Ever thought you might like to live in a small town on the Maine coast? Or wondered what it’s like living here year round?

Some visitors are so intrigued with the idea, they make the transition from guest to resident. We asked a few of them what it was like to go from just passing through, to putting down roots with the rest of the locals. Some moved here more than a decade ago and some much more recently, but there are surprising similarities in their responses.

You might think folks in Livingston, Montana would seek a warm climate when they decide to move. For Craig Lancaster and wife Elisa Lorello, the weather wasn’t much of an issue. Elisa said any place will have some bad weather, so the couple didn’t make weather a priority in their 2017 decision.

Craig and Elisa had been to Maine on their honeymoon the year before and had a short list of requirements. Because the two are authors, work from home and could live anywhere, they started their search by asking “Where do we want to live?”

Wherever “it” was, it had to be near or on the water, in a less populated area and accessible to an airport.

Being realistic about a move to Maine meant the couple wanted to see what it would be like when it wasn’t tourist season. During a February 2018 visit, they found a house in Boothbay.

Their cross country move that May took a week. Leaving Montana, they were a bit leery. Elisa said they wondered “What have we done?” But by the time they moved in, "We knew it was going to be okay ... because we found out how uncommonly nice Mainers are.”

As for surprises, Craig said there were some economic ones, like the cost of heating oil and utilities. And pleasant surprises too, like Gardens Aglow and Boothbay Railway Village at Halloween.

Now settled in the home they share with Craig’s father Ron, Craig summed up the experience. “It’s the friendly faces you see. I feel that I’m living in the place where I ought to be living.”

For Jim and Annette Stormont, the move to the Midcoast from Marshalltown, Iowa happened eight years ago. “We were corporate gypsies, living in nine cities over the years and we became experts at moving," Jim explained.

Jim had been coming to his father’s home on Southport since he was 7 and the family goes back for generations here. What is now the East Boothbay post office was once his grandmother’s general store.

“Boothbay had always been on our radar, but only as a place to visit and not as a place to retire,” Jim said. That changed on a trip when the couple briefly looked at properties (“nothing serious,” Annette said), and then started for Connecticut and a planned visit with Jim’s nephew. 

By the time they reached the bridge in Bath, they realized they wanted to return and start looking seriously for their new home. They moved here from Iowa in 2008.

The Stormonts love the Midcoast pace of life. “We have not had one regret or one thing we wish we’d done differently,” Jim said.

Asked what they would tell someone looking to move here, Annette said, “Everywhere you go there’s such beauty any time of the year.” Jim enjoys the variety here. “We are not a retirement community. I can’t imagine living somewhere where everyone is the same.”  Annette added, “I’ve never lived anywhere with a stronger sense of community than here.”

Lois Engel moved to Boothbay from Belchertown, Massachusetts in March 2013 with her son, Darren Gainer. They had been coming to Maine for years and were sitting by a campfire in Acadia the summer before when Darren suggested the move.

At the time, each was living in their own home and the thought of pooling their resources appealed to them.  For Lois, it meant leaving the home that had been in her family since her grandparents.

They were driving back to Massachusetts in their 40’ camper but checked the map, picked Boothbay “out of the air” as she explained, and called a realtor. The following day was spent looking at homes and by the end of the day they found one they thought would work for them.

After a bit of back and forth, the house was theirs and Lois began the arduous work of divesting the family farm of its horses, dogs and chickens.  In January, Darren brought a van with household items from each of their homes and they moved in with a few remaining dogs and cats.

For a while, the change was difficult. As Lois explained, “It’s hard to leave everything you’ve ever known.”  She credited the Community Center and Jane Good with helping her make the transition. “She welcomed me and gave me a tour and made me feel like I’d made the right move."

Becoming part of the Center’s knitting group made all the difference for her and she quickly made friends and became part of the community.

“I spent 70 years in Massachusetts and felt like I lived there. But I spent five years in Boothbay and feel that I belong here. I should have been here all my life." She said Darren feels the same way.

“The treasure here is not just the beauty and the ocean. The real treasure here is the people. This is a healing place,” she said. “You come here to put yourself back together.”

The four Hamblen siblings are good friends as well as family. So it’s no surprise that, after Dave Hamblen and his wife Susi moved here permanently from Connecticut in 1990, his brother and sisters would follow.

Sister Betty and her husband Ted Repa moved from New York in 2000, brother Bill and his wife Jan arrived in 2003 from Massachusetts and sister Lyn Hamilton will be moving from Connecticut when she retires.

The siblings spent summers visiting their grandfather William Raye and liked the area so much, they spent their honeymoons here. Because they are so close, they thought it would be wonderful if they could all live in the same community.

From past vacations, they knew what it was like in the summer but wondered about the winter.

Bill explained, “We found out that there is lots to do if you want to pursue it.” Ted Repa’s family is on the West Coast and the decision about where to retire was important. “We knew Boothbay Harbor and the lifestyle we would have when we got here, so we knew it would work,” he said.

What should people know about the area if they are planning to move?

“The sense of community is so strong here,” Bill answered. “There’s nothing like it anywhere else.”

“People come here for the scenery, but they stay here because of the community,” Jan said. “And the community cares on every level,” Betty added.

Ted found “People are not concerned about what you did, they are more concerned about what you can do.”

The area has also appealed to the next generation of their family. Bill and Jan’s daughter Jennifer Lassen, a teacher, now lives in Edgecomb; and Dave and Susi’s daughter Lisa Cladis plans to retire here.

“Living here has exceeded my expectations,” Ted said. Everyone agreed.