Toddy Pond Days - Surry and Newbury Neck

While we stayed in the cabin on Toddy Pond, my father continued his characteristic trait of exploring new roads. We lived on the Surry Road (Rt.#176), which connected Rt.#1 to Surry. This crossed Rt.#172, which connected Ellsworth to Blue Hill.

My father's oldest brother, Roy Beverly, used to live in Surry when he was first married, so my father wanted to see how it had changed. It's a tiny little community with not many buildings in town. I do remember the general store. (one that met my expectations of a true general store - filled from corner to corner with anything you could think of) They sold cheese by the wheel, covered by a glass dome and sliced in wedges as it was sold. Whenever we passed that way, we bought a big slice.

I'm sure we drove all around Blue Hill and Sedgewick, but I don't remember too much about them (at that time), but I do remember a couple of excursions to Newbury Neck.

Route 176 continued through Surry down a peninsula to the ocean. It was a very rough and narrow road. Somewhere along that road, we passed an old "castle," at least that's what it looked like to us. The old house must have had three or four stories. There were turrets on the front corners. I would have loved to explore it. My imagination created all kinds of stories to be set in that old mansion, surrounded by trees, hidden away on that winding road that led to the bay.

The road ended on a narrow sandbar that jutted out into the water. A small island sat a mile or so offshore. One Sunday afternoon, we took a walk along the shore, not watching the tide. By the time we realized it was coming up, we were quite a ways from the point. The water kept coming and coming up until there was no place to walk. The land was covered in bushes and trees and thick underbrush, so going inland wasn't a good option. We waded through the shallow water (maybe even in our church clothes, I'm thinking) back to the car.

Later, a group of us went back on July 4th, to watch the fireworks display across the bay. That was a pleasant evening, sitting on the beach (at low tide) - good friends, good times.