Allan Johnson 11/1/16 Allan Johnson 11/1/16

Maine Day 6 – B-52 Crash Site

Elephant Mountain, Maine

Today was a bad day. It rained off and on making some places we wanted to go to nearly impossible.

Originally we went out looking for Moose. We have done this many times before and have yet to see one in the wild. We did make it to a park and got close to some deer but still no Moose.

So with no luck again we move on to another spot to see something different.

Elephant Mountain, Maine

Today was a bad day. It rained off and on making some places we wanted to go to nearly impossible.

Originally we went out looking for Moose. We have done this many times before and have yet to see one in the wild. We did make it to a park and got close to some deer but still no Moose.

So with no luck again we move on to another spot to see something different.

Elephant Mountain

The next stop was not to look for Moose but to see a crash site of a B-52 Bomber from 1963. The crash site is located on Elephant Mountain.

I’ll warn you that the road is really rough and a car or van without really good suspension should think twice about going up it. We were able to manage in a van but it took us a long time to get to the site.

There are signs pointing to the crash site on the road but they are very spread out. The road you will need to find will be marked B-52 Road.

The Crash

On January 24, 1963, a B-52 Bomber was doing a Terrain Avoidance Flight to practice getting under the radar of the Soviet Air Defense. During the flight, they dropped to about 500 feet and with the bad weather ran into some turbulence.

The pilot tried to bring the plane back up above the turbulence, but the plane’s vertical stabilizer came off causing the plane to nose dive.

You can read more about the crash here.

Memorial

Now the site stands as a memorial to the 7 men who died on that night. The pilot and navigator were the only ones to survive the crash.

When you find the site there is a small parking lot across from the entrance. When you enter you see signs telling you not to take or touch anything but a usual people have gone in and put their names on the tires and other items.

Crash Site

You have to walk back to the site through a gate. Once inside you see a few parts of the plane along the sides of the path. The farther you walk in the more debris you see.

You will get to see full-size tires from the craft and parts of the fuselage. There are many big parts of the plane lying around. You have to be careful since some might be covered by leaves and you can trip on them plus the metal is extremely sharp and can cut you easily.

You do not want to get seriously hurt in this area due to no cell phone reception and it will take awhile for someone to be able to make it out to the site to help you.

Thoughts

If you are in the area and have the vehicle and time I would say to go check this out. You get to see some history that you do not hear much about. I did not know anything about this crash until we were trying to find something to do.

This is a neat little hidden history of Maine.

Gallery

Allan Johnson 10/31/16 Allan Johnson 10/31/16

Maine Day 5 – Edgar M. Tennis Preserve

Today we did not do too much in the way of adventures. We did, however, go to Deer Isle Maine to the Edgar M. Tennis Preserve for a nice hike.

The weather thankfully was nice and cool with some cloud cover and no rain. We arrived at the preserve around 11:00am and started our hike promptly after arriving.

There is an old cemetery along the hike which we checked out before hitting

Deer Isle, Maine

Today we did not do too much in the way of adventures. We did, however, go to Deer Isle Maine to the Edgar M. Tennis Preserve for a nice hike.

The weather thankfully was nice and cool with some cloud cover and no rain. We arrived at the preserve around 11:00am and started our hike promptly after arriving.

There is an old cemetery along the hike which we checked out before hitting the rest of the trail. While there we were greeted by a couple of red squirrels that were chasing each other. They ran right by us acting like we were not even there (watch the YouTube Video to see them running).

The Hike

The hike started off pretty easy. After we left the cemetery we headed down the red trail and continued on for quite some time before we ran into a different trail.

We had the choice of taking the red trail or switching off onto the blue trail. We picked the red since the blue lead away from the shoreline.

We also found out that the red trail is the longest trail taking you around a good chunk if the preserve. Some areas of the trail were a little dangerous with very small areas for you to get a good foothold.

While out there we only encountered one other person,a few squirrels, and some crows. One thing we did see a lot of out there were wild mushrooms. Some on the ground but some really big ones on the trees.

After the Preserve

After we finished our hike they decided to go to another Maine Fish and Wildlife building. The problem with that is the drive to the building was two hours from where the preserve is located. We wasted a nice day driving around in a car instead of being outside enjoying it.

The building we went to was just that a small building. It really was a waste of time. The only nice thing there was some wild blueberry fields across the street.

