But if there is ever a good time to end a good thing, then we think this is our time.

We began “Oh, the Places We See” on a whim: share our photos and tell our stories and people will come. And you did. And we loved hearing from you, reading your posts and comments, and becoming all the richer for encounters with people we might never see in person.

Together we traveled the world and shared our experiences with any and all of you willing to travel with us.

We’ve shown each other photos based upon themes or just random glimpses of life as we know and see it. We were grateful for it all — not just for topics of the week we looked forward to receiving but also your takes and how you interpreted them so beautifully.

We’ve shared our passions, our favorite spots in the world, our families and recipes.

And through it all, we’ve become internet friends. Friends who endured a pandemic, the ups and downs of politics, personal illnesses, and the inevitable changes that life has thrown at us.

Saying goodbye doesn’t mean anything. It’s the time we spent together that matters, not how we left it. 

Trey Parker

For us, the art of writing, posting pictures, and sharing our thoughts and adventures has enriched our lives immensely. And we thank you for sharing your worlds with us. What a joy to have so many perspectives and friends and mutual admiration!

“Oh, the Places We See,” will remain on WordPress until Spring 2023. But for now, we won’t be contributing new posts or adding new pictures even though we will continue to read those of the people we follow. Our old posts will also be available for reading.

Good friends never say good-bye. They just say “See you soon”!

Anonymous

Thank you for eleven great years of blogging.

Travel wide-eyed. We’ll see you soon!

Rusha and Bert

Without commitment, you’ll never start, but more importantly without consistency, you’ll never finish.

The LOUNGE13

We’ve enjoyed hearing from our followers as much as we’ve enjoyed putting posts together. Thank you so much for your interest in us and for your comments that connect — even though we live miles apart. Following you has brought us closer to people and places around the world, and for that, we are grateful.

In 2019, we hired Michael Wender, a web designer, to upgrade the appearance and format of Oh, the Places We See. Our fresher look (using the Christopher theme) coupled with a commitment to continue blogging even during a pandemic have netted us more followers and more satisfaction with what we want our blog to portray: the joy of travel — near AND far.

So which posts have been our most popular? According to WordPress stats, here are the most visited, most read (we assume) posts from each of the last five years. We’re a bit surprised at the topics, but we’re maybe readers search for big cities and famous names. And why not?

Most Visited — Last 5 Years

2017: Seven swanky lobbies to see: Vegas Hotels

Oh, those lobbies in Vegas — playgrounds of the rich and famous, or so we thought. But they’re open for all to see and enjoy, just for a walk down the strip.

Part One: Seven swanky lobbies to see: Vegas Hotels

Part Two: Seven swanky lobbies to see: Vegas Hotels

2018: Five things to do in a day: St. Petersburg, Florida

St. Petersburg’s got a lot going for it — shopping, beach, and friendly residents. But what we loved most was The Dali, a fascinating repository of art by Salvador Dali, complete with docents willing to share “their stuff” with the masses. A great place to visit!

2019: Whitney to High Line to Chelsea Market: A newer New York

Give us an opportunity to select one city to see, and we’d probably choose the Big Apple. Vibrant, exciting, and massive — we loved seeing department stores at Christmas, riding public transportation just so we could listen to people’s accents, and touring museums like the Whitney. The High Line brought innovation to light, and we could see this whole area unfolding in a positive way.

2020: Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #113: A Labor of Love

In the last year or so, we’ve participated in the Lens-Artists Photo Challenges almost every week. What fun it is to see how other photographers interpret the challenge words of the week with posts of their own! In #113, we were asked to serve as guest hosts, and we chose the theme “A Labor of Love” to show how people around the world do their work with commitment, diligence, skill, and yes, happiness.

2021: Life is short, take the curves: Needles Highway, SD

A trip to South Dakota netted us scenery like no other, but Needles Highway took our breath away. No wonder so many bikers flock to the area for glimpses of monolithic rock, natural tunnels, and curves that only a stalwart rider could handle. Could we go back to SD? In a heartbeat!

For us, there’s more that we’ve loved on our travels, and so our top five may differ from what the stats show. We’ve loved (and now miss!) traveling — sometimes to work with Habitat for Humanity, sometimes for the pure pleasure of sitting on a Viking long boat. Our travel agent, Lauren Gunnels of Ortelius Travel Advisors, is ready to plan a new trip for us when the time is right.

