A little vacation in Maine
We just got back from spending 5 days on Frye Island on Sebago Lake in Maine. We drove up on Monday morning and reached the ferry to the island by 1. It was rainy and overcast but we rode our bikes on the island to the tennis courts to play.
On Tuesday, the rain was really coming down so we decided to drive to Freeport to do some back-to-school shopping and to visit the LL Bean store(s).
On Wednesday, we decided to do some rock and mineral collecting. We took a short drive to Mount Apatite and hiked up to the abandoned quarry. The dirt road leading from the National Guard Armory has several large and intimidating signs saying to KEEP OUT. However, it is perfectly legal to hike, bike and collect minerals here. Shortly after the last No Trespassing sign is a sign that says to stay on the trails, be careful of falling rocks, and no swimming in the quarries.
The hike is about 1/2 mile uphill on the main “road”. Not too strenuous. There are several quarry pits and tailings areas. We went past the pits and summited Mount Apatite in another 1/2 mile. Not much to see through the dense forest. We broke out the hand shovels, hammers and chisels (and safety glasses and gloves of course) and started exploring. We collected a number of garnets – nothing fantastic but fun nevertheless. We also found some nicely formed but small black Tourmaline crystals. There was lots of mica around too.
After a few hours we decided to visit Perham’s Rock Shop in West Paris. They have quite a nice museum of specimens from the local area as well as jewelry and minerals for sale. The also own 3 quarries in neighboring Greenwood that they allow collectors to visit for free – and they even hand out directions and information sheets. We decided to visit the Waisanen Quarry for a few hours. We found lots more black Tourmaline, smokey quartz and some yet to be identified minerals.
The next day, the boys wanted to go back to the Harvard Quarry, another one of Perham’s locations and an important historical quarry. The pegmatite at Harvard was amazing, huge crystals of quartz, black Tourmaline, garnets and other minerals intertwined. I’ll post photos of some of our finds later but we had a lot of fun and found a few keepers.
Friday was a relaxing morning and then the drive home. We stopped in Kittery to do some more back to school shopping.