Grand Manan: Day One

It started with an invite to celebrate my friend's landmark 2 year anniversary of her stage 4 melanoma diagnosis. Jane was given an expiration date of 6-9 months, but the doctors didn't know that she's much stronger than your average bear. Her wife Andrea calls her the Ginga Ninja and this particular type of ninja kicks cancer and expiration dates in the ass. :)

So this was a special invite of sorts. Sign me up. I will go to this foreign place that sounds oddly similar to "Grand Banana." It wasn't until a few weeks before the trip I learned the actual name was Grand Manan.

This first photo was stolen from Tiff. (Thanks, Tiff!!)

We packed up the three dogs and four lady friends and left with an expectation that weird things may happen on this distant Canadian island.

"Can you define 'weird things'?" I asked Jane.

I pictured throngs of drunken sailors singing sea chanties around a campfire and hypnotic drum beats fading into the sound of the waves, all while Tiff was making us s'mores. Sounds like my kind of weird!

Nah, "more like mice and bats in the cabin," she said. The backyard bear head and strange bones that washed up on shore would end up being an added bonus.

We zipped through Massachusetts, New Hampshire and climbed up and down impossibly long, curvy one lane roads in Maine, crossed border patrol then finally hopped on a ferry to our destination. It was sunny and bright but we needed about three layers of clothing to feel comfortable.

Andrea and Tiff, the dog charmers, kept the canines calm on the ferry's rooftop deck. I tied Neko, the red one, to a chair because she tends to hurl herself into bodies of water with reckless abandon. You can see her lick her lips at the thought of a chilly swim.

It was on the ferry ride that I discovered what real fog looks like. I was pretty sure it would go away at some point. It didn't occur to me until much later that Tiff's family curse may have followed us on this adventure. :)

An hour and 45 minutes later I caught my first view of Swallows Tail Lighthouse from the boat.  All of Grand Manan was shrouded in this beautiful, dramatic fogginess. The fog became its own character throughout my photo adventure.

We unloaded the million things we thought we would need on this trip and then headed out for a tour of town. Jane pointed to a bunch of broken down smoke houses and I practically had a photography-gasm. I could barely stay seated in the car when I caught my first glimpse of this place. I didn't know places like this still existed in 2013. The buildings had creative designs on their sides and funky mismatched windows. The thick pungent smell of fish permeated the whole place.

This part of town looked completely abandoned. I didn't know until after I hopped back in the car that these smoke houses still operate, despite the holes in the walls, the lack of doors or any ability to lock anything.

The scene above caught my eye because night was falling and this looked like a spooky face, or just an exclamation point.

I could have spent days there wandering from house to house. Each one was unique.

Every time I would try to hop back in the car with the others I would spot something out of the corner of my eye that looked interesting and hop over to the next scene.

No one was enforcing this sign; I do what I want. :)

I was pretty happy with the framing in the above photo. It was worth stepping into slimy fishiness to capture it.

The photo below shows some Lupines that can be found all over the island. I wondered if Grand Mananers appreciate how pretty they are? Or maybe they're the unofficial weed of the island?

One of the smoke house folks decorated his building with old lobster crates.

The shingles below gave me an idea that this place has weathered some interesting storms in its time.

Sea junk is everywhere and celebrated. 

You can see how dramatic the tide changes can be in this last one.