Saturday, 16 July
Acadia National Park – Schoodic Woods Campground
We left Cedar Haven Campground near Portland, ME, around 10 am. We took the I-95 for half the trip and then the US-1 for most of the rest. We stopped for gas in Pittsfield about halfway. We arrived at Schoodic Woods Campground on the Schoodic Peninsula around 3 pm.
The Schoodic Peninsula is the only part of Acadia National Park found on the mainland and about an hour away from the main park. It is intentionally managed by Acadia National Park as a minimally-developed, low-visitation area.
The campground is the only campground in Acadia National Park, with 41 sites with water and electricity. The sites are large, very spaced apart, level, and provide much privacy.
Gouldsboro area
After we set up the camper, we drove over to Gouldsboro to get some gas because we were very low. While we were there we also got some ice cream from a stand called Me & Bens.
Schoodic Loop
We then drove south on the Schoodic Loop, a 6-mile, one-way loop road around Schoodic Peninsula. The beginning parallels the western shore of the peninsula leading to Schoodic Point. There were automobile turnouts for viewing along the way and many signs prohibiting stopping on the road or parking outside designated pull-offs.
At the southern tip of the loop was a road to Schoodic Point, where we stopped and walked around. The granite headlands bore the erosional scars of storm waves and flood tides.
We then drove up to Schoodic Institute, a former Navy listening station. The Institute and NPS work together to bring researchers, educators, and students to the park to use the park’s diverse ecosystems as classrooms and to conduct field research. We stopped and went inside the Welcome Center in the historic 1933 Rockefeller Hall. The Center had a few exhibits and a very small gift shop, but mostly, the building itself was the attraction.
We then continued around the loop and stopped at a few other turnouts before returning to the campground.
We got back to the campground around 6:30 pm.
Sunday, 17 July
We took off at 8:35 am and headed east. It was low tide, so as we drove along the coast, we were still astonished by how much the tides affected the coast. We learned later that Maine has two high tides and two low tides daily, with 9-11-foot ranges in the Southern Maine Coast area all the way up to 19-foot ranges in far north towns near Canada.
Bold Coast Byway
We connected with the Bold Coast Byway, which took us through small lobstering towns along the coast. These towns had a mixture of weather-beaten buildings and lovely vacation cottages. The cottages usually had beautiful flower gardens around them. Since it was low tide, lots of exposed shoreline was covered with seagrass, giving off a stench of wet grass. Most tidal creeks were empty or very low, exposing their muddy bottoms.
Wild Blueberry Land
Our first stop was Wild Blueberry Land. Google showed that the place was temporarily closed, but their website said they were open. Their Facebook has not been updated since 2018. We saw a sign saying they were open when we arrived, but the front door was locked. We did enjoy the fun blueberry-inspired photo ops outside the store, though most were pretty weather-worn, and their mini-golf course looked abandoned and dangerous.
Rogue Bluff Park
We headed off the byway a bit and drove toward Rogue Bluff Park because the name sounded intriguing. The park was a very small beach area with some small grass-covered sand bluffs. On our way to and from the beach, we saw some wide tidal creeks with muddy banks, more stacks of lobster traps everywhere, and many boats in the harbor. Out in the ocean, we could see numerous tree-covered islands and hundreds of lobster trap buoys bobbing in the water.
We had to backtrack to continue on the byway.
We continued driving down the Bold Coast Byway.
Bad Little Falls Park
We stopped briefly in Machias at Bad Little Falls Park, where there were some small waterfalls. It was a relatively small park, but they had a little walking bridge that gave us a good view of the falls.
Fort Machias O’Brien
A couple of miles down the road was Fort Machias O’Brien Historic Site. The site preserves the remains of a fort built and destroyed three times over 90 years ago. It was also involved in military actions during the American Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. The first American naval battle was fought near there on June 11–12, 1775, in which a small Royal Navy ship was captured by the colonists led by Jeremiah O’Brien, for whom the fort is named. It was captured and destroyed by the British in 1777 and 1814. Now, all that remains is a built-up beam.
Machiasport
Reversing Falls
We then drove over to Reversing Falls Park near Pembroke, ME, where we could witness the ocean tide’s power.
Dropping or rising an average of 20 feet every 6.4 hours, millions of gallons of water flow into and out of Dennys and Whiting Bays pass through a narrow channel between Mahar Point and Falls Island. A large ledge impedes the current in this channel, creating falls, deep whirlpools, and high swells. On the outgoing tide, the process occurs in the reverse direction, hence the reversing falls. A 12-foot drop between the two ends of the falls occurs at mid-tide.
