I use the South Portland Community Center primarily for its pool. It's $3 for South Portland…read moreresidents, or you can buy a punchcard for 50 visits that lowers the cost-per-visit to $2.50. Not a bad deal! The people are friendly, the locker rooms are spacious and clean, and the pool is perfectly-heated. It's a great temperature for lap swimming or just playing around. In addition to the pool, there are basketball courts and an indoor track. The South Portland Community Center is a great local resource, and I'm very glad I've started taking advantage of it. If you live in the area, I suggest you do too! Just don't everybody come at once, because the pool can get pretty crowded during lap swim.

Great for open hours of youth basketball - organized chaos. And the pool is fun as well. And nice…read morethat it's open to non-SoPo residents.

The St. Lawrence Arts center is "historic," which is the general term used for very old and grungy…read more While this could be a negative, the experience is saved by one phenomenal, rare feature: drinking is encouraged from your seat. But from the beginning...St. Lawrence was originally a church founded in 1897 on the site of a former ice rink, in the heart of Munjoy Hill. The Front Room is across the street for easy pre-show food/beverages. In 2001, the non profit group Friends of the St. Lawrence re-opened the property as a 110 seat theater. I attended the Nutcracker Burlesque. Mistakenly thinking I was going to a strip club, I downed two strong Manhattan's before. After entering, you immediately encounter the bar, with many affordable options for wine and beer. Unlike Merrill Auditorium or any local theater I've been to, you can bring the drinks to your seat. And I think literally everyone did. I haven't seen such a tipsy, hooting and hollering crowd since Rock of Ages on Broadway. It's a smaller theater and not exceptionally nice, but the lights and sound were great, and you just know the people running it are passionate. There are no assigned seats, so you risk being in proximity to Falmouth soccer moms who won't slide over one seat to make room. Still, there's something charming about this quaint theater, with none of the stuffiness of Merrill. I'll be back.

I love this little Portland venue. I have seen numerous local plays there. Some of the shows have…read morebeen great, some have been.. not so great... BUT, the venue is awesome. It's VERY small. Maybe 200+ seats. You can hear and see from every seat. If you are super excited about seeing an act that is coming there, I strongly recommend getting tickets. Make sure you get there early, as most shows are seat yo self. They have a bar with wine, beer, and snacks. There are also 5 or 6 restaurants in the vicinity that are great for pre-show tapas or appetizers. There is no parking lot, so it's on street parking in the super popular "East End". Give yourself a lot of time for driving around and scoping out a spot.

Great place to learn tennis, racquetball, squash and golf. Top notch teaching staffread more

Just adding a note that Stephen and his staff are very generous and their support for the Rowe…read moreSchool in Portland is greatly appreciated.

Danville Community Center was previously known as the Danville Fire Association Hall until the Town…read morepurchased it in 2011. They made a lot of improvements to it (new secure entry doors, upgraded/updated kitchen and washrooms, etc.). They kept the rustic knotty pine panelling. Not my thing, but it warms up what would otherwise be a sterile commercial building. It's the polling place for all municipal, state and federal voting events, used by several town organizations (some committees, youth sports leagues, senior luncheons, I think guides and scouts, etc.). Town earns some revenue by renting it out for private functions. And blood drives are held here. Used to be just once a year around Christmas, but now I think Red Cross comes three times. Residents of Danville seem to be getting a good deal of use from the Community Center. Dare I say money well spent? ;)

Dunaway Community Center is the venue where we saw a concert featuring Paul Sullivan and Con…read moreFullam. It was the first concert of the 29th Annual Capriccio Music Festival presented by Ogunquit Performing Arts. We had seen Paul Sullivan in concert in Damariscotta, Maine 25 or 30 years ago and enjoyed the concert so much we bought all 5 CDs he had out at the time. When I learned from his email a few months ago that he would be performing tonight Alan and I discussed rearranging our itinerary slightly so we could see him. The center was built in1974 w/ $250,000 given by philanthropist Sanford Judson Dunaway. It looks as if it houses civic offices as well as the performances space. Architecturally it looks mid-century New England. Parking lots are on the side and in the back. A walkway leads from the back parking lot to the front entrance of the community center. There are basketball courts next door which were closed from 6 PM to 11 PM tonight, probably because of the concert. The auditorium is large, w/ a stage in front. Comfortably padded blue chairs had been set up in rows w/ aisles separating the center section from two side sections. There are a couple of bathrooms on the main level, one all gender, the other marked 'staff only' which means people unfamiliar w/ the facility wouldn't know they could use it--or even that it was a bathroom--unless they were told. It would be good if temporary signs were posted at future events alerting people to this. The concert piano was a 122 year old Steinway which had been rescued and restored by Betty Dunaway Burnham, a local pianist and Judson Dunaway's daughter, who was chair of the board of Ogunquit Performing Arts and two master piano tuners she engaged, Frank Hanson and Vincent D'Errico. The piano tuners bought the abused piano from a piano dealer and restored it to life. Once their work was done they sold the piano to OPA at cost, donating their labor to restore it, w/ the agreement that they would maintain it, again donating their labor. The only caveats were that the piano could be used only for OPA performances and that they would maintain it. The piano is a 7'9" Concert Model C w/ an ebony finish. It looks and sounds magnificent and OPA is justifiably proud of it.