis.

 

Thanks for sharing all of your pictures i think i might like to take a trip up there myself. Did you really camp or did you go to bed and breakfasts? i heard there are lots of nice bed and breakfasts up there.