We sat on a hill overlooking the falls near a small cemetery plot with only a few graves and ate lunch.
Afterward, I walked around the shore for a closer look.
Lubec
A heavy fog covered the area when we reached Lubec, the easternmost city in the United States and a gateway into Canada. We parked in a public parking lot and walked through the downtown area. We stopped at the Lubec Brewery, the easternmost brewery in the United States, and had a couple of beers. It looked like a hippie hangout with old couches and chairs scattered around. Even the older bartenders looked like they still might listen to the Grateful Dead. I bought a T-shirt before we left and headed to the nearby park.
The Lost Fisherman’s Memorial Park was near a bridge that went into Canada. It was almost impossible to see into Canada when we first got there. The fog slowly faded,, revealing the Canadian shore and the Mulholland Point Lighthouse on the Canadian side. The large memorial honored the brave souls who lost their lives in the fishing industry off Washington County, Maine, and Charlotte County, New Brunswick, Canada.
On our way back to the truck, we stopped at the remains of the McCurdy Smokehouse. Lubec was once the center of the United States fish-canning and fish-smoking industry. McCurdy Smokehouse, which operated between 1906 and 1991, was the last herring processing facility in the United States. Now it is a museum. It was closed when we were there, but it was still interesting to see the collection of buildings standing on tall logs piling out in the swift tidal currents of the Lubec Narrows.
West Quoddy Head Light Station
It was still very foggy as we headed out to West Quoddy Light Station and the westernmost point in the United States.
It was a little eerie when we arrived at the lighthouse in the heavy fog. The light station included the tower, former keeper’s quarters, service building, and oil house. The beautiful tower was built in 1858 and is still in use. It is 49 feet tall and painted with alternating horizontal red and white stripes. The keeper’s house is a wood-frame structure, 11⁄2 stories in height.
There was a monument on the grounds that declared itself the easternmost point (though the easternmost point was technically the rocks extending eastward from the shore.) It was still a great photo op.
Afterward, we drove directly back to the campground and arrived around 6:15 pm.
Monday, 18 July
Bar Harbor Ferry
Today, we took the Winter Harbor to Bar Harbor Ferry and to Mount Desert Island to see the other half of Acadia National Park. It would have taken about 70 minutes to drive to the island, so we took a ferry across the Mount Desert Narrows instead. I had also read that the traffic and parking were terrible in the park, so we booked a tour, hoping that it would allow us to enjoy the sights in the park more.
We left the campsite at 9 am to catch the Bar Harbor Ferry in Winter Harbor at 9:30 am. The terminal was only 15 minutes away from the campground. When we boarded the boat, we chose to sit outside in the rear.
The Narrows were foggy, especially at the beginning of the trip, making it very difficult to see much. The ferry trip was only supposed to take 45 minutes, but because the boat pilot had to drive slowly through the fog, we barely arrived to catch the tour bus at 11 am.
Acadia National Park Tours
I booked the Premium Tour, which was 3.5 to 4 hours in duration, on a nice Berkshire Coach. The tour covered 27-mile Park Loop Road, with 4 stops within Acadia National Park: Cadillac Mountain, Sieur De Mont, Thunder Hole, and The Jordan Pond House.
Summit Drive and Cadillac Mountain
Our first stop was Cadillac Mountain. Cadillac Mountain is probably the most popular destination for visitors to Acadia National Park. It is the highest point on the eastern seaboard of the U.S. and offers magnificent panoramic views of the park. Parking can get so congested that you must buy a ticket for a specific time slot before driving the three-mile winding Summit Drive to the top.
Our guide gave us an overview of the summit and then released us to walk around on our own for around 20 minutes. We saw a lot of exposed granite with deep gouges that seemed to follow north-south directions. There were boardwalks and sidewalk trails, but we could walk directly on the granite as long as we did not step on any vegetation. Walking around the rocky surface and seeing the incredible views below was fun. We could see a lot of fog still hanging around the islands.
Sieur De Mont
Our next stop was Sieur De Mont. Sieur de Monts area includes Sieur de Monts Spring and Spring House, Nature Center, Wild Gardens of Acadia, and the Abbe Museum, which was closed.
