It's 60 degrees this morning, hazy over Goose Cove, with a stiff breeze roaring through the spruce trees behind the cottage. Shockingly I slept till nearly 8 a.m., old time, though the clock change is allowing me to pretend to be more virtuous than that.

No doubt the somnolence was due to our long day out on the water. In the morning we took the ferry from Bass Harbor out to Swan's Island. Here are some photos of Bass Harbor: you can see the Acadia mountains behind the moored boats, and the stalled marine construction equipment by the ferry pier. There were few visitors on the boat: mostly locals in vehicles; only a sprinkling of people outside on the upper deck. But the weather was September-like, and the ride was a joy. I love boats; all of my car-transportation fears melt away unreasonably on a ferry, and I turn my face into the wind and want to sing.

Swan's Island is six miles off the Mount Desert coast and, except for the ocean and the lobster traps and the old boats rotting in yards, might be located next door to Harmony. Guys in pickups, guys in blaze orange hunting gear, guys working up their firewood, 100-percent Republican political signs. It was homey, in an cozy/alarming sort of way. I could very easily imagine having ended up in such a place when I was 28 years old, instead of the place I did end up. I was eager for difficulty in those days, and that's what I got.

So we hiked along the quiet roads, and ate our lunch here, on a windy beach draped with green-yellow seaweed that looked like witches' hair. 

And then we caught a 3 p.m. ferry back to Bass Harbor, and wended our way back to the cottage for naps and then dinner with our friends. And then a walk to the edge to listen to the nighttime sea. And then sleep.