boothbay botanical gardens

here's how awesome i am at posting - some friends from ny visited over the 4th of july and we spent one afternoon at the boothbay botanical gardens.  nearly a month later.. pics.  it was a gorgeous but oh so hot and humid day.  maine summers on the coast are supposed to be 75 and breeze with a slight chill in the shade.  not 99 and suffocatingly muggy.  but the pictures mostly speak for themselves.  we had a lovely 3 hour wander and then ice cream.  and showers.  and a nap.  but i digress.  prepare for lots of pics.

maine at it's finest - woodsy, some little hills, and water

sebago lake state park

4th of july was spent eating vietnamese food [with a friend's entire extended family] on a beach in the woods surrounding a lake.  that makes little to no sense.  i know.  google maps places it here ..and on the drive in i was responsible for announcing the google maps directions from someone's phone gps.  having never been to sebago before, i followed the exact directions which took us around the west side of the lake.  the scenic way.  which took twice as long but was adorable and we found some potential future camping sites, complete with beach access, toilets, and fried food shacks. 

bridges

the manhattan bridge.  connecting chinatown and vinegar hill.  aka dumbo.  which was explained to me as down-under-mahnattan-bridge-overpass.  not glamorous in either sense.  but whatever. 

all bright and sun-lit in 15 degree weather and high winds

god forbid anyone should try and access the footing for the brooklyn bridge.  razor wire yo.

the brooklyn bridge.  the other suspension bridge connecting chinatown and dumbo.  why build another bridge right next to it?  eeeh idk. 

view from the bridge [under construction] and the itty bitty statue of liberty

looks like a beginning art class.  "ok kids, these are perspective lines.  they all reach a vanishing point, can you tell where it is?  no?  then you should probably be in a gym class."

lobstah!

sooo i have always claimed not to like lobster.  i had never *actually* tried it until the day after thanksgiving.  thats right.  black friday i did not go shopping with the hordes.  i ate a lobster.  claws to tail.  and umm..the tail still weirds me out texture/flavor-wise.

but claws.  and little bitty feet.

holy shit.  amazing.

velvety soft and not fishy tasting.  delicious dipped in butter ..or not.  the little dude all cracked and [mostly cleaned] and ready for the eatin

nervous nellies

what i was very obtusely hinting at here, was a visit by my roommate and me to nervous nellie's jams and jellies!  i had been on a previous visit home, and enjoyed the homemade preserves on a scone with a hot cup of tea.  this time was just a sculpture tour.  peter handmakes all the art while his wife anne makes the amazing foods.

very picture-heavy

sneak peak

where can you find these things?

oyster fest

every year the town of oyster bay [specifically the village] throws a 2 day event appropriately named oyster fest.  here are the gritty details:

200,000 people
30 food stands
90 craft stands
tall ships
pirates
bands
free transport from LIRR stations

after 4 years in long island i FINALLY made it to oyster fest.  and it was amazing.

the fairway full of screaming children

a mozza-repa.  2 arepas with mozz in the middle.  DELECTABLE. 

pickle on a stick..  i also ate a steak sandwich, 1 1/2 ears of corn, and some pumpkin ravioli.  no oysters.  do. not. like.

rocky point pine barrens

my two favorite pictures from what turned into more of a nature photoshoot than a healthy walk.  [click to enlarge]

wine tour photos

these are all on the ubiquitous facebook.  along with a bunch of group pics, posed shots, and drunkards.  but thats par for a wine tour no?

purses and glasses waiting at a picnic table at baiting hollow.  no good horsey close ups, but we did almost witness a stallion fight..

long island's first potato vodka distillery.  and only i would assume. but one never knows.  and i guess they dont grow potatoes every year as our visit culminated in some glamour shots on a deck overlooking abandoned turned out fields.  loverly.

the bottling room at palmer vineyard.  looks a bit like an industrial milker.. but supposedly it corks in the tasty. 

a quote worthy of some wines.  others are bottled sour pain.  and/or the asian flush.  but im sure some consist of poetry.  or cause people to think they speak in poetic utterances.

tasting flights.  the "summer sweet selection" gewurztraminer, lighthouse white, and sunrise sunset.  oh the inspiration...

grapes at vineyard 48.  these idyllic rows cant begin to convey the lovely/trashy dj playing bad 90s hits in attempt at making girls in stilettos shake it on a gravel dance floor. 