We spent time walking around the garden with hundreds of plants indigenous to Mount Desert Island. They are labeled and grouped by habitat for educational purposes. The Bar Harbor Garden Club manages the garden, not the Park Service. The beautiful spring flowed through the garden, and the wooden bridges added to the picturesque setting.
The Nature Center was small and mostly an information center staffed by Rangers, though it did have a few displays about research currently underway by park scientists. They also had a board listing the current wild animal sightings.
Thunder Hole
The coach continued the loop to our next stop near Thunder Hole. The road was packed with cars parked on either side of the road for miles.
Thunder Hole is a small sea cave that creates a thunderous sound when the waves trap air. Our guide told us that actually hearing the roar is rare, and most of the time, you just hear a gurgle or some sloshing. It is also believed that it can be heard during an incoming high tide, but it depends on the waves.
We walked down the steps through the crowds to get a better look at the sea cave and to see if we could hear the roar, but all we heard was the gurgling sound.
The shoreline was exposed granite, and we did enjoy watching the waves crash against them.
Jordan Pond
As we continued south, we began to see a lot of fog.
As we continued on the loop and got closer to Jordan’s Pond, we saw a carriage going over one of the carriage bridges in the park. John D. Rockefeller Jr. endowed the park with much of its land area. Like many rusticators, Rockefeller, whose family fortune was derived from the petroleum industry, wanted to keep the island automobile-free. Still, local governments allowed automobiles to enter the island’s roads. So Rockefeller constructed about 50 miles of carriage roads with stone bridges around the island’s eastern half between 1913 and 1940 and closed their automobiles. About 40 miles of these roads are within Acadia National Park and are still closed to cars.
Our coach stopped at The Jordan Pond House, a restaurant serving visitors since 1896 and most famous for its popovers and high tea. Though a fire burned the original Jordan Pond House in 1979, the tradition of tea and popovers continues. We did not have time to get a table at the restaurant, but we walked down to Jordan Pond and then sat at a raised patio area with a snack bar overlooking the outdoor eating area.
Bar Harbor
The coach finished the loop and took us back to Bar Harbor around 2:30 pm.
We then walked downtown and stopped at Geddy’s Bar for a beer and lunch. It was decorated with fun signs, and the place was not crowded since we were between meals.
We then walked around and stopped at various tourist shops, looking at all the fun gifts. After buying some T-shirts, we walked along the shore and relaxed on a bench overlooking the water.
Bar Harbor Ferry
We caught the 5:30 ferry back to Winter Harbor. About halfway back, the weather got even foggier than it was in the morning which caused the ferry to go very slowly. It was foggy back in Winter Harbor. When we docked around 6:30, it started to rain.
We were back at the camper about 15 minutes later.
Tuesday, 19 July
Tidal Falls in Hancock
We left the camper around 9:15 and headed to Tidal Falls Preserve in Hancock which was about 30 minutes away. Tidal Falls Preserve belongs to Frenchman Bay Conservancy.
Like the Reversing Falls, millions of gallons of water flow between Frenchman Bay and the inland Taunton and Hog bays during the tides. This water is constricted by the area’s underwater ledges causing rapids.
Several people dug under the rocks, looking for things left by the tides. Walking around the rocky shore, we saw large snail shells and mussels deposits among the rocks.
Bangor
Our next stop was Bangor to see the giant Paul Bunyan there. Bangor claims to be both the birthplace of the lumber industry and the birthplace of Paul Bunyan. Bunyan’s birth certificate is on display in the City Clerk’s office in City Hall. He was born, according to the official document, on February 12, 1834.
The statue is 31 feet high and weighs 3,700 pounds, not including its double-sided ax and lumberjack’s peavey. Paul Bunyan’s fiberglass-over-metal frame is hurricane-proofed to withstand 110 mph winds. Stephen King bestowed a brief pop culture celebrity on the statue when he brought it to life in his 1986 novel, IT. The statue was unveiled in Bangor on February 12, 1959, Paul’s 125th birthday.
South Lincoln Boat Landing
From Bangor, we drove north on Hwy 2E along the Penobscot River. Around 12:30 we stopped at the South Lincoln Boat Landing for lunch. Though there were picnic tables at the landing, we preferred our camp chairs where we could sit closer to the river.
