Thursday 29th June – Acadia National Park

With only one full day to enjoy the Park I got us moving in the morning to catch the 1014am bus.  The journey made us incredibly relieved that we had left the RV behind – there were roadworks most of the way towards the Visitor Centre meaning a very slim single lane on the equivalent of unmade roads.  The bus we were in sounded like it wasn’t going to make it!

But thankfully it did and we reached the VC and changed onto the number 4 ‘Loop Road’ bus around the eastern part of the island. It was a very hot, sunny day.  We’d made some decisions about where we wanted to get off and investigate - first stop, Thunder Hole but we’d timed it completely wrong. 

This is what it was meant to look like:

But this is what it looks like on a calm day when the tide is out.....

 
This is a rocky inlet famous for the sounds produced when the waves crash into the gap in the rocks.  The best sounds are at high tide.  We managed to visit at low tide and so it was underwhelming to say the least. But the views were nice.

We queued and got back on what was now a very busy bus to Jordan Pond, which was more lake-sized if you ask me.

Above and below - Jordan pond with 'the bubbles' at the far end.  Glad to see they didn't go for the more obvious name...

 

After a brief wander around we changed bus routes which took us to north east harbour (right).  As an unexpected bonus there was an exhibition of Antique cars by the quay.  It made the small town look like something out of the wacky races!

There were much fewer tourists around here so we took the opportunity to re-fuel at a lovely restaurant overlooking the marina.  What started out as stopping for a quick lunch-time snack ended up with us tackling the largest plate of nachos you have ever seen! 

View from the restaurant

The steep, rocky trail up Cadillac Mountain

I had been keen to do a hike (no surprises there then) but it was now after 3pm as we headed back across the island past Jordan pond.  The most prestigious hike would be to climb the tallest mountain on the island – Cadillac Mountain.  The bumph informed us that the north ridge would be the easiest of the four routes up the mountain apparently, so off we went. It took us 1.5 hours to reach the summit. The annoying thing was the amount of people who had cheated by driving up – where’s the sense of achievement in that?! Simon was not impressed.  But driving wasn’t an option for us with no car and the buses don’t go up to the peak!   We stopped for a drink and an energy bar to take in the 360° views before heading back down again.

Proof we made it.... and below:

Most importantly we had to get down to a bus stop before the last bus left for the village green at Bar Harbor! We chose to take the trail down the west side of the mountain.  Yes, it was shorter, but also much steeper and rockier (below).  It probably took just as long as the other way would’ve but at about 1 mile shorter it was exciting and surely it was better to see a fresh route?! Si was not convinced….

In a race against time, we needed to get back down to Bubble pond below us.... lucky it was steep then.

Bubble pond

When we finally reached the bottom of what felt like a cliff-face we took some photos of bubble pond before running to catch the number 5 bus into village green for a well-deserved dinner.

The Lobster roll photo

It was time for US sandwich number 9 - the lobster roll. I had been looking forward to this for a long time.  A chance to have a seafood sandwich rather than another meat-based one.  I gave it 7.5 out of 10, so, it didn’t set my world alight!  It was tasty but the flavour of the lobster was not as strong as I was hoping for.  Simon tucked into a pizza and we both enjoyed a local brew.  The plan had been to explore the vibrant town some more after dinner but we were both feeling too stiff to be able to move very far after our earlier exertions!

 


It had been a very full and energetic day (as evidenced by my Fitbit, right), so we jumped on the 830pm bus back to the site and walked down to the RV just in time for sunset.