By Marty Basch

There aren't any lighthouses in rocky Two Lights State Park in Cape Elizabeth. The two lights are nearby, one an automated light station and the other a lighthouse transformed into a private home. But there is the sea, salt air and solitude found while watching boats go into and out from Portland Harbor.

The 40-acre park south of Portland with its thick vegetation, narrow paths, crashing waves, striated ledges, cliffs, wind-sheltered picnic tables and many stone steps overlooks the Atlantic and Casco Bay.

Watch life go by

It is a place for walkers, bench-sitters and thinkers. Hold hands, pose for a picture on the ledges as the waves thunder, snuggle, smooch, ponder. Bring a picnic and a blanket. Or, drop a quarter into one of the coin-operated binoculars and gaze out to sea from the small peninsula for a look at Old Orchard Beach, Richmond Island, Wood Island Lighthouse and other landmarks readily identified with the handy grid affixed to each scope. Find a vessel and follow along as it cuts through the ocean.

The ledges and flora can be both an austere or striking world of white, gray and brown depending on the light, cloud cover or snow fall.

The past

The park is bathed in both history and nature. It is the  site of a World War II battery covered in earth as camouflage. The battery was an unused part of a seacoast defense system that ran from Popham Beach in Phippsburg to Cape Elizabeth in the 1940s.  The war ended before the battery's completion. The gun emplacements are still there that would have been outfitted with firepower capable of reaching targets 15 miles out to sea.

The bunker was linked to a still-standing six-story cylindrical concrete tower built in 1943 on an adjoining hill. Constructed next to a farmhouse, it  resembles a silo as a disguise. Both are closed to the public. A small wooded path goes to the tower and connects to another which encircles a tiny pond by a colorful playground and rest rooms.

The sea

But the focus is the sea with its massive ledges looking like they've been squeezed by a giant vise. Resembling petrified wood, part of the fun is rock-hopping along the pressured and folded light brown quartzite and gray phyllite slabs which also contain hues of pinks, yellows and greens.

Those rocks are a shining example of what time, heat and pressure can do. Over 400 million years ago, they started out as sand, clay and mud. But with geologic stresses and shifts, the sedimentary rock morphed into today's bedrock which now serves as ledges for careful exploration.  The ebb and flow of the tide decides the availability of the rockbound real estate. The rocks are slippery when wet and signs warn to be aware of random larger waves called "rogue" waves. Staying 20 feet away from the water is urged.

But staying away from the park  is not.

One Tank Away

Cape Elizabeth is:

*344 miles from Elizabeth, N.J.

*104 miles from Lynn, Mass.

*143 miles from Sharon, Mass.