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Maine 91% Wooded, Burning Firewood Nothing New.

Controlled Spring Grass Fires, Like Home Wood Burning Part Of Maine Life On A Farm.

Fires at night at a lake camp in Maine with friends around it are a common past time.

Talking, gazing as the flame dances, crackles and gives off all those positive ions. You can detach, dream, and bath in the heat, the glow. And enjoy friendship with others around that fire. While your kids play hide and go seek, other games in the background. Drifting in and out of the camp fire circle. Picking up bits and pieces of the conversation. Building childhood memories, family traditions.

When you grow up in Maine, fire wood gathering, processing is part of the long list of chores you tackle once a year. Not everyone burns work exclusively to heat their Maine homes. But many go through a cord a year in a kitchen end heater. Or put stove wood through a cellar unit that at least heats the house floors. The nightly ritual of going down to check the fire. Throw on an extra log or two to keep a bed of coals going through the night. So there is something to work with the next morning when you wake. And it may not be as toasty warm as when you toddled off to bed eight hours before in your Maine home or farmstead.

Europeans, especially Scandanavians, give their woodlots to their kids, future generations in as good, hopefully better condition than when they received it.

That is good land stewardship. Deep seeded appreciation and respect for the woods. And trees which to me demonstrate the true meaning of the word patience. My dad always told me in the family 100 acre wood lot in Ludlow that an acre, roughly an area 208′ by 208′, produces at least a cord a year if managed properly.

But overseas, because of wars, burning wood for so many centuries longer than us, the natural resource is not so plentiful in those areas. Better wood burning stoves with higher efficiency come out of those places because of it. My dad used to sell Jotul wood heaters. And any time I have a Maine real estate listing with a Jotul stove of any model in it, the sellers invariably never ever leave the Jotul behind in the sale. They get that attached, bonded.

Depend on that wood stove, not walking out the door without it.

Causes a little arm wrestling in the Maine home sale negotiations. And someone never having burned wood, exposed to it wonders what’s all the fuss. Only a wood stove. Not to the seller who relies on it for warmth, comfort or even cooking.

Think of how valuable, how everything centered around the one old antique cook stove of early Maine settlers, farmers, lumbermen. A big part of daily survival revolved around that one “appliance”. Heat for living, fire for cooking. Hot water from the neighboring copper tank heated with coils in that wood stove. Or just a big pot on the old kitchen wood stove heating up water for the Saturday night one bath a week ritual. Whether you needed it or not.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, Broker
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

February 25, 2011
Maine, It Changes Your Life.

If I could only live in Maine full time, if I could get the other half to move to Vacationland, etc.

Hear those heavy sighs, regrets, laments every day. The attraction is the many sides of Maine from rugged rock bound coastal scenes with lighthouses, freshly caught lobster and steamed clams. Or the thousands of acres of Maine woods to explore, or being on the water of our many lakes, ponds, rivers. Less people and more elbow room are a big attraction of Maine.

But the best things you remember, that grab your attention, your heart and never let go in Maine is the long long list of what we don’t have here in the Pine Tree State. No traffic, no gangs, 4th lowest crime state status in the country. The lack of light pollution so you see millions, billions of stars on a night sky of black velvet.

Lack of high prices, lots of zeroes in our Maine real estate property price tags.

Our fun is no or low cost. You won’t need a lot of money here to live day to day. We don’t play the “impress and woo” with money “look at me, better than you” dog and pony in Maine.

People that ignore you don’t in Maine.

You don’t find unfriendly here.

A nod, wave, smile happens in Maine. Not being snubbed, avoided or mentally air brushed out of the picture frame. Folks care about you. You feel it instantly wash over you, tension lifted. When you cross the New Hampshire, Quebec, New Brunswick border. And you can relax, push the seat back a notch or two and take a little slower breath of fresh Maine air.

Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, Broker
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com
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February 20, 2011
Early Maine Snow Sledding, Ride For One Hour, Tinker For Two.

Northern Maine Meduxnekeag Ramblers Snow Sled Groomer

As a kid in Northern Maine, snow sledding exploded in popularity in the 1960’s, early 1970’s with a variety of colors, styles, flavors of snowmobiles.

During a better than average Maine potato year, my parents bought a Johnson Skee Horse which was some kind of fast on hard packed surfaces. But venture out in to a Maine field of drifting white new powder and suddenly the snow sled was lost on radar. Dropping out of sight. Thoughts of leaving the sled in the middle of that field until spring surfaced in our heads as kids not built like Hercules or Ajax.

