Category Archives: Nature

Acadia National Park

The entire Maine coast is beautiful. The sandy beaches, lighthouses on offshore islands, the rocky coast, and pine forests growing nearly to the water’s edge make for a picturesque landscape at nearly every point. Acadia National Park is just a little more beautiful than nearly every spot I’ve visited on the coast. The mountains are more dramatic, and the islands more numerous. When I worked on an island 20 miles off shore, the mountains of Acadia were more dramatic than anywhere else I could view from my bird blind. There are other spots along the coast that I love, and might even visit before I chose Acadia. But nothing is more spectacular.

Sunrise on Cadillac
Sunrise on Cadillac

We had a long weekend coming up and we had a goal of hiking. Since our daughter had never been to Acadia in the summertime, we decided that was our destination. But with so many hikes, we had trouble deciding on which ones to do. We checked out Joe’s Guide to Acadia and decided to only go on the hikes that Joe determined were “Classic Acadia.” We poured over our trail map, and decided upon a nice loop – St Sauveur and Acadia Mountain, with a possible Flying Mountain extension. Sunrise and Sunset on Cadillac Mountain were also essentials on our list.

We spent the first day of our weekend further Downeast near Jonesport at Great Wass Island, and rolled into Acadia in the early evening. I had booked a campsite at the Mount Desert Campground, and was really surprised by how great this place was. I am always wary of campgrounds. There is always someone with a boom box or a giant RV with electric lights next to your tent. This is not the case at this place. Our campsite at Mount Desert was up the trail from our parking area (not quite hike in, but we had to carry our stuff about 50 feet up a hill). We could only see one other tent from ours and we felt like we had the place to ourselves. We cooked up our burritos over the fire and had a feast before heading to bed, hoping for an early start in the morning.

Gourmet Dinner on the Grill
Gourmet Dinner on the Grill

We started out hike by heading to the St Sauveur summit. We hiked along, and came to the summit marker in the middle of a wooded area. A little anti-climatic to get to a summit and have no views, but we hiked on a little further onto Valley Peak trail and were rewarded with impressive views of the Somes Sound. We kept seeing impressive views all day – the loop we planned went in and out of the forest, so we had a nice mix of terrain.

The View from St Sauvuer
The View from St Sauvuer

When you are hiking over granite, it isn’t as easy to see your impact as it is when hiking on trail where your boots can mess up and trample vegetation and cause erosion. After a while, I began to notice the lack of lichen on the rocks marked the trail. Walking over the granite did have an impact, but not one nearly as obvious. I started using the absence of lichen to find the trail when I couldn’t find the next blaze. It was a great indication of where the trail was, until it wasn’t. After I led us fifty feet down a granite path only to find it dead end into the woods, my daughter recommended I stick with following the blazes.

By this point the day was heating up. I usually pack warm clothes when going to Maine – I have worn a wool sweater throughout June – and was not expecting such oppressive heat. It was over 90 degrees, and when we were on the granite, I was baking. The forested areas offered a little relief.

The best blueberries on Earth!
The best blueberries on Earth!
All day, we were hiking past wild blueberry bushes, laden with green blueberries. If we had gone just a week later, we would have been able to feast on the berries. I always think of Blueberries for Sal when I hike in Downeast Maine. These bushes were so loaded, I could have parked myself and waited for Mother Bear to find me – if they were ripe. And then we hiked a through a small microclimate where the berries were just a little bit further along. So we sat down and ate. I left a couple, but it was hard. Nothing beats a blueberry warmed by the sun. My daughter said she didn’t need to eat another blueberry for the rest of her life – nothing could top those.

Hiking with my daughter reminded me I am no longer young – the hiking was not especially difficult, but took more out of me than I would like to admit. She was generous and didn’t mind too much waiting for me on the uphill scrambles, but I know I slowed her down and she could have probably covered many more miles. I’ll be doing some quad and hamstring exercises in the gym to be ready for next year.

After our hike, we were pretty hot and went for a swim at Echo Lake, not at the main beach area, but near Ike’s Point. There were streams of people headed down the trail, and it seemed like we could get to the water there, instead of getting in the car and driving around to the official beach. This was a good call. Most of the people here seemed local, and looking down the lake, we could see just how crowded the official beach was. The trail led right to the water’s edge, so we didn’t cause a great deal of impact by thrashing through the under brush.

This is a great place to swim. The lake is huge, and there is a sheer wall of rock on the opposite shore. It is a pretty dramatic setting. The water temperature was perfect, but I still inched in, even though I was really suffering in the heat. By the time I got in, my wife and daughter were almost ready to climb out. After swimming a while, I sat on the rock edge and broke out the Edward Abbey. It was a perfect mix of cooling off in the lake, and then getting warmed by the sun. Right before we left, I dunked again to fend off the shimmering heat.

The Bubbles!
The Bubbles!
Capped the day off with a drive to the top of Cadillac Mountain for the sunset. Turned around and did the same thing at 4:00 AM for the sunrise. Both were a little cloudy, but any day you see the sunrise or set is a good day. Sunrise is particularly nice, (although crawling out of the sleeping bag that early is tough). The sun hits the top of Cadillac almost before anywhere else in the United States. It is kind of fun to see it first. After watching the sunrise, we got a great pancake breakfast in Bar Harbor (vegan pancakes!), and then went over to Jordan Pond to get a walk in before the drive back to the city.

With the exception of Cadillac and Jordan Pond, this is all on the “quiet side” of Mount Desert Island. My wife and I had come to Acadia over Memorial Day weekend one year, and had been blown away by how many people were there. We could see people standing in line on one of the iron rung hikes, and the Jordan Pond parking lot looked like Target on Black Friday. I was pleasantly surprised that the quiet side of the island was just that – quiet, with not nearly as many hikers as I had expected.

After a weekend like this, it is always a difficult reentry into daily life. Hitting the alarm clock and heading off to work on Monday morning somehow isn’t as enjoyable as sleeping outside and waking up to the birds. I’ve already started to plan our next trip.

The Pup enjoyed her walk around Jordan Pond - especially the porcupine!
The Pup enjoyed her walk around Jordan Pond – especially the porcupine!