COURTESY / WOLF COVE INN
A couple in their 30s swapped corporate jobs on the West Coast for a new career as innkeepers in Poland, at the Wolf Cove Inn.
Updated: July 17, 2023
Searching the U.S. and braving a tornado, West Coast couple takes reins at Poland inn
COURTESY / WOLF COVE INN
Geoff Skidmore and Nicole McMaster looked at numerous inn listings. Wolf Cove checked all the boxes.
A couple in their 30s decided to swap their corporate jobs on the West Coast for a new career as innkeepers in the rural Androscoggin County town of Poland.
Nicole McMaster and Geoff Skidmore bought the Wolf Cove Inn, at 5 Jordan Shore Drive, from Roy and Sue Forsberg for an undisclosed price.
Eben Viens of the B&B Team and Dana Moos and Diane Pace of the Maine Inn Team of Swan Agency Real Estate brokered the transaction.
“Nicole’s grandparents operated the Captain's House in Chatham, Mass.,” said Skidmore. “Nicole would help them as a little girl. That planted the seed of this dream in her.”
Crawford and Shatner
The Wolf Cove Inn, established in 1996, has 11 guest rooms, a cabin and lawns on almost two acres with over 560 feet of private shorefront on Tripp Lake.
The property dates to 1894, when the Wolf family from Pennsylvania built a four-bedroom summer home. At some point, the house was expanded. The original rooms and the expansion are part of today’s inn.
In 1950, a family named Cullen, who owned a lobster shack in Lewiston, converted the house into a restaurant called Lobster-Land on the Lake, which operated for more than 20 years, according to the inn’s website.
“In 1963, Lobster-Land provided the locale for the filming of a scene from the episode ‘Same Picture, Different Frame’ of the TV series 'Route 66,'” the website says. “Joan Crawford appeared as guest star.”
Other actors who were at Lobster-Land but not in the episode were Lon Chaney Jr. and William Shatner.
In 1970, Rose and Jim Aikman bought Lobster-Land and operated the restaurant until 1971, when they converted the property back to a private residence.
In 1996, the Aikmans converted the property into Wolf Cove Inn. In 2000, a third floor was added.
“Following the terrorists attacks of 2001, the Secret Service spent much time at the inn for several years,” the website says. “A member of George W. Bush’s staff had a summer home on Jordan Shore Drive, so the Secret Service used the inn as a base to monitor traffic on the road.”
In December 2013, Sue and Roy Forsberg swapped out 30-year careers as technology professionals to buy the property.
They began a four-month renovation, reopening the inn the following May. Additional renovations and upgrades ensued, including construction of a cabin in 2016.
Aspiring innkeepers
In the recent sale to McMaster and Skidmore, “it was fascinating how many professionals involved in the transfer process (attorneys, inspectors, bankers, accountants) were personally aware of the property given it's appeal to both out of state and in-state travelers,” said Viens of the B&B Team.
Viens noted that, coming from her grandparents’ experience as long-time owner and operators of Captain's House in Chatham, McMaster and her father, Bruce McMaster, an owner and partner in this transaction, “had a greater understanding of the inn business than most buyers in our market.”
COURTESY / WOLF COVE INN
The inn, established in 1996, is on Tripp Lake and has over 560 feet of private shorefront.
Viens and his team met the buyers at an aspiring innkeeper seminar the team hosted in Whitefish, Mont., and from there worked with them to identify properties of interest outside of Chattanooga, Tenn., and in Washington's San Juan Islands before they settled on destination Maine market.
From rut to epiphany
A couple of years ago, the couple was hitting a rut in their careers, said Skidmore.
Skidmore was working for Walt Disney Studios, in Burbank, Calif. He was assistant manager for studio integrated planning and franchise management.
“That’s basically air traffic control for business partners who work on all the film and theatrical campaigns,” he said. “We oversaw campaigns and made sure everyone was in constant communication with each other and on-brand with filmmakers, marketing, Disney parks, consumer products, and many other cross lines of business partners.”
McMaster was working remotely for a printed circuit board company, a job she started straight out of college and held for 18 years.
“We were unhappy living in Los Angeles,” said Skidmore. “We moved to Oregon for a couple of years. I was still working remotely with Disney. I hit that wall of unhappiness with what I was doing. We started brainstorming on things we could do with our lives that would bring us more fulfillment, more joy.”
One day, they were hiking Mount Rainier in Washington.
“We saw the peak of Mount Rainier with the sunrise coming up above it,” he recalled. “We had an epiphany. We wanted an occupation in a beautiful location that would provide an experience for people.”
‘Vision quest’
McMaster had majored in business and hospitality at Arizona State University. Skidmore grew up in Napa Valley in California and as a teen had worked in hospitality job.
They went on a “vision quest” of sorts, first checking out lodgings in the Pacific Northwest. By 2021, they had connected with Viens and continued looking in both the Southeast and the Northwest.
Eventually, they decided to look at bed-and-breakfasts in the Northeast, including Pennsylvania and Maine, where they arrived in January.
“We had that Arctic blast with negative 40 degrees in some areas,” said Skidmore. “So we got a taste of what it feels like in the Northeast in the winter.”
Tornado terror
They loved the properties they viewed in the Berkshires in Western Massachusetts and in Bucks County, Pa. But arriving in Maine, they decided that Wolf Cove Inn checked off all the boxes.
They returned to California, submitted an offer and found themselves in a bidding situation.
“We ultimately came out on top,” he said.
The deal done, they drove back East — which proved to be its own adventure.
“We ran into tornado warnings in Kansas,” he said. “We were driving through the strongest torrential downpour I’ve ever experienced. I could barely see through the window. Thunder and lightning every few seconds. The dogs in the back seat were freaking out. We were hydroplaning. I was gripping the wheel for dear life. My phone was plugged into the sound system and blasted alerts, while all this was happening, to find shelter.”
But in the flat terrain, they couldn’t find a place to shelter. So they just drove right through.
He added with a laugh, “After that, we watched 'Twister,' with the phone propped up on our dashboard.”
The last stop before hitting Maine was the Captain’s House in Chatham, where it all started for Nicole.
Health and wellness
Arriving at Wolf Cove Inn, the couple hit the ground running in early June.
“The staff has been incredibly warm and welcoming,” he said. “We’ve got so many fun ideas we want to do with this inn. And there’s on-site innkeeper who already lives here.”
That includes maintaining the inn’s appeal, which is marketed as a “romantic getaway,” but also adding health and wellness elements with local business partners to promote their products and services, with a goal of drawing more customers during the off-season.
“Nicole and are I are both health and wellness fans,” Skidmore said. “We ‘d like to enhance the guest experience and create year-round appeal with those added amenities.”
The purchase was financed through the U.S. Small Business Administration 504 program, which provides loans advantageous to borrowers for certain commercial purposes in combination with a regular bank loan. The buyers worked with Katahdin Trust Co. and with Paul Collins at Granite State Development Corp. in Portland. Granite State is a certified development company, a nonprofit that administers the 504 program on behalf of the SBA.
Wolf Cove Inn has been year-round and the buyers will maintain that.
“Business is doing pretty well so far,” said Skidmore. “We’ll be kicking up a lot of the marketing for the fall. It’s a very stable operation.”
He added, “We had a really positive experience with the Forsbergs, transitioning and training with them. We can see why the staff and the community loves them so much.”
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