But following the onset of COVID-19, we’re grateful we can still travel by car and see sites and sights in the good ol’ U.S. of A. Click on any of these posts, and you’ll see why and how we’re discovering new ways to get around and enjoy life together. And yes, we recommend getting vaccinated, wearing masks, and practicing social distancing.

Some of our favorite posts:

Five places to see: Monhegan Island

Our last dreamy town: Onancock, VA — Road Trip 2020

Hoodoo you love? Bryce Canyons National Park

Elkmont: Once upon a time in the Great Smokies

Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #157: Getting Away

Although numerous bloggers, photographers, and followers on WordPress have influenced us, we dare not try to thank them all. We would, inadvertently, omit someone. So, thanks to all of you for sharing your lives with us and helping us dream of more places to visit.

We appreciate your comments, new ideas, and virtual friendships.

Let’s keep finding new ways to see this glorious world of ours and enjoy each other’s company.

Travel wide-eyed,

Rusha & Bert

Life is like a camera. Just focus on what’s important, capture the good times, and if things don’t work out, just take another shot.”

Richard Branson

1. Change the weather

OK. So, you can’t really change the weather, but try taking the same shot on different weather days. Although we thought we’d only have one shot at capturing photos of the Portland Head Light (seen in sunny light above) at Fort Williams Park in Maine, we found that the morning we were to fly home the whole area was socked in by a glorious Maine-y misty kinda fog.

What to do? Well, head back to the light for one last foggy look, of course

2. Change your lens

At Cape Elizabeth, I noticed a white house standing tall on the craggy beach as if it were staring out to sea. Lonely almost. So I shot it with the only telephoto lens I own (Canon 55-25) and thought it might be a good little Maine house to sketch someday.

But as I stepped back, I realized it was the whole that I was after. So, I reached for the lens I use most (Canon 18-55mm) and took it all in. Both photos have merit, but I think I like this distant one best.

3. Change your filter

A bucket on a dock in New Harbor, Maine, drew me closer. I wanted to see the chains rusted from years of use and the rope of many fibers all spun into coils languishing at the bottom. Color made the details stand out. But when I changed the photo to black and white merely by overlaying a computer filter, the ordinary became almost sinister and dark just with a touch of the screen.

4. Change your position

Shooting from a boat as it passes a harbor can be tricky, but also quite interesting. The shot of these colorful red and yellow lobster buoys in New Harbor propped up against the traps looked different as the boat put me squarely in front of the whole lot of them and then moved so I saw only a part. Same subject but from different positions and shot vertically first, then horizontally.

5. Change your Zoom!

A golden-shingled building caught my attention in downtown Kennebunkport across the water from where we parked. I loved the colors, textures, and various components.

But when I zoomed in for a second shot, I found that I liked this section best. It was propped up on wooden stilts, and its windows — almost hauntingly — invited me in for a closer look.

6. Change your attitude

Sometimes, no matter how much we plan, our subjects just don’t cooperate with us, or we allow our expectations to run too high. Take this Hardy Boat Puffin Watch Cruise, for example, out of New Harbor, Maine. Weren’t those puffins guaranteed to be there? And wouldn’t they be standing on rocks like penguins do, waiting for tourists to take the pictures they’ll show back home? Well, we looked on the rocks with no luck and then in the waters where our guide pointed. I steadied myself, and readied my telephoto. But still, this was about as good a shot of those water-loving, tiny birds as I could get. (And believe me, I took hundreds of photos.)

But fear not. Sometimes you don’t know what you’ve captured until you get home and use the cropper tool to isolate parts of the whole. The closer I got to the bird (using the cropper, of course), the more excited I became.

“Oh, my,” I said. “It really is the puffin we went to see!!!”

So take two photos of the same thing. Or manipulate your pictures so you’ll have two versions.

Or do as Richard Branson said, “. . . if things don’t work out, just take another shot.”

Many thanks to Tina for the challenge this week. You can see more entries here.

Travel dually,

Rusha & Bert

All the beauty of life is made up of light and shadow.

