Say Cheese

On our days off this week we headed to Freeport for the 3rd annual Maine Cheese Festival.  Last month we went to the Machias Blueberry Festival and enjoyed it very much, so we were really looking forward to the cheese festival.

The web site stated that only 2000 tickets would be sold this year and it was recommended to pre-purchase tickets on line, which we did.  $15 per person seemed a little steep but they advertised over 30 Maine cheese makers would be there with plenty of samples and items to buy.

The festival opened at 11:00 and we arrived at 11:30. We were surprised to see that there was a long line of cars waiting to park.  In fact, it looked like there were about 2000 cars already parked.  We waited in line a while for a shuttle and finally decided to start walking.  We couldn’t tell how far to the entrance but a lot of people had given up on the shuttle and were walking.

As we approached the entrance we were told to get in a long line.  

After a while someone mentioned that if we had pre-paid we were in the wrong line!  We finally got to the correct entrance and were asked if we had pre-paid.  We said yes, no one questioned our answer or asked for proof, and we were handed a handy insulated bag.  We were told that there was only one per couple.  Hum … but we bought 2 tickets!

Our first stop was the Yum Bus for something to eat.  We waited in line for two small tacos ($6 each).  They were not very filling.

Next stop was for a scoop of ice cream.

We finally made it into the booth area only to see extreme long lines at each booth.  There was probably a 20-30 minute wait to get close enough to taste a sample and decided if we wanted to purchase their product.  The only booth that didn’t have a line, or any customers, was a woman selling spices.  She didn’t have any samples.   

There seemed to be a mad frenzy to grab as much free food as possible.  We walked around for a few minutes, decided that we had wasted $30, and left without sampling or purchasing any cheese.    

We checked into our hotel room and spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing before heading out to dinner.

There are several disc golf courses in this area (Freeport, Augusta, Portland).  Mark has played a few of them this year but wanted to try a few more.

We spent a beautiful morning playing two 18-hole courses.

Downtown Freeport is very interesting.  It is one big outlet mall.  All the big names such as Coach, Calvin, Polo, etc. are there.  LL Bean has their flagship store.  In fact, there are many LL Bean stores.  Each has a different theme such as Home, Hunting, Biking, etc.  I wanted to see the famous “big shoe”.  After spending some time looking for a parking spot, we walked around a little before finding the big shoe.

No purchases were made until we found ourselves at Wicked Whoopies (gourmet whoopie pies).

We had one more disc golf course to play.

It rained all night and rain was predicted all the next day so we headed back home.

Even without cheese we had great disc golf and whoopie pies - what more can you ask for?