Kennebunkport, Maine
- laurenlcoon
- Aug 30, 2017
- 5 min read
When trying to figure out where to go for my mom's birthday, I knew she loves lighthouses and the water... so Maine was an obvious option!
I knew little to none about Maine but a quick search brought up the cute town of Kennebunkport and Portland as viable options. Staying in Cape Elizabeth was just a bit out of our price range and my mom and sister weren't wanting to go as far as Acadia National Park... so we started with Kennebunk.
We flew (RSW to ATL) and ATL to PWM. We got a rental car from Enterprise and drove a quick 45 minutes to Kennebunk.
Ideally we would have stayed in a cute Bed & Breakfast, however, most of them book several months in advance and so we had limited options in Kennebunkport.
We opted to stay at the Port Inn Kennebunk. It was cute little hotel and served all of our needs but was about 4-6 miles from the port. There is the town of Kennebunk and Kennebunkport, both very close bordering the Kennebunk River. There are cute shops on both sides and plenty of stores to pop into.
After checking into our hotel, we decided to get some food after a long morning of travel. It had been pouring rain so we quickly popped into a couple stores to get a hat and umbrella. We found a place called Allison's, that had both gluten free and vegetarian options and was very good!
After eating, we decided to look around some more shops and of course had to check out all the dog stores! I loved how dog friendly Maine was. Both from hotels and shops to restaurants. After a long day of travel and shopping until we dropped. We opted for ice cream for dinner and headed to bed at a fairly decent hour.
The next morning, we had planned a Scenic Lobster Cruise with First Chance Whale Watching for my mom's birthday! Before heading that way, we made a pit stop at Mornings in Paris for a macaron and coffee. The lobster cruise was a 1.5 hour boat ride where they take you up and down the coast and show you how they trap lobsters. We got to see Walker's Point and the Bush compound and several beautiful homes and boats. Unfortunately the ride was a bit choppy and I was more than ready for it to be over.
Afterwards we checked out some more shops in Kennebunkport before stopping into Federal Jacks for a late lunch. Another great place for gluten free and vegetarian options. We then headed to York to see the Nubble Lighthouse.
After looking around York we headed back to Kennebunkport for some more ice cream at Rococo. They have gluten free cones and dog ice cream... what a dream! And yes this is 2/2 nights with ice cream for dinner... my kinda vacay! :)
Sunday was our third and last day in Kennebunkport. Mom and Lyndsey set off to do a 4.5 hour whale watching cruise through the same company we'd used the day before. I opted out as feeling sick for 4+ hours didn't sound like a fun time for me. They had a wonderful time on the boat and I decided to check out a close park at the Wells Nature Reserve. I really enjoyed this as Maine is gorgeous and has so much natural beauty to offer.
After my hike down to the beach, through the woods and to several overlooks... I headed back towards Kennebunk and decided to see the beach. I drove past so many beautiful homes and found a quiet little private beach to enjoy for a quick minute and some sand to steal for a little jar I bought.
I then ran back to some shops to explore and wait on picking up my mom and sister! One of the best stores I found was one called The Deep Blue and carried beautiful art made of sea glass. I had to get one and had a hard time choosing all of the options.
It was getting close to time for mom and Lyndsey to be done so I walked to David's to get us a table. Once they were done, we had a great lunch on the water. The view there is amazing and the food also great!
Afterwards, we headed towards Portland making sure to stop at Cape Elizabeth on the way to see some more lighthouses at the Two Lights State Park and the Portland Head Light.
We then drove a quick 15 minutes to our hotel in Portland. We stayed at a great location off of Commercial Street at the Hilton Garden Inn there. The hotel is nice and it's in great location to everything so we could park our rental car and walk as much as we'd like.
For dinner we decided to go to Sebago Brewing Company. Not a place I'd typically go to for gluten free and vegetarian fare but they had plenty of options... Yay Maine! We ate and then headed out to what we were most excited about... Bar of Chocolate! A bar that serves all things chocolate.... think cake, chocolatinis, etc! They don't have a website, just a facebook page but it is located on Wharf street. If you're walking on a cobblestone street, you're in the right place!
The next morning it was back to shop until you drop! First and foremost we had to go to all the dog stores we could find! And then it was onto more sweets because we needed them, obviously!
At this point it was Monday August 21st and we had about an hour to kill until the highly anticipated eclipse of our lifetime! So we drove to another lighthouse to get a good view of the sky!
First we stopped at the Spring Point Ledge Lighthouse which is beautiful but at the end of some rocks so it took a bit to get to.
About a mile or so down the road was another light house and since we still had about 30 minutes until full totality (or lack there of for our location) we decided to head that way. We watched the eclipse in our cool glasses from the Bug Light Park Lighthouse.
Below left is a picture of us in our goofy glasses. Below right is a picture Brandon took with his telescope and my Nikon. How cool!
After the anticlimactic eclipse, we headed to Saltwater Grill for some food and relaxing views of the Harbor and city skyline.
We ended our evening with a sunset walk of Commercial Street exploring the remnants of the Berlin Wall, some ice cream -duh, and making friends with pelicans.
We woke up the next morning, our last day in Maine and decided we wanted to tour the Victoria Mansion. We read online that parking was limited so we decided we'd walk the 0.7 miles from our hotel there. It was pretty warm so we worked up a sweat on the way, but thankfully the home had been updated with some powerful Air Conditioning. The home was beautiful and the tour, about 45 minutes, was so interesting. Unfortunately they do not allow pictures inside the home so we had to take a timed photo with a tripod outside the house after the tour.
After our tour we walked to Dobra Tea House for some Bubble Tea, hummus and cake! We had our very own tea party and then headed back to the hotel to grab our belongings, the car and head towards the airport!!
Back to Atlanta and Naples we go!
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