Launching the Lens-Artists Photo Challenge this week is Ann Christine inviting us to share shades and shadows. With two trips under our belts this year, we’re finding shadows that we didn’t even remember as we review our photos and note them with interest.

Previously, we shared a post — Shadowplay: Castine, Maine — featuring the artfulness of tree branches on white clapboard houses in a beautiful town Down East. But since we’ve recently returned from a trip along Route 1 in Maine once again, we’re sharing more shade and more shadows — like the photo above taken in New Harbor as we walked past it on our way to a puffin tour.

Along the coast of Maine, shadows — long ones, in fact — hover over homes and gardens, along craggy shores, and into the sweetest gardens.

You can only come to the morning through the shadows.

J. R. R. Tolkien

But in Newcastle, Maine, the view from our garden window at the Newcastle Inn revealed a shadowy spot for a New England respite, complete with flowering shrubs and perennials and a lovely glimpse of the Damariscotta River.

At our other favorite vacation spot, Pawleys Island, South Carolina, morning shadows defined the walkway to our beach cottage for the week as light played with the wooden posts, forming a grid of lines and rows.

The brighter the light, the darker the shadow.

Carl Jung

And just after sun-up, those who woke early were treated to shadows formed by the rocking chairs on the oceanside porch. Ah, morning at Pawleys!

Both light and shadow are the dance of love.

Rumi

To see more examples of shade and shadows, head to Ann-Christine’s post here. And if you want to share a post of your own, add the tag Lens-Artists.

Travel in the shadows,

Rusha & Bert

So where in the U.S. does the sun come up first?

According to a USA Today report the sun comes up first (at least from October 7th to November 29th) in Maine — on Cadillac Mountain in Acadia National Park.

Early risers greet the day with a panorama that defies description. And the sun puts on a show — creeping over the vast landscape while reaching its fingers over the waters of Frenchman Bay and out to the Atlantic, highlighting the rounded, bare rocks of Cadillac.

For some it’s a time of contemplation, for assessing one’s state in life in the midst of an overwhelming natural expanse. And for planning the future — or at least thinking about it.

But for us, during a month when we greeted Ol’ Sol each morning in nearby Castine, Maine, it was a time of reflection and renewal. Sunrise unfolded like clockwork in the Bay of Castine where we stood at the harbor, watching gentle rays emerge from the forests, barely peeking over the landscape.

Sunlight washed over boats — all boats — indiscriminately.

And it shone on buildings, nudging them to wakefulness and productivity and leisure.

Yes, the sun came up at every “tomorrow” in Maine, just as it will continue to do in all places this coming year no matter what comes our way: virus, forest fires, civil unrest, changes in the stock market, another wave of quarantine for everyone, and yes, the election of a new President.

With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Many thanks to Ana of Anvica Photos for this meaningful, timely challenge this week. If you click on her post, you will see thoughtful responses from other bloggers. And if you want to participate in this week’s Lens-Artists Photo Challenge, link your blog to her post and add Lens-Artists to your tags.

Wishing all of you a hopeful future even with the challenges before us. After all, we are resilient and resourceful.

And the sun will come up tomorrow.

Rusha and Bert

Although not in our top five Most Viewed posts, Morocco was perhaps our Number One destination in 2018.

It was about this time last year that those nice folks at Gallivance (Terri and James Vance) published Best of the Blog: The Top 10 Faves, and ever since then, we’ve wondered what you, our readers, would find fascinating among our ramblings for 2018.  After all, we’ve been near (our home town of Knoxville) and far (Maine and Morocco), but never really thought of what you enjoyed reading about the most . . . until now.

Come to think of it, looking back is a good thing.  We just may want to do less of one place and more of another based upon what you like.  (Now there’s a concept — pleasing our readers!)

So, with thanks to the Vances for inspiration (good writing, humor, great photos, too), here are our top five Most Viewed posts of 2018.  Ta-da!!!

Most Viewed Number 5:  “Food, glorious food:  West End Market, Cleveland, Ohio”

Now, this one was no surprise to us:  everyone we know who travels seems to love eating food of the area.  And after a trip to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland and the house in A Christmas Story, we decided that a big market like West Side was just what we needed to see (and sample).  With a plethora of fresh veggies piled high for the taking and some regional specialties we just don’t get that often in Tennessee (think perogies, apple provolone stuffed tenderloin, and pizza bagels), it was definitely love at first sight — and first bite — at West Side Market.