The horsepower was around fourteen. Skis were a narrow stance because there were no groomed wide ITS snow trails. You had to be narrow enough to squeeze between trees to travel any great distance.

It was catch as catch can with field riding and the Maine railroad beds were active, not available like today’s “Interstate” to get through a Maine County, clipping off townships pretty quickly.

I was always in awe of hardcore Maine snow sledders who would take off to Quebec or other exotic sounding places when hearing the stories as a small child. My appreciation grows even today knowing no network of connected trails to and from that Canadian province existed then. And riding on earlier model snow sleds that were not the most dependable mechanically.

My Uncle Carl Hagan took on the Sno Jet snowmobile franchise. Soon we had a new blue sled parked in the chicken house to replace the green hernia heavy Skee Horse.

The Sno Jet built in Thetford Mines Quebec was nimbler, lighter but with its own quirks.

As a kid, to pull the recoil to start the 13.8 horsepower Hirth engine, required a couple of cans of Popeye’s spinach. And a little anger to throw your whole weight of frustration in to the pull cord. Compression was high and usually getting pulled back bloodied a kid’s knuckles.

It also had a metal gas tank that would get condensation, causing rust on the inside which clogged the gas fuel filter. I had lots of neighborhood mechanics who helped suggest a side gas tank like the early Artic Cats used, bungie corded in to place. Crude but effective so weekends the neighborhoods around the farm kids could go round and round fields. Utilize the few woods trails that existed or make our own.

The suspension was a series of bogie wheels, not the slides, shock absorbers like today. That and the narrow ski stance so it could go between trees when breaking a woods trail meant a Maine snow sledder was on his knees alot. Not just praying to please God avoid a breakdown. But to maneuver and lean, twist, turn to help the machine go around obstacles by shifting your weight. Your passenger if you had one had to do the same “bobsled” lean, like the Olympic luge routine too. Otherwise you could go in to a tree from skis not responding, not runnered with carbides and more balanced like today.

Modern snowmobiles are way way more sophisticated, more expensive, only come in four not fifty flavors. Under the lifted fiberglass cowling you see lots of belts, tubes, multiple cylinder tuned exhaust canisters. Meaning barnyard mechanics with whatever you can round up for replacement part days are over. I remember the early Kawasaki Drifter, Skiroule RTX, Rupp Nitro snow machines were ahead of their time. Have you ever seen Maine on a snow sled?

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

February 16, 2011
Would You Like To See Acadia National Park In Maine By Horse Carriage Ride?

At a recent Houlton Maine Rotary club meeting, the guest speaker was a local attorney who runs a successful family horse business called Carriages of Acadia.

See Acadia National Park By ME Horse Drawn Carriage.
Horse drawn carriage tours of the Acadia National Park’s roads ways are very popular with Maine tourists traveling to Vacationland.

With around 100 cruise ships parking off the Maine coast in Bar Harbor and other spots, sight seeing is big for travelers to the Pine Tree state. That territory up here in the right hand corner of the country almost in Canada that sticks out like a Vacationer’s hitch hiking thumb.

Last year Carriages of Acadia owner Michael Carpenter said 19,600 climbed in to special made carriages with hydraulic brakes, all the extras made by an Amish outfit specifically for these tours. Carpenter’s winning ten year bid for providing Acadia National Park tourist rides has eight more to go. And he expects over 20,000 Maine carriage riders to book trips to see the Day Mountain, Rockefeller Bridge, Jordan Pond House Tea and Popover rides.

The Acadia carriage tours take anyway from one to two hours.

Views of Cranberry Isles, Schoodic Pennisula and Isle au Haut are part of the attraction.

But other highlights include exploring the Cobblestone Bridge, the first of John D Rockefeller’s bridges built in 1913.

Thought it would be neat to vacation with your horse? Reservations required but that’s an option. Day use horse trailer parking also possible for tourists on horseback. Call for details, suggested reservations at 877 276 3622. Begin making your plans for a trip to Maine from June to October for memories of a lifetime. Log on for more at www.carriagesofacadia.com

The horse drawn tours in Acadia National Park offer ten carriages pulled by up to 26 horses (13 teams).

The schedule runs for 102 days, with hay and grain for the draft horses coming from Aroostook County. Supplies bought from the local Amish community in Smyrna Maine are part of the operation.

