On we sailed to Boothbay Harbor which is a quiet fishing town of 5,000 people until summertime makes its population climb to 50,000. We picked up a town mooring and enjoyed the busy resort village for an afternoon. Boothbay Harbor has a footbridge connecting the two sides of the deep harbor built a long time ago so townsfolk would not have to go all the way around the harbor edge. The man who built the pedestrian bridge charged two cents per person to cross until he had recouped his building costs and then turned the bridge over to the town. The wooden house in the middle of the bridge was the toll-house where fees were collected. Now the little house has been renovated and is for sale for $750,000 complete with its own porch and dock. Lots of people would pass by your front door daily.
After all the excitement of a busy resort town we sailed away to the "for now" calm waters of Maine with colorful lobster pot floats all around. Priority is fortunate to have a hull shape where our keel and rudder are connected so the lobster pot lines slide across our hull rather than catch on our rudder or propeller.
The lobster pots can be in water from 30-200 feet deep and lobsters seem to like the mouths of bays and rivers since that is where the floats are most plentiful. We sailed up St. George's River to anchor in Maple Juice Cove named because there are maple trees on some of its shores. We can see the Olson House high on a hill from our anchored boat. You know the Olson house! In Andrew Wyeth's painting, Christina's World, Christina Olsen is lying in the field looking up toward her house.
We dinghied ashore to learn more. Although the original painting is in the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, the house has been maintained as a historic site. Christina lived here near Andrew Wyeth's summer home in Cushing, Maine.
Andrew Wyeth 's family became close family friends with the Olsens. More than 50 paintings were completed by Andrew Wyeth of Christina, her family and the house. Christina became ill at 3 years of age leaving her with debilitating paralysis that increased as she aged. In the painting Christina's World, she is dragging herself back up the hill to the house from visiting the cemetery where her parents are buried. Paintings seem to come alive when you learn all the details and story behind them.
The house is a typical wood clapped New England house of the 1940s. On the back of the house we noted the wooden rain gutter troughs and even wooden rain spouts. Wood was their plentiful building material. Being unable to move about easily, Christina spent much of her day sitting by a window to my left doing chores but able to watch neighbors traveling by.
