1/31/08 Fish fry

Alan and Betty graciously invited me to their home for the big fish fry. Alan cleaned the first fish and I got to clean the remaining 6. It involves cutting (off the head), slicing (open the belly), scooping (out the innards), and washing (out the inside under running water and running some water on the outside, too). Don't remove the bones, though. That is much easier to do after they're cooked.

The rest of our dinner: pork chops ('cuz there weren't enough fish), potatoes, peas, and the skillet on the back right burner has bacon in it 'cuz we're going to fry the fish in bacon grease.

Dip them in egg, then in a corn meal mixture.

Fry 'em up.

Filet them and eat them. Alan and Betty gave me all 7 to eat. They're so small that 7 is a small serving. Oh were they yummy!!

Thank you Alan and Betty for a wonderful day of life in Maine, especially the gracious Maine hospitality!

1/31/08 More about Smelting

We paid $15 a piece for the privilege of smelting in these shacks. Inside was a wood stove and a big stack of wood. The fire was already going when we got there, so we took off our jackets to settle in for our 6 hours. Our bait was sand worms. The package of worms wrapped in newspaper was included in the price of renting the shack.

But ewwww, the sand worms are too big for bait, so you cut them up! And the small pieces of worm still wiggle after they've been cut and that's the bait. Betty offered to bait my hook for me, but I insisted that I do it myself. ewwww. But I did it.

This is the right side of the inside of the shack. Betty is checking the line. There were 10 lines on our side of the shack (boys vs. girls). The horizontal wooden bar from which the lines hang is suspended on springs so you can pull the bar and all 10 of your lines will wiggle just right. We actually only used 9 of our lines 'cuz the 10th line was missing a hook.

Alan built this "jig board" which is just a board with 3 lines that are similar to a jig pole. They use a finer line (the ones provided were practically string they were so thick) and hang from a piece of wire that creates a rather constant jiggle.

On both sides of the shack are big holes like this cut into the ice. In the middle of the shack there's room for the wood stove, 4 stools or chairs, and not much else.

The first bite came after we'd only been there about 5 minutes. And this smelt bit one of my lines! So technically, I caught the first fish! Betty coached me through pulling it in.

Alan took it off the hook. You can see that a smelt isn't very big.

In the next 4 hours and 45 minutes, we caught 6 more smelt. Alan caught all of those on his jig board. Often you can catch over 100 smelt and even as high as 300. But that wasn't for us on this trip. At least we weren't "skunked" and I had a blast hanging out with Alan and Betty and their friend Doyle who went with us.

I learned a bunch of new vocabulary but it's written on a piece of paper that I don't have with me. So I will make another entry later with those vocabulary words. In the meantime, know that this was a true Maine experience! I love my life with the Mainiacs.

1/31/09 Smelting!

I did it! I finally got to go ice fishing!! Alan, one of the wonderful custodians in the Education Center is quite the outdoorsman and he and his wife took me ice fishing.

First thing to know: there is more than one kind of ice fishing. Today we are smelting which is fishing for smelt (a kind of fish). The ice that we're fishing through is on a river and smelt are a salt water fish. You fish during the tides on the river! So much to learn!!!

We met at the Park 'n Ride in New Sharon. On a Saturday morning at 8am there were already 2 cars: mine and someone else's. Good thing I got there at 8 'cuz there are only 7 parking spaces at this Park 'n Ride. ;-)

We drove about 90 minutes to Bowdoinham to fish on the Cathance River. We had to take the toll road. The signs said it was $1.00 but it was really only still $0.60. Tomorrow the rates go up but today the signs are already up.

Here we are at "the camp". (Yes, this means that there is yet another meaning to the word "camp.") Note that there are cars here from New Jersey, Massachusetts, and New York. This must be quite the sport!

We cross the road from the parking lot to go to where the ice shacks are located. Yes, those shacks are sitting on the frozen river and they have no floors and have holes cut in the ice inside each one, yet they don't sink or break the ice. Wow. One of these (#17) is going to be our home for the next 5 hours.

Population numbers

I'm always getting asked questions about the population in Maine and I can never quite keep the numbers straight, so here are the actual numbers of the largest cities/towns in Maine, starting with the largest.

1. Portland 62,825
2. Lewiston 35,234 (a part of the metropolis of Lewiston/Auburn or Auburn/Lewiston)
3. Bangor 31,853
4. South Portland 23,748 (a suburb of Portland . . . just to the south . . . never assume logic in names of cities/towns, but in this case, the logic holds)
5. Auburn 23,203 (see #2 above)
6. Brunswick 21,806
7. Biddeford 21,594
8. Sanford 21,252
9. Augusta (the capital) 18,560
10. Scarborough 16,970
11. Saco 16,822
12. Westbrook 16,142
13. Waterville 15,605
14. Windham 14,904
15. Gorham 14,141
16. York 12,854
17. Kennebunk (I don't think that's counting Kennebunkport which is right next door and home to the elder President Bush) 10,476
18. Falmouth 10,310
19. Kittery 9,543
20. Presque Isle 9,511
21. Wells 9,400
22. Standish 9,285
23. Bath 9,266
24. Orono 9,112
25. Topsham 9,100
26. Lisbon 9,077
27. Cape Elizabeth 9,068
28. Brewer 8,987
29. Old Orchard Beach 8,856
30. Skowhegan 8,824
31. Yarmouth 8,360
32. Caribou 8,312
33. Old Town 8,130
34. Freeport (home to L.L. Bean and lots of great outlet shopping) pop. 7,800
35. Winslow 7,743
36. Rockland (home of the Lobster Festival) 7,609
37. Buxton 7,452
38. Farmington 7,410
39. Cumberland 7,159
40. Gray 6,820

http://www.citypopulation.de/USA-Maine.html

MAINE
Land area, 2000 (square miles) 30,861.55
Persons per square mile 41.3
http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/23000.html
Population, 2006 estimate 1,321,574
[Note: The population of The City of Dallas is 1.2 million. The population of Dallas County is over 2 million]

TEXAS
Land area, 2000 (square miles) 261,797.12
Persons per square mile 2000 79.6
Population, 2006 estimate 23,507,783