Girlie Motorcycle Blog

If you’re looking for a 1-2 punch of good riding and interesting roadside attractions, Maine has a lot to offer. Just a hop skip and a jump from a 3 story outhouse, a giant butterfly sculpture and down the road a piece from Rumford’s Paul Bunyan Muffler Man is the World’s Largest Telephone. It is a 14 foot tall statue of a hand-cranked candlestick model.

Plaque Reads:
“This sculpture by Gil Whitman is dedicated to the memory of Barbara & Elden Hathaway owners of the Bryant Pond Telephone Company the very last hand crank magneto telephone system in the U.S.A. They purchased the company in 1951 and operated it from their home as a family business until selling it to the Oxford Network Company in 1981, when it was integrated into the national dial system.”

We spotted this lovely little Honda CB350 while we were in Maine last summer. It appears to be stock save for the windshield and highway bars. What a great looking bike. It just makes me want to go for a ride, 70′s style.

Honda CB350

I can see it now – Me, putting on my best pair of Earth Shoes and hitting the road on a groovy adventure. I have big dreams of listening to 8-tracks, making Jiffy Pop and eating fondue from here to San Francisco. “Breaker, breaker this is Motorcycle Mama, come back. How am I hitting you? Wall to wall and treetop tall? Watch your donkey, good buddy. We got us a Kojack with a Kodak hiding in the grass.”

It just feels good. Doesn’t it?

This post is nothing without you: Bring it back, now. Do you copy?

On our way home from celebrating the Independence Day weekend in Maine, we were detoured off of our natural route home by a road closure. As luck would have it, our travels led us passed this curious beast that was parked with a For Sale sign on it. Naturally, at first glance I couldn’t help but be drawn in by the paint job and I giggled to myself thinking about how great it would be to show up to a prom or a wedding in this star spangled baby.

As I walked up to get a closer look at the limousine I spotted the Patriot Guard Rider sticker on the windshield. That was when the car’s wrapper suddenly made sense. If this livery does not continue on in that service it will sure make one hell of a conversation piece when it pulls up to the bowling alley for Tuesday league night, don’t you think?

The town of Rockland sits on Midcoast Maine’s Penobscot bay. A perfect strolling town, lined by charming window displays of clever artisan’s works, sparkly baubles and puffin related souvenirs, Rockland brings to mind what a small American town should look like. No strip malls, no Burger King drive thru, no shiny officeplex housing a cubicle farm full of disgruntled workers.

We walked along watching ice cream eating families laughing as they too walked. I couldn’t help but be completely enamored with watching an elderly man hand painting the lettering on a store window. The story that I built in my mind had him doing that very thing for the last 50 years.

I was very excited to see that artist Robert Indiana, a Maine resident since 1978 currently has a featured exhibit entitled Robert Indiana and the Star of Hope at the Farnsworth Museum. While looking at one of Indiana’s quintessential LOVE sculptures on a street-side display I heard someone who is clearly not versed in art history say, ‘Hey, I know that sculpture.’ Such a reaction just serves to show the importance of the pop artist in the fabric of the public psyche.

After a month or so of rain in the state, we were fortunate to have a big blue sky and warm weather for our day trip. This gave us the perfect opportunity to comfortably walk the nearly one mile limestone breakwater out to the Rockland Breakwater Lighthouse. The lighthouse was open and free to climb up on its deck and finally up the narrow spiral stairs to the light tower. The last 5 or 6 steps up the ladder into the lens area are not kind to those afraid of heights but the view of the harbor and a watching a 1940s biplane from the Owl’s Head Transportation Museum giving a tour of the coast made the shaky legged trip back down the ladder totally worth it.

For the 2009 President’s week holiday, we spent our time in Maine. While there, we stopped off in the town of Rumford and had a tasty homecooked-style lunch at the River Valley Grille. It was the first time that I’d ever laid eyes on a red hot dog. Yes, that’s right. I said, RED. Apparently it is something that is native to the state. They are commonly referred to as Red Snappers.

The reason for heading to Rumford was for me to visit with Maine’s last standing actual Paul Bunyan Muffler Man. He looms over the Rumford Visitor Center. Fittingly, the visitor center sells postcards with his mug on it complete with a thumb visible in the postcard photograph. Perfect