And we were glad that the market was ginormous.  It gave us an opportunity to walk off what we sampled — from macarons to ginger snaps and then some.

You can be sure we’ll be frequenting more Farmers Markets in 2019.  In fact, you can hardly beat the Knoxville’s Saturday set-up in our downtown Market Square.  So watch for more food, glorious food.

Most Viewed Number 4: “Sunrise at Acadia Dock”

Shoulda known this one would be in the Top Five.  Sunrise photos rank right up there with puppies in a basket and cuddly babies in knitted caps as favorites.  But these sunrises were special to us.  We woke early almost every morning during the month we spent in Castine, Maine, just to walk to the dock and stand with the locals in silent reverence for God’s paintings on the water.

Sunrise: Castine Harbor.

We loved it all — from boats tied up and waiting, to watching lobstermen hard at work before dawn, to the launch each day of the Maine Maritime Academy’s training boat, the Bowdoin.

Bowdoin, training vessel for Maine Maritime Academy

In fact, those early morning strolls down the street, cup of coffee in hand and jacket zipped up, remain some of our fondest memories.  But coming in at a close second after clapping for the sunrise was hiking up the main drag to enter MarKel’s Bakehouse for a whiff of those moist right-out-of-the-oven blueberry scones.  Would go back in a heartbeat!

Morning light: Castine, Maine.

Most Viewed Number 3: Out of this world:  Monhegan Island, Maine

Speaking of going back — one night in Monhegan is definitely not enough.  From the boat trip on choppy waters to the laid-back, no-improvements-needed landscape of this little island Down East, it was, hands-down, one of our sites and sights to remember from all of our U. S. travels.

Main road in Monhegan – pleasantly untouched.

Just like our early morning adventures in Castine, Maine, we wanted to see Monhegan at dawn.  So getting up early and trekking to the top of the hill where the original lighthouse and Monhegan museum stand was a no-brainer.  We had to do it, and we did.  And the reward? A panorama of houses and unmanicured yards and dirt paths leading up the road apiece.  It’s life as it was fifty years ago, and that’s why people come to see it. And it’s what keeps the locals there even through brutal winters.

Greeting the sun: buildings at Monhegan Island Light

If you’re ever in Maine wondering whether to spend a couple of days in Monhegan or not, we say, “Go for it.”  It’s artistry, community, and raw beauty all in one — something you can’t find packaged together much anymore. If this post isn’t enough of Monhegan (and one post really isn’t), try taking a look at this one as well:  “Five places to see: Monhegan Island, Maine.” 

Most Viewed Number 2:  “Variations on a Theme: Island Cottages, St. George Island”

Near Apalachicola, Florida, lies an expanse of beach that, although lined with residences, doesn’t seem crowded at all.  It’s because the founding fathers or the current municipal fathers (or both) have seen fit to leave St. George Island almost untouched.  You rarely see a restaurant.  And there are few rental places, few beach shops selling air-brush t-shirts, and almost no dune buggies whizzing past.  Just beach.  And that’s the beauty of it.

But there are viewing spots — now, more than ever.  Island cottages are nestled in and among the older beach houses so that we who want to visit St. George can get a glimpse, no matter how high up, of that beautiful blue water and untouched sand beach.

Lined up for your island vacation at St. George

So, here’s to the skinny houses, the ones that seem precariously perched on stilts so that residents can sit on skinny porches, raise their binoculars and search for dolphins swimming by.

All in a row: St. George Island

This was one of those posts we put together for the WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge, and we must admit that we miss those weekly suggestions for posting sent to us by the WordPress folks.  It only takes a few words from the blog people to make the photo bugs within us search our memories (and our hard drives) for just the right thing. But since that’s no longer done for us, we probably need to do that on our own a little more often.

Most Viewed Number 1:  “Weekly Photo Challenge:  Silence in a Garden”

And here it is:  Number One!  Again it was a WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge response that catapulted this little three-photo post to the Most Viewed status among our blogs in 2018!  Perhaps readers share our desire to “sit a spell” in a relaxing place, like a garden, and let the cares of the world pass us by, even if just for a short while.

