Paid partnership with Maine Maritime Museum

I spend a slightly ridiculous amount of time in Bath. We have family there, so I’m usually up at least once a week. It’s one of many towns in Maine I love, but one of the few I could actually picture myself living in.

So when the Maine Maritime Museum asked if I’d help promote Pints on the Pier, their annual beer festival happening this Saturday, it was a pretty easy yes. I already love the museum, and it gave me a good excuse to put together the kind of Saturday in Bath I’d want to have anyway.

Bath has somehow managed to pack nearly everything I want into a few blocks. There’s an incredible butcher, a natural grocery store, Solo Pane for bread and Italian pastries, a proper cooking store, a coworking space, my favorite bookstore in Maine, and now The Parlor, a four-seat oyster bar. Four seats. That’s the whole thing. I love it.

But the thing I like most about Bath is that it still feels like a real town. Bath Iron Works (BIW) is right there. People actually live and work downtown. The Cabin is still serving pizza a few blocks from a tiny oyster bar, and somehow none of it feels weird together. Bath is beautiful, but it doesn’t feel like it was built for visitors.

And if you care about old houses even half as much as I do, walk Washington Street. It’s lined with Italianates, Victorians, and old sea captains’ houses, and if you’re anything like me, you’ll probably spend too much time looking at the porches and brackets. Keep heading south past Bath Iron Works and eventually you’ll end up at Maine Maritime Museum, right on the Kennebec.

I’ve been a few times now, and my boyfriend’s mother has even applied to volunteer there, so I’m hoping to be back more often.

If you want to explore the museum too, make that your first stop. The galleries close at 2 this Saturday, leaving time to head downtown for something to eat and a wander before catching the boat back for Pints on the Pier. The festival takes place outside in the historic Percy & Small Shipyard.

Now in its ninth year, Pints on the Pier runs from 4 to 7 right on the Kennebec. There will be beer from Maine Beer Company, Bissell Brothers, Mast Landing, Bath Ale Works, and a bunch of others, plus cider, canned cocktails, nonalcoholic options, live music, and lawn games. Food-wise, there will be pizza, kimbap, oysters, and Zellie’s Ice Cream, which is taking its truck on the road for the first time!

Tickets are $47, or $22 if you’re not drinking, and museum members get 20% off.

If you can’t make it this Saturday, they’re also running boat tours through the end of October. I’ll probably be back for one myself.

Here’s what I’d do. Go up early and get something from Solo Pane. Head to the museum before the galleries close at 2, then spend some time downtown. Wander Front and Centre Streets. Stop at the butcher. Try your luck with one of the four seats at The Parlor. Stare at houses on Washington Street. Then leave the car downtown and take the new $10 boat shuttle down the Kennebec for Pints on the Pier. It leaves at 3:30 and 4:30.

If you can arrive at a party in an old shipyard by boat, you should.

I was walking through the West End with a friend recently when they absolutely slammed their toe into one of those big granite blocks sitting at the end of a brick walkway.

They were understandably pissed, mostly because why is there just a giant block of granite sitting there?

I told them it was an old carriage mounting block, basically a stone step that helped people get in and out of horse-drawn carriages, and they looked at me like I was insane.

Which was when I realized maybe this is not something everybody knows. Maybe most people have better things to do than spend this much time learning about random stones sitting outside old Portland houses.

Before cars, you might have had one of these blocks near your front walkway, with a hitching post nearby where you could tie your horse. The block made the step between the carriage and the sidewalk a little less of a climb.

There’s a great one at 62 Bowdoin Street with the house number carved right into the granite. At 357 Spring Street, there’s still a cast-iron hitching post shaped like a horse’s head, with two rings where the reins would have been tied.

Greater Portland Landmarks has documented a bunch of them around the West End and actually put the surviving hitching posts and mounting blocks on its Places in Peril list in 2015. Sitting that close to the street, they’re pretty easy to damage. Snowplows, utility work, and people who have no idea what they’re looking at can make pretty quick work of a random-looking block of granite.

Portland even still has a working horse watering trough on Federal Street. The Stanley Pullen Fountain was installed in 1910. It’s made of granite, has six carved dolphins around it, and kids apparently used to call it “the bubble.”

Horse-drawn carriages can still stop there for water in the warmer months. And apparently horses never completely disappeared from Portland’s rulebook either. The city still has regulations for licensed horse-drawn cabs. The horses have to be fed, watered, and groomed, and the drivers have to be “courteous, well dressed, and neatly groomed.”

So next time you’re walking around the West End, look where the walkways meet the street. There’s a decent chance that random piece of granite wasn’t random at all.

Once you know what they are, you start seeing them everywhere.

🐶 Bayou – 4 yrs
87 pounds of goofy, blue-eyed charm. Bayou loves walks, playtime, belly rubs, and being right next to his people.

🐶 Domino – 10 mo
A shy little guy who quickly turns into a total Velcro dog. Domino loves toys, pets, and being in your arms.

🐱 Buddy – 6 yrs
Sweet, spicy, and looking for someone who gets cats. Buddy needs a little patience and space to settle in, plus a home where he can enjoy both indoor life and outdoor adventures.

If the link doesn’t open anymore, it means they’ve already been adopted!

LCD Soundsystem @ Thompson's Point | 7 pm | 🎟️ $75

Dirty Sound Magnet + Gran Moreno @ Live at Madrid's | 7:30 pm | 🎟️ $17

PMA Films: Remake @ SPACE | 7 pm | 🎟️ $10

Dead Wednesdays (Final Night!) @ Portland House of Music | 8 pm | 🎟️ $20

Sea Dogs vs. Binghamton Rumble Ponies @ Delta Dental Park | 6 pm | 🎟️ $15

Heartsapalooza @ Thompson's Point | 5 pm | Free

Blackberry Smoke @ State Theatre | 7:30 pm | 🎟️ $35

Georgia O'Keeffe: The Brightness of Light @ The Hill Arts | 7 pm | 🎟️ $20

Kendall St. Company & The Crowded Table @ Portland House of Music | 8 pm | 🎟️ $15

Crafted Conversations: Bold Coast Spirits @ Five of Clubs | Free

Ethiopian New Year Celebration & Dinner @ Coffee By Design | 🎟️ $55

Portland Fire Department 9/11 Memorial Ceremony @ Portland Fire Department | 8 am | Free

Matt McCusker @ State Theatre | 8 pm | 🎟️ $30

Gandahar @ SPACE | 7 pm | 🎟️ $10

Dharma Down @ Portland Conservatory of Music | 7:30 pm | 🎟️ $28

PMA Films: Tehachapi (Free Screening + Panel) @ Portland Museum of Art | 2 pm | Free

Kellerei Bozen Wine Tasting @ Friends & Family | Free

Pints on the Pier @ Percy & Small Shipyard | 4 pm | 🎟️ $47

Portland Farmers' Market @ Deering Oaks Park | 7 am | Free

Maine Open Lighthouse Day @ Statewide | 7 am | Free

Tom Papa @ State Theatre | 7 pm | 🎟️ $25

Alela Diane w/ Alexa Rose @ SPACE | 8 pm | 🎟️ $22

Good Company Pop-Up Market @ Next to LB Kitchen, Congress St | Free

Gluten-Free Market & Expo @ Orange Bike Brewing | 12 pm | Free

Until next week,
— Jake Newman