IN SEARCH OF SECLUSION

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CRUISES
ONLY!
and
NCL

Call
932 - 4444

To Receive Your
Certificate

that bisect the property. Many locals are de-
scendants of Loyalists who left New England
after the American Revolution. That explains
the neocolonial-style surroundings— salt-
box cottages, white picket fences, flowering
gardens— and certainly the lilting colonial di-
alect passed down by Tory ancestors.
Hope Town Harbour Lodge offers twenty-
one rooms. Honeymooners should request
one of the eight cottage rooms clustered
around the pool. Don't expect style. These
rooms are comfortable but modest (wood
paneling, wall-to-wall carpet). The rest of the
rooms in the main lodge overlook the harbor.
Guests wanting to explore the clear Ba-
hamian waters will find day sailers and Boston
whalers for rent nearby and wonderful snor-
keling just fifteen yards off the main beach.
Lunch is served at the laid-back cafe near the
fresh-water pool. The bar is a popular gath-
ering place for yachtsmen and a good place
to sample the Abacos' infamous goombay
smash, a concoction of rum, pineapple juice
and apricot brandy.
A twenty-minute launch ride from Marsh
Harbour, the largest island in the Abacos,
Hope Town is a small fishing settlement rec-
ognized for an oft-photographed, 120-foot,
candy-striped lighthouse. Built in 1863, ifs
one of the last hand-turned, kerosene-fueled
beacons in the Bahamas. (Yes, you can climb
to the top, but only if the lightkeeper is
amenable. And remember, he works all
night)
Hope Town is where it all happens during
regatta week in early July. Take care that you
do not stay at Hope Town Harbour Lodge
at that time, for this hostelry is a favorite
among yachtsmen and draws quite a crowd.
The rest of the year it's a casual, unpreten-
tious and amiable sort of place. (Winter rates:
$95 per night, double occupancy; summer:
$75. Call 800-626-5690.)

Pilgrim's Inn, Deer Isle,
Maine Perched on a shiny mill pond on

28592 Orchard Lake Road
Farmington Hills, MI 48334

58

•JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1993

• STYLE

tiny Deer Isle just off the Maine coast, the
1793 Pilgrim's Inn is expertly maintained and
run by former Marylanders Jean and Dud
Hendrick. Dud, who grew up in Annapolis
and was an all-American lacrosse player at
the Naval Academy, coached lacrosse for six-
teen years at Dartmouth. During a recruiting
trip to Annapolis, he met Jean— who had es-
tablished the popular Anne Arundel County

restaurant Capers. They married, gave up
their jobs, and headed for the rugged Maine
coast
The Hendricks set about establishing a
first-rate hostelry and proving that haute cui-
sine is not incompatible with the piney isola-
tion of rural Maine. Their efforts have paid off;
these days, their inn is regularly featured in
travel and gourmet guides throughout the U.S.
Breakfast and dinner are served in the at-
tached barn, which housed goats in an ear-
lier life. The barn is still a rustic space, with
farm implements on display. The food served
there is marvelous. Breakfast, for example,
might feature fruit-stuffed French toast and
crispy bacon from the local smokehouse. The
prix-fixe, five-course dinners usually com-
mence with a wonderful bisque or chowder
and conclude with a seasonal dessert such
as wild blackberries with creme Anglaise.
The dinner entree might be butter-soft
poached salmon; tenderloin with cabernet,
mushroom and leek sauce; or glazed, roast-
ed duck.
There are thirteen rooms at Pilgrim's Inn,
each with a slightly different decor, decorat-
ed with antiques, high beds with quilts, Lau-
ra Ashley fabrics, and local crafts.
Honeymooners should check out the neigh-
boring guest cottage, called simply Number
Fifteen. This one-bedroom seaside cottage,
located a few steps from the inn, features a
living room with open beams and fireplace,
a full kitchen and a second-floor bedroom
whose deck overlooks the tiny settlement of
Deer Isle Village.
Back at the inn proper, there's a common
room with an eight-foot wide fireplace and
bee-hive oven; a tap room with a view of pic-
turesque Mill Pond; and a library stocked with
books about the Maine coast Several bicy-
cles are available to guests. The Inn will pre-
pare a picnic lunch for guests to take down to
Stonington, the quintessential Maine fishing
village, complete with shingled houses, lob-
ster traps piled high, seagulls screeching
above, and a harbor often shrouded in mist
Sightseers can board the mail boat and trav-
el to tiny Isle Au Haut for an all-day excursion.
Happily, Deer Isle's end-of-the world lo-
cation tends to attract only serious Maine vis-
itors. So utterly undeveloped, so reminiscent
of a bygone era in which there were no jar-
ring fast-food dives or strip shopping centers,
this corner of the world is too beautiful to pro-
mote.
(Season is mid-May to mid-October, $80
by the day, per person, including break-

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