My Life as a Maine Innkeeper: October 2010

Thursday, October 7, 2010

The Big Fall Weekend

Well the big fall weekend is here - Columbus Day. There is a lot going on in Bath this weekend with Autumnfest. There will be a great Maine made craft show, the Farmers' Market, Citizens' Involvement Day, music, scarecrow making and lots more all happening downtown on Saturday. The weather looks like it is going to cooperate so there should be a good turnout. The Columbus Day weekend also marks the end of the season for two favorite eating places - Fat Boys Drive In and their unbelievable frappes (we called them milkshakes back in PA) and Five Islands and that wonderful lobster. Yes, we still have lobster year round but there is nothing like sitting on the dock at Five Islands and scarfing down a lobster and onion rings. I guess being open only on a seasonal basis gives us all something to look forward to through the winter and mud season. Our cool little city of Bath, of course, does not shut down and we are a year round town. There are lots of things still going on throughout the fall and before we know it all the activities for An Old Fashioned Christmas in Bath will be gearing up. So don't put away those thoughts of a getaway to Maine just yet - we are here, we are open and I am waiting to greet you when you arrive.

Our Journey to Bath

Before Amy and Mark ever even thought about making me a part of their family, they were thinking about being innkeepers. About a year and a half after they adopted me, they left me in Erie, PA and took a trip to explore possible towns in New England to open their new business. While I patiently waited at home with a dog sitter, they journeyed to Bath ME, their first stop on the trip. It was December of 2004 so it was cold and raining in Maine but they fell in love with the town and the people they met. Driving to the next town in New Hampshire in a snow storm, they knew in their hearts that Bath was going to be our new home. They went ahead and looked at the other places as planned, but Bath was it. In February of 2005, they left me once again to look at a house on the market in Bath. It had been a B&B but had gone to a private home for the past couple years. Well, lucky us, they loved the house and put in a bid. It was so exciting when the realtor called us in Erie to say the Benjamin F. Packard House was ours! Things started moving quickly then. Packing up the house in Erie, making long distance arrangements for licenses, sprinkler systems and all the things that go with opening a new business. On May 14th, they packed the car and this time took me along too. We closed on the house on May 16th and in six hectic weeks, opened the new Benjamin F. Packard House B&B! My life as a bed and breakfast dog had begun.