Saturday 10.11.08
Acadia National Park
If yesterday was our best weather day ever, this one is better. We are going to spend the day in Acadia National Park which takes up a large portion of Mt. Desert (spelled like the hot sandy place, but usually pronounced like pie or cake) Island. In the days when people traveled by ship the big hitters from New York used to sail up to Bar Harbor for the summer to stay at their cottages on the island and race their yachts. Little by little the wealthy property owners started to acquire land around the island and eventually donated the whole thing to the federal government. They in turn made it the first national park in the eastern U.S. John D. Rockefeller Jr. then built 40 miles of carriage roads throughout the park which are wonderfully wooded and dotted with granite block bridges. His only stipulation was that they not be used for motorcars and today they are filled with hikers and bikers.
We start at the visitors center for a 15-minute film on the history and layout of the park. Then we pop the 12 bucks for an audio CD which leads us through a 27 mile route in the park and another 28 miles around the island. Every stop is a painting with harbor views, island views, garden settings, orange-red-yellow hillsides, and ocean vistas all backdropped by bright blue skies and white wispy clouds. Before we left town this morning we stopped at a little deli for lunch to go, and now we found a bench in the woods next to a little creek where John ate his lobster roll and Mary had a tuna sandwich.
One of our last stops in the park was the top of Cadillac Mountain. It is “only” 1530 feet high but is the highest point on the east coast of the country. Since its also one of the most eastern points in the country, there are a lot of folks who like to show up here at dawn to be the first to welcome the new day to America. Looking due east is the south of France, and looking due south is Venezuela. We find two things up here: 1) breathtaking views, and; 2) cell phone service. It is almost a 360 view from up here and we know that none of our pictures will do it justice.
Our out-of-park tour segment takes us along one of the glacial fjords to Northeast Harbor, a real live working fishing village. There are a couple boats unloading totes of lobsters at the docks for our entertainment (maybe not). They each have 5 or 6 totes that each seem to weigh about 50 or more pounds so we calculate 300 pounds of lobster at the “dock rate” of $2.60 for a total of $750. For that they have a couple guys working hard all day and the operating expenses of the boat so nobody is getting rich but it’s a living. With the market the way it is, we are considering all options.
It is late afternoon and we hate to give up on our perfect day so we re-enter the park and stop at Bubbles Pond where we couldn’t find a parking place earlier. This is a beautiful piece of water with peak-color hills on all sides and one of the carriage roads along the shore. We dedicate our last half hour to a walk around the pond just as the sun is dipping below the surrounding hills. Perfect!!
We’re walking to dinner tonight at Jack Russell’s next door to our motel. It is a steak place that specializes in Maple New York Strips and Smoked Ribeyes. They are out of the Maple Strips (someone needs to be fired) so John has the smoked prime rib that is mediocre. Mary is reluctant to give up on the lobster so has one sautéed tonight, and that is mediocre too. A perfect dinner would have been too much for one day. At least it’s an easy walk back to bed.
Acadia National Park
If yesterday was our best weather day ever, this one is better. We are going to spend the day in Acadia National Park which takes up a large portion of Mt. Desert (spelled like the hot sandy place, but usually pronounced like pie or cake) Island. In the days when people traveled by ship the big hitters from New York used to sail up to Bar Harbor for the summer to stay at their cottages on the island and race their yachts. Little by little the wealthy property owners started to acquire land around the island and eventually donated the whole thing to the federal government. They in turn made it the first national park in the eastern U.S. John D. Rockefeller Jr. then built 40 miles of carriage roads throughout the park which are wonderfully wooded and dotted with granite block bridges. His only stipulation was that they not be used for motorcars and today they are filled with hikers and bikers.
We start at the visitors center for a 15-minute film on the history and layout of the park. Then we pop the 12 bucks for an audio CD which leads us through a 27 mile route in the park and another 28 miles around the island. Every stop is a painting with harbor views, island views, garden settings, orange-red-yellow hillsides, and ocean vistas all backdropped by bright blue skies and white wispy clouds. Before we left town this morning we stopped at a little deli for lunch to go, and now we found a bench in the woods next to a little creek where John ate his lobster roll and Mary had a tuna sandwich.
One of our last stops in the park was the top of Cadillac Mountain. It is “only” 1530 feet high but is the highest point on the east coast of the country. Since its also one of the most eastern points in the country, there are a lot of folks who like to show up here at dawn to be the first to welcome the new day to America. Looking due east is the south of France, and looking due south is Venezuela. We find two things up here: 1) breathtaking views, and; 2) cell phone service. It is almost a 360 view from up here and we know that none of our pictures will do it justice.
Our out-of-park tour segment takes us along one of the glacial fjords to Northeast Harbor, a real live working fishing village. There are a couple boats unloading totes of lobsters at the docks for our entertainment (maybe not). They each have 5 or 6 totes that each seem to weigh about 50 or more pounds so we calculate 300 pounds of lobster at the “dock rate” of $2.60 for a total of $750. For that they have a couple guys working hard all day and the operating expenses of the boat so nobody is getting rich but it’s a living. With the market the way it is, we are considering all options.
It is late afternoon and we hate to give up on our perfect day so we re-enter the park and stop at Bubbles Pond where we couldn’t find a parking place earlier. This is a beautiful piece of water with peak-color hills on all sides and one of the carriage roads along the shore. We dedicate our last half hour to a walk around the pond just as the sun is dipping below the surrounding hills. Perfect!!
We’re walking to dinner tonight at Jack Russell’s next door to our motel. It is a steak place that specializes in Maple New York Strips and Smoked Ribeyes. They are out of the Maple Strips (someone needs to be fired) so John has the smoked prime rib that is mediocre. Mary is reluctant to give up on the lobster so has one sautéed tonight, and that is mediocre too. A perfect dinner would have been too much for one day. At least it’s an easy walk back to bed.
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