Barbara
loves Maine, L.L. Bean, and letterboxing, so
several years ago when she heard of a letterboxing event at L.L. Bean’s
flagship store in Freeport,
Maine she signed up. The flagship
store stays open 24 hours a day. A letterboxer who works at L.L. Bean got
permission to host a letterboxing event in the store in the middle of the night
in January. Letterboxes were hidden inside and outside the four store
buildings. (One box was hidden under that boot statue!) Then late at night when
the event began, people hunted for the boxes following clues hinting at the
location of boxes. Each box contained a hand carved stamp and letterboxers
stamp the images in their logbooks.
The
event has taken place for several years. Here’s Barbara in Freeport in 2015 and 2016.
So
this year we drove back from Florida
in time for Barbara to attend the event again. She picked up some friends and
headed to Maine
looking for letterboxes along the way. Usually letterboxes are found on trails,
but with the snow they sought indoor boxes – like one in a fun toy store in Portsmouth NH.
Here
is the stamp image from another letterbox called “Life is Good in Maine,” found in the Life is Good shop in Portland ME.
They
met other friends at a hotel in Freeport,
went out to dinner, and then headed for L.L. Bean. At 8pm (which is pretty
close to Barbara’s usual bedtime) they picked up the clue packet with clues
arranged per store. For example one clue for the Home store said “a bushel of
striped towels,” and there, in a basket of striped towels, was the box. Others
were pretty tricky. One of the hardest ones said “15-2 for a skunk.”
Fortunately one of Barbara’s friends figured that one out. Do you know what it
means? [See answer at bottom.] Another hard one in the Hunt & Fishing store
said “Bean’s Wooden Line Dryer.” Once we figured out that this antique for
drying fishing line was on display, we found the box.
There
were over 100 boxes with stamps in various categories. One was “Best of Maine,”
with stamp images of many of the things Barbara loves, like: blueberries,
lobster, Acadia National Park, Portland Head
Lighthouse... Another was things that happened in 1912 (the year L.L. Bean was
founded). Another was called “Produced of Maine.” Here are the stamps in that
series.
Another was “Maine Lingo.” Here’s a stamp from that set. Can you figure out what these Mainers are saying? [See translation at bottom.]
Everyone
stopped at midnight for the photo op. You might be able to spot Barbara way up
on the left.
 |
| picture from Facebook |
Barbara
is not typically a night owl, but she and her group of friends stayed up until
after 3:30am and found almost all the boxes.
They
slept a couple hours in the hotel and then did some more letterboxing around
the town of Freeport
before heading for home.
*“15-2
for a skunk” is cribbage lingo, so the box was near cribbage games.
*Maine lingo: “Aya” is
Air and “Ayuh” is their way of saying yes. :-)
*For
more information on letterboxing, see Atlasquest.com or just ask Barbara about
it.
