They sat on the hoods of their cars for two hours or more, eating lobster rolls and waiting for the motorcade to arrive. The crowds along Route 3 outside the Trenton Bridge Lobster Pound late Friday morning could see the Gulf Stream jet fly into Maine's Hancock County-Bar Harbor Airport, just half a mile away. The moment was here.
No, the gawkers weren't there to see Pamelia drive New York artist Margaret Krug over the bridge onto Mount Desert Island for her appearance at The Naturalist's Notebook. But they could have been. Our decade-old station wagon was perhaps not as impressive as the 16-car Presidential motorcade carrying the Obama family (including Bo, the Portuguese water dog) onto the island, but Margaret's arrival was exciting news. Today she will be teaching her "Seeing and Drawing" workshop all day and launching a show of her work called "Faces and Flora" which pairs portraits of literary and musical figures with illustrations of flowers cited in their works.
Oh, yes, the First Family did make it in too. The Obamas (who, alas, now seem unlikely to visit Seal Harbor, given that they're not staying there) were out biking on the carriage roads of Acadia National Park before they even checked into their Bar Harbor hotel. They got ice cream and went to the top of Cadillac Mountain. The president's personal aide told reporters, "We're ready, we're going to do it all."
That's our attitude about the Notebook on this busy Saturday. A dozen artists are showing up this morning, and at 5 p.m. we're hosting a reception and informal show of the drawings they create today. (Come in if you're around!) I must now drive from our house, past the storied Trenton Bridge pound (where I picked up three pound-and-a-quarter lobsters for our dinner with Margaret last night), and onto the island to get to the Notebook early. The morning fog should burn off soon. When the weather clears, we'll see what adventures unfold.