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Tidal Falls, Where Memories Rush Back

Courtesty of http://www.ellsworthamerican.com/ourtown/hancock/ot_hancock7_08-15-02.html

(The restaurant closed its doors after the 2008 season but picnic tables are still there and access is still the same)

Fifty years ago, folks came to Tidal Falls for a lobster dinner and to watch the dramatic reversing tides.

Not much has changed at the falls today and that’s the whole idea behind its revival as a public place.

Since the Frenchman Bay Conservancy purchased the four-acre spot within sight of the Hancock-Sullivan Bridge two years ago,
the same great food, views and access to the water have remained open to all. Children can scramble across the nearby beach,
finding ocean treasures as kayakers bob and roll in the swift current beyond. For other visitors, long-ago memories of the area drift back to mind.

The scenic spot has become a Downeast-style drive-in known to locals and seasoned visitors both.

It is through their efforts that the site’s character will continue to be preserved, too.

Barbara Welch, executive director for the Frenchman Bay Conservancy, said that the plot by the falls was purchased to protect the traditional use of the property.

People who once came here with their grandparents and haven’t been back since see our sign and say, ‘Is that the same place we used to go?’

Welch said. When those people get down to the falls again, she said, you can almost see the memories come back over them in waves.

The Tidal Falls restaurant serves giant lobsters just as it did when the Hodgkins family owned the lobster pound they founded there in 1950.

The Tidal Falls site also allows canoers and kayakers access to the ocean rapids.

The conservancy also owns a 50-acre plot on Little Tunk Pond in Sullivan where visitors can swim and play on the beach. A third spot at the
Salt Pond on Hancock Point has a hiking trail with spectacular ocean views. Each of the properties, explained Welch, is a place that the
community wanted to see protected and is unique in character. 

by James J. Allen

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