In addition to legendary philanthropist John D Rockefeller, Charles W Eliot president of Harvard University and George B Dorr, never tiring Maine conservationalist, Mount Desert Island is forever protected. More than 57 miles of broken stone carriage roads were built with back breaking effort according to Carpenter. Along this roadway are magnificent handmade granite bridges and stunning Maine land and water views. Bring your camera because the horse, it’s driver knows the way to stay on the roadways. While you capture never fade, memory making photos to magnet to your fridge back home. To use on the this year’s Christmas card.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, Broker
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

February 15, 2011
Think Not Being In Debt Means You’re Wealthy?

Maine Is Simpler Living, Not Simple People.

You believe if you had a break even year, that makes you a winner, happy, content.

If you are grateful you are rich. Wealth is not measured in dollars. It’s your health, your kid’s and family being in the pink, fit as a fiddle. And you are beyond just physically ship shape with all those outdoor recreation options Maine is famous for all four seasons. Mentally, spiritually you’re some kind of full of joy too. You live in Maine don’t you?

If you call up here in the right hand corner of the country home, spending gobs of money is taken right off the consideration table. Maine real estate is cheap, low cost. Get a lot for a little. And mortgages, don’t have those for long or at all. Everything you know for over head expenses, spending down country, out of state divide by three and four for costs when you land in Maine.

No one makes obscene amounts of money, but you don’t have to, want to.

No one is impressed with showy spending, material “stuff” bought like a drunken sailor with poor impulse control.

Your head is screwed on straight with the long list of what matters most way beyond the legal tender, Benjamins, Hamiltons.
In Maine, we’re not tractor beamed in to retail therapy on a day when feeling anxious, just so so. Because we get outside, fill our lungs with the clean fresh air. Look around at the four seasons unspoiled beauty. And go through the long personal list at least three times a day of what you should be and are happy about. And then at the end of the private recitation, voila, you are high, centered. Realizing loud and clear without a doubt that you, I, anyone has nothing to whine, complain about. If you live in Maine that is.

Maine, the folks work harder, are family centered and already live in a Disney land of sorts. But the natural, not man made kind. We have it made in Vacationland, 4th lowest crime state where there are no gangs. Zip for traffic. 46th lowest in the country for FSSR (foreclosure, short sale, repossession). Sample some, get a piece of your own for yourself, to pass on.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, Broker
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

February 11, 2011
If There Was A Snow Plowing World Olympics, Maine Would Win.

The gold medal or the world’s best snow removal by states, local municipalities and individual home owners would go to Maine if there was a national event to compete in.

Efficient dealing with the white stuff that blankets Vacationland is a given in Maine. Each winter, we all pray for snow in Maine because the snowsledding, skiing, snowshoeing, sliding would be pretty difficult without it.

And when we get a storm with a foot of new snow, life is not stopped, panic does not happen. Because we live in Maine, that is one reason we do and winter not a hibernation period spent indoors. We are ready for snow, plan for it. Get in to gear to quickly remove it from our highways, driveways, off our roof to avoid collapse. The experience, growing up with it and having the right equipment and training helps Mainers carry on in day to day during, after a storm. Work, school, living, and especially recreation after any day or night snow storm with ease is the way we roll when the white stuff happens.

Watch the lead in video footage of this past Sunday when I awoke to what was predicted to be one to three inches of snow in Aroostook County. But turned out to be more. But quickly, on the highway you see what happens in the “ants at a picnic” like snow attack, containment.

By the time I got to Presque Isle Maine, 46 miles north of Houlton where I started out with a dooryard of new snow, everything cleared out and business as usual for the IBU World Cup Biathlon event at venue seven. Fort Kent Maine the site for venue eight on the World Cup Tour if you can get up to see the fun of this really fun cross country skiing, rifle target shooting events that is huge around the planet. Don’t ever let a little snow in the Maine forecast make you hesitate or cancel a trip to Vacationland.

Overnight in my Maine home town last night, I could hear dump trucks, large snow blowers and plows tidying up with bank removal for safety and better visibility for local motorists.

Having less population, traffic to plow around helps in keeping towns running during a Maine winter. But attacking the snow with experise, the right equipment and years of training doesn’t hurt either. Snow in Maine, not a dirty word at all. Like a kid, we all get excited with a blanket of new snow arrives. To sled, ski, build tunnels, snowmen and forts to defend with well stock arsenals of backyard piles of snowballs. We are in awe being inside nice and warm looking out, watching. Or actually walking outdoors in the natural weather process of it all. While coming down during a storm and the beauty, powder sugar coating when it stops. As the sun comes out with blue blue skies and crisp clean air surrounding you. Making everything look magical, sparkling, fresh and new.

February 10, 2011