Reversing Falls
In the nineties, my now-husband and I drove all around Pembroke Maine, searching for Reversing Falls, a tiny town park on the remote coast of Downeast Maine. Just about to give up, a weathered paper plate tacked to a telephone pole, hand-written in faded black magic marker, pointed the way. Enchanted by the tidal falls, we camped there for three days - and never saw another soul. Today it is a 191 acre preserve on Cobscook Bay.
Cobscook is the Passamaquoddy tribal word for “boiling tides." And indeed, the ice cold salt waters appear to simmer then boil as the 24 foot tide rises and falls over a hidden underwater ledge - towards the shore as the tide comes in; reversing direction as the tide falls out.
Everything moves. Eagles fly and dive. Porpoise play, swimming in against the tide then turning to ride out on their backs, flippers in the air. You can almost hear them laugh, all to the rhythm of the ocean.
And if you are there at exactly the right time, there is a brief moment between the incoming and outgoing tide when everything stills. The eagles perch, the boiling stops, the porpoise disappear, and the bay flattens to glass. Magic.
Reversing Falls
In the nineties, my now-husband and I drove all around Pembroke Maine, searching for Reversing Falls, a tiny town park on the remote coast of Downeast Maine. Just about to give up, a weathered paper plate tacked to a telephone pole, hand-written in faded black magic marker, pointed the way. Enchanted by the tidal falls, we camped there for three days - and never saw another soul. Today it is a 191 acre preserve on Cobscook Bay.
Cobscook is the Passamaquoddy tribal word for “boiling tides." And indeed, the ice cold salt waters appear to simmer then boil as the 24 foot tide rises and falls over a hidden underwater ledge - towards the shore as the tide comes in; reversing direction as the tide falls out.
Everything moves. Eagles fly and dive. Porpoise play, swimming in against the tide then turning to ride out on their backs, flippers in the air. You can almost hear them laugh, all to the rhythm of the ocean.
And if you are there at exactly the right time, there is a brief moment between the incoming and outgoing tide when everything stills. The eagles perch, the boiling stops, the porpoise disappear, and the bay flattens to glass. Magic.