so peaceful looking fading off into the horizon

kings park psychiatric center

 

pic from chris marshall, edited by me

saturday afternoon we took what we intended to be a brief trip to the kings park psychiatric center, which turned into a 4 hour wander of 7 buildings.  out of 151.  we didnt venture into any of the buildings as it is both illegal and extremely dangerous as we were ill-equipped for urban exploring.  plus there are massive quantities of peeling lead paint and disintegrating asbestos coatings.  however, i found a site with amazing indoor shots from 2003-2005.  we also had a nice picnic supper [pasta salad with homemade pesto and homegrown tomato and cucumber] in the green space near buildings 21 22 and 7 which i just found out are the former surgery ward, infirmary, and morgue.  lovely.

building 93, the infirmary, is the most well known and housed thousands of patients and is at least 12 stories high.  building 15, also known as wisteria, may or may not have housed violent offenders.  woo.  building 80, york hall, appears to have been a former theatre for patients as the KPPC eventually became akin to a small town.  building 83, clearly marked as the safety department for police and fire, had some toxic looking barrels lined up out back and we stood amongst them for a bit hoping they werent radioactive.  brilliant i know.  also, as it turns out building 1, with its decently maintained parking lot and seemingly random population, is still used to house psychiatric patients.  when we wandered off in search of more abandoned buildings, a man passed us and said "dont worry no one will hurt you in there"  until then... i wasnt worried about anything really.  but thanks for putting that seed in my mind.

mostly it was an architecture photo-op afternoon with some peeking in windows and trying not to imagine the horrible things that happened within the confines of the campus.

some of the best pics:

food and flowers

the daffodils have bloomed finally!

this is kind of an odd pic but i liked how the forsythia was just peeking over the fence

i made a crapload of vegetarian sushi

isnt it pretty?  ingredients: scrambled egg, red pepper, baby cucumber, sauteed sweet potato noodles, avocado

in iowa they still have dq.  and the new thing is $1.99 mini blizzards.  FUCKING AWESOME!  i had two.  and fries.  left-toffee cookie, right-chocolate truffle

battered cherry blossoms in kansas city

i'm on a boat

unless you watch a lot of SNL or are under the age of 30...that title will make absolutely no sense.  its ok.  but i was.  on a boat.

pelicans guarding the drawbridge that separates manasota key from the mainland

some birds waiting for a sea cow to amble by

when youre rich enough to build a concrete seawall and 2-story screened-in outdoor pool with mini waterslide.. you can put out 8 adirondack loungers around a giant chessboard.  or you know, you could do something good.

heavenly cupcakes

welp...they were pretty damn good.  flavorful perfectly textured cake, not overly sweet cloying frosting and unlike mine often, not too much frosting.

i had a coffee cupcake with buttercream icing and a chocolate covered espresso bean on top

the pops had lemon and mums had an amazing coconut with toasted coconut [unpictured].  this little shop was literally around the corner from the thai place we visited last week, and in this sarasota jaunt, we also popped in to the british imports place, the european imports place, a scandinavian imports place, another cupcake place that also serves meat pies [?], and passed a perogie place, an italian deli, about 6 british pubs, a microbrewery, some random clothing shops, several holistic medicine practitioners, an "erotic boutique", and best of all, the munchies 420 cafe open 4:20pm to 4:20am cos "yo momma dont cook past midnight"

lemon bay

this is why you dont swim in the bay.  its nasty and full of algae and weeds.  plus its fucking cold.

i have absolutely no idea where these ripples were coming from. they seemed to be very straight and uniform, not radiating out from a plop somewhere out in the middle

dead trees out at stump pass.  technically not lemon bay but.. near enough

tri-annual dredging of stump pass.  environmentally..not so great.  economically/aesthetically/touristy.. yea whatever.  it would help beach circulation if people hadnt been greedy and put in their own beach retention efforts.  now it = big fail.

pelicans flying above lemon bay providing the apt name.. pelican shores.

thai watermelon

 seen in thailand sushi and steakhouse in sarasota

 

ornate hand-carved fruit art is usually a good omen of excellent food. 

also in the gulf gate drive shopping center: oriental food & gifts [korean-run], taste of europe [crepes and perogies], chocolate bark company [drool], and some kind of british imports store with meat pies!