Allan Johnson 10/29/16 Allan Johnson 10/29/16

Maine Day 3 - Kittery and Beyond

Kittery Outlets, Kittery Maine

Today was a slow day. We did not do much worth talking about. We drove to Kittery to the outlet stores.

They wanted to go to the Trading Post and see what it was like. When we walked in I was blown away by how much stuff was in the building.

It was three floors packed with stuff from clothing, hunting, camping, fishing, food, and tons more. We spent a good two hours or more looking around at all the stuff.

I had a lot of fun just looking at all the crazy stuff they had. If I had the money I probably would have bought some ok the crazy items for family members.

Old Orchard Beach

Once we were done at the Trading post and had lunch we decided our next location was going to be Old Orchard Beach. My brother wanted to see if we could find some Piper Plovers.

When I was reading about them online I mistook what an article said and thought that they leave after a certain time of the year. This lead to my mistake of leaving my camera and telephoto lens behind in the car and just taking a 50mm lens.

The weather was bad with a constant mist blowing about. I figured if any Plovers were here they would be in hiding. Yet I was wrong again and we did finally come across two Piper Plovers running around on the beach.

No matter what I tried I could not get anywhere near them that a 50mm lens would make a decent picture.

While walking the beach after playing hide and seek with the Plovers we came across all kinds of thing strewn about. We came across a dead decaying seagull and many crab claws plus a lobster claw.

L.L. Bean

After we finished at the beach we headed back to L.L. Beans again to pick up a small backpack for a hike we will be doing later this week on Deer Isle.

I shot more video for my YouTube channel while in there. If you want to check it out you can head over to my channel and see all the videos I have done for this trip.

What do you think?

Let me know what you think of this series so far and what you would like to see more of. Leave a comment or send me a message through the contact form. Thanks and have a good day!

Allan Johnson 10/17/16 Allan Johnson 10/17/16

Maine Day 1 – Let the Adventure Begin

Posted from Big Al's Adventures: http://www.bigalsadventures.com/maine-day-1-let-the-adventure-begin/

Freeport, ME

Today we made a journey to Freeport, Maine to the L.L. Bean outlet stores. As usual, we forgot something in this case binoculars.

We got to the L.L. Bean store which we have been to before and this time I took some video inside the store that I will be posting on my YouTube Channel. We found the section with the binoculars and were quickly asked if we needed help.

Knowing very little about what the best binoculars were the Bean associate was able to steer us in the right direction. We ended up getting Nikon 8248 ACULON A211 10x50 Binoculars. After my brother saw them he also went and bought his own.

Lunch

Once we finished making out purchases it was afternoon so we decided to find a place to eat. The great thing about the area around L.L. Bean is there are more shops and food places.

Out of all the different places, we looked at we settled on Linda Bean’s Maine Kitchen and Topside Tavern. Linda Beans has seating on both the inside and out. We went in and were greeted and sat right away. They were even able to get us a spot downstairs so we didn't have to climb the stairs.

My dad any myself decided to go light and get two red hot dogs. Yes, RED hot dogs which were really good. The others got a lobster sandwich and turkey club.

The food was very good and the service quick and helpful.

Linda Bean’s Maine Kitchen and Topside Tavern Red Hot Dog

Kennebunkport

Now with lunch and shopping out of our way, we moved to our next location Kennebunkport. This location was not my idea, but the others wanted to go see Walkers Point.

Walkers Point is where President Bush's family have a compound that you can see. They have a small pull over for you to park and get a look at the compound. You can not get into the compound, though. They have Secret Service and gates blocking the road in and ocean surrounding it on the other sides.

It is a nice place to get some photos, though. The coastline is pretty with rocks and nice waves crashing in most of the time. If you are lucky and the Bush's are staying there you might be able to see them outside if you have good binoculars or a telephoto lens.

Tomorrow

I do not have any idea of what we are going to do tomorrow. Someone said something about some outlet stores in Kittery. To me, that does not sound like a lot of fun, but we will see. I am sure we will have time to check out other stuff too.

Allan Johnson 10/7/15 Allan Johnson 10/7/15

Moose in Maine?

So on my current trip I have been to two places that "suppose" to have a high level population of Moose. WELLLLL so far I have seen nothing to support those claims. Tomorrow We are going to try one more place. Maybe we will get lucky, but so far the feeling is we won't see a thing. OH and the roads we went on were void of any kind of animals except crows. That is very weird.