Mount Katahdin Scenic Overlook
We then continued north to the Mount Katahdin Scenic Overlook. This rest stop is off of I-95 Medway, Maine, where you can look at the highest mountain in Maine, in the distance of Salmon Stream Lake in the foreground. An information sign there talks about the great heritage of Mt. Katahdin.
Katahdin Loop Road
Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument is a U.S. national monument spanning 87,563 acres of mountains and forestland in northern Penobscot County on the eastern border of Maine’s Baxter State Park. In 2016, the land was donated by a foundation to the government and proclaimed a national monument by President Obama. The Katahdin Loop Road is a 17-mile loop through the southern portion of the monument and includes pull-offs with scenic views.
We had to drive rough two-lane roads to get to the loop and then rough roads throughout. Several bridges along the route creaked too much for my comfort when we crossed them.
The vegetation was so thick along the road that we could not see anything. There were one or two viewpoints where we could look into the distance, but most of the time, we just drove 10-15 mph, avoiding potholes. We were hoping to see some wildlife also but came up empty.
Ellsworth
We headed back to the camper along I-95 when we left the Katahdin Loop Road. It was after 7 pm when we arrived in Ellsworth and decided to eat dinner at Governor’s Restaurant and Bakery. This was a Maine restaurant chain similar to Denny’s but with more seafood options on the menu.
Back to the camper around 8:45 pm
Wednesday, 20 July
Today, we left the campsite around 8:30 and headed to Acadia National Park to see some areas we did not get to see on the tour and relook at others.
Park Loop Road
Once we crossed over to Desert Island, we decided to go directly to Jordon Pond Restaurant to see if we could get a table. We arrived around 9:30, but we could not find a parking place.
We instead drove over to the Wild Gardens. While we were there, we bought a pass to Cadillac Mountain. The earliest tickets I could find were for 2:30 pm.
We then decided to drive around the rest of the park loop road. We were able to find a spot near the Thunder Hole alongside an oceanside walking trail called Ocean Path that follows the eastern coastline of Mount Desert Island from Sandy Beach past Thunder Hole and then continues until it reaches Otter Cliff to the south. We walked along the path and out onto the bare granite shoreline, watching the waves crash onto the shoreline.
We continued around Park Loop and then decided to check out the island’s eastern side.
West Side of Desert Island
We exited Park Loop Road south of Jordan’s Pond and followed the roads around the Somes Sound to Bass Harbor Head Light Station. Not all of Mount Desert Island is part of the National Park, so we drove through numerous towns and villages.
When we got to the lighthouse, we parked in the small parking lot and took a paved pathway to the base of the tower which gave a great view of the Bass Harbor and Blue Hill Bay on the southwest corner of Mount Desert Island. The tower was built in 1858 and is 37 feet tall including the lightning rod.
We then continued up the west coast of Desert Island, which had a lot of very nice homes, until it was time to head over to Cadillac Mountain.
Cadillac Mountain
We had to check in at a booth at the bottom of Cadillac Mountain and show the Ranger our ticket before we were allowed to drive up Summit Drive. There were several pull-offs on the way up, and we stopped at most of them. When we got to the top, it was still difficult to get a parking spot because though you do have to buy a ticket for a specific time to drive up to the mountain, there is no restriction on how long you could stay. We saw several groups that looked set up for the day.
We took our time walking around the summit and visiting the gift shop. The views were stunning.
Jordan Pond
It was about 4 pm, so we decided to drive to Jordan Pond and get a table or a popover in their snack bar. Though the parking lot was still busy, we were able to find a parking spot and get on the wait list at the restaurant. We did not have to wait more than 15 minutes before they took us outside to their lawn. We decided to get a popover there and eat dinner since it was such a beautiful spot, even though the weather was very hot and sticky. It was hot enough that we saw the head waiter pulling waiters off duty frequently to ensure they stayed hydrated and rested.
They served us our popovers first, and we were given honey to drizzle on them. As we tried to eat them, we were swarmed by lots of bees which started to ruin the experience. We eventually had to ask the waitress to move us inside, and even though they had the inside closed at the time, she found us a spot that still allowed us to look out over the lawn while we ate our meal.
Sunset at Schoodic Point
After dinner, we returned to the campground but stopped at Schoodic Point to watch the sunset. We instead found a nice pull-off on the Schoodic Loop overlooking the Mount Desert Narrows before we got to the Point, where we set up our chairs and enjoyed the beautiful sunset.
Thursday, 21 July
Left Schoodic Woods Campground around 8:30 am