A weathered garden bench invites visitors to sit a spell and enjoy the quiet.

Or perhaps it’s the power of WordPress to help us network and share posts with so many people who blog on a regular basis.  Whatever the reason, we are delighted that a garden spot in Knoxville, Tennessee, was the Most Viewed Post of 2018.

And maybe we need to rethink big trips — like the one we took to Morocco — for popular posts.  Not one of our Morocco posts landed in the Top Five; instead, viewers liked sunrises, beaches, and gardens more.  (And we love those as well.)

We’ve been photo bombed — by a cat in Meknes, Morocco. Oh, well.

Thanks to you, our viewers, we look forward to another year of blogging.  We’ll finish up our series Marvelous Morocco just in time to head to Southeast Asia for a January 2019 itinerary that includes meandering the streets of Hanoi, sleeping two nights on a junk in Halong Bay, snapping endless photos of Angkor Wat in Siem Reap, and reveling in the colorful city of Bangkok.

We wish for all of you a very happy 2019 — whether you travel far or near.  It’s all good when you love where you are in the world.

Thanks for following Oh, the Places We See.

Rusha and Bert Sams

A Pinterest favorite is this home surrounded by trees of autumn splendor standing in the square of Castine.

Our typical morning in Castine found us up before dawn, standing at Acadia Dock to greet the sun, and then hiking uphill to the open door (at 7 a.m. no less) of MarKel’s Bakehouse where the smell of hot-from-the-oven blueberry muffins and rich quiches greeted “the regulars” and visitors like us who quickly made friends.

Open for business: MarKel’s Bakehouse near the Castine harbor

It would be easy to typify this town of predominately white clapboard homes as just another seaside village. But with the British, French, and Dutch all vying for dominance of Castine’s location at the mouth of the Penobscot Bay and settling troops and families in the village, the architecture took on a decidedly European look with embellishments not seen in other coastal Maine towns.  Some white homes in Castine boast painted doors.

But it’s not all white houses in Castine.  Colorful homes as well dot the landscape. Under renovation, this deep red home faces Water Street but opens its back to the beauty of the bay. Here are a few we loved.

Looking a bit like a fixer upper, this deep red beauty gets new doors and updated interior.

Swaths of gray mark the age of this shingled beauty that blends in with the landscape.

At water’s edge, a grey-shingled home greets the morning fog.

Dating back to 1796, this home is considered one of the oldest, if not THE oldest, in Castine. Its doorway remains one of its prettiest features, yet one of its darkest.

European styling with stone, plaster, and timber combined in the exterior.

An inset door flanked by shutters and benches on the oldest cottage in Castine.

A few buildings are used for teaching and demonstrating crafts of yesteryear — like this place for blacksmithing with a distinctive red door.

Open only during summer months, this building houses equipment for blacksmithing.

Some cottages are quaint . . .

Gray cottage with black door

Yellow two-story with framed doorway

while others are quite elegant surrounded by walkways, hedges and formal gardens.

Elegant home and former antique shop — one of the prettiest in Castine

But even among the finest, the largest, the cutest, and so forth, we found a favorite:  a simple, white Cape Cod with red door and stone wall facing the water.  Oh, to have a cup of coffee while sitting in the front window watching the boats sail past.

House with red door and rock fence facing Penobscot Bay

You know it’s Castine when even the typical becomes the extraordinary.

Every week, you can find more doors at Norm’s Thursday Doors.

Early morning sun brightens the waters of Castine harbor where the sailing vessel Bowdoin resides.

Coastal Maine offers glorious sunrises if you’re willing to wake up early, bundle yourself in layers, and stand on a dock for the morning show.

And you’re never alone.  From birds gliding overhead to lobstermen checking traps before dawn, docks like Acadia in Castine put on a spectacle like no other.

Leaving Acadia Dock before dawn is the Maine Maritime Academy tug awash in early-morning sunlight.

Sunlight filters through lobster traps at Acadia Dock, Castine, Maine

Dawn comes in layers.  First a subtle orange or salmon or pinkish sky.

Aglow in morning light, a lone tethered boat stands ready.

Then a peep of light that quickly washes over anything in front of it.

Sunrise: Castine Harbor.

To a full-blown wake-up of morning activities.

Morning light: Castine, Maine.

Just another sunrise?  No such thing.

For more sunrises and sunsets, visit the WordPress DailyPost Weekly Photo Challenge:  Rise/Set.

For more posts on the beautiful state of Maine, check our Travel Series:  Autumn Down East.

One of Castine’s elms stands at the base of Main Street at the entrance to the harbor.

Considered almost sacred in Castine, Maine, are the stately elms hovering over private residences, shops, and the charming streets of this tucked-away town.  Even the free walking tour map entitled “Under The Elms and By The Sea” focuses on two aspects of Castine that residents (permanent and sometime) and visitors look for year after year.

Leaves turn golden on one of the largest elm trees in Castine.

In the 1930s, Dutch elm disease wiped out many of America’s elms (all told over 77 million of them), but not so much in Castine where a vaccine created in the 70s by Dr. Richard Campana of the University of Maine began systematically identifying, studying, and treating elms.

An ancient elm stands almost as tall as the steeple on Trinitarian Congregational Parish of Castine.

With the help of the Castine Garden Club who took on the task of measuring the 100 or so remaining elms, the town fathers developed the Elm Tree Ordinance to monitor and protect these glorious trees. For more oversight, a five-member Tree Committee with a Tree Warden and a Consulting Arborist visit each numbered elm and add data to the statistics on each of the trees that “belong to the city,” according to a resident we talked to. The ordinance states: “The Town shall be responsible for the treatment or removal and disposal of any diseased or damaged elm tree within the public area.”

Trees showing signs of ailment are treated, and, in a worse-case scenario, taken down.  But not without weeping and wailing from the residents.  Mention the Post Office elm, and you’re sure to see sad faces.  Damage, not disease, prompted the removal of the beloved tree after a devastating storm hit Castine in April 2011.

A resident leaves yard raking to explain the care the town of Castine bestows on its treasured elms.

A wealth of elm trees in this yard!

Elms in Castine tower over whatever stands beside them — historic white homes, stately steepled churches, even the cadets of Maine Maritime Academy as they walk down to the harbor for training on board their sailing vessel Bowdoin.

So come to Castine to see the elms.  Be ready to look up.  Be ready to be impressed.  Because elms are honored as an integral part of the history and traditions of Castine.

Treasured by all — the elegant Castine elms.

For more stories on Castine and other towns in Maine, check out our Travel Series:  Autumn Down East. 

For more information and posts on Castine, check these out.

“Castine elm trees focus of tour,” Castine Patriot, June 23, 2011

Aimee Tucker, “Castine Maine/A Historic Midcoast Maine Tour,” New England Today.

Castine Elm Tree Ordinance, April 2009

Bowdoin setting sail from Acadia Dock in Castine, Maine

Many people have asked us what our favorite place in Maine might be since our trip in the Fall of 2017.  Of course, there are many, but for Tennessee landlubbers like us, sailing the Bowdoin on Penobscot Bay has to be a memory for a lifetime.

Bowdoin, training vessel for Maine Maritime Academy

It was the dream of Donald B. McMillan to sail to the Arctic Circle, and that dream in 1921 led to the hiring of a Naval architect, William B. Hand, to design the schooner Bowdoin (named after McMillan’s alma mater Bowdoin College) that would eventually make 30 trips to the Arctic, 25 under the command of McMillan. After serving several owners, Bowdoin finally came under the ownership of the Maine Maritime Academy (located in Castine) for use as a sail training vessel.

Cadets learning to sail aboard Bowdoin

When not in use for training cadets, Maine Maritime Academy allows community residents and visitors to set sail if crews are available.  And that’s how we were allowed to sail the smooth waters of Penobscot Bay one golden October afternoon.

Sailing at sunset on the Penobscot Bay

Hoisting the sails, experiencing the quiet of a sail boat on placid waters, and seeing Dice Head Light from the deck of Bowdoin remain some of our fondest memories of Maine.  Most assuredly, we were in a favorite place.

See other favorite places in the WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge: Favorite Place.