Camping in Acadia

Vidhi and I have always wanted to go to Acadia national park. A couple of times, we headed out with that intention, but got side tracked by other places in Maine. This July, we committed ourselves and headed out on a Acadia camping adventure with the kids.  And… boy did we have a good time.

We were extremely fortunate to have perfect (almost) weather (can’t be said the same about the rest of the rest of the summer).  We camped for 5 days and 4 nights. The days were hot and the nights freezing.

Well, what did we do? Here’s the list in chronological order:

• Camping –  … already mentioned that.  The kids enjoyed sleeping in the tents.  The nights were cold but we were prepared for that.
• Biking – We took our bikes along with us.  We rode them out to the nearest harbor.  We were exhausted as our bikes were not in good shape.  I would have preferred to rent them there or get new bikes.  I’ll remember for the next time.
• Beach – Enjoyed the beach at the echo lake.  Vidhi and the kids did anyway.  I was in the mood for hiking and I headed out to climb the steep Beech mountain.
• Driving – We drove most of the time on the Mount Desert island.  It was not crowded as it usually is at this time of the year. We found parking easily.  We drove the whole island for the next couple of days.  Highlights of some of the stops are:
  • The Thunder hole – walked down to the Thunder hole.  Aakash and I were a bit adventurous and got off the trail and climbed down to the water.
  • The Otter Cliffs – These are spectacular cliffs.  The contrasting color of the pink granite against the aqua green and the deep blue of the water is a sight to see.  Pictures are great but they don’t do justice to them.
  • Cadillac Mountain – The Cadillac mountain was easy to get to.  And the views are great.  You can see Bar Harbor, Cranberry islands and the ocean.
• Whale watching in the Gulf of Maine – The fog was everywhere the first day, so we postponed this.  We took a gamble and rode this particular day.  As we got away from the coast the fog cleared up and the ocean was clear and calm.  The catamaran was fast.  The salty spray drenched Aakash, but that didn’t spoil his mood.  It took us a few hours but then fortune hit us.  We saw six large finbacks, several minkis, and four humpback whales.
• Bar Harbor – Great downtown with good shopping and great dining.  We had a lunch on the patio of a good restaurant.  The kids had their usual chicken fingers and hot dogs.  I had my first crab roll.  Good, but different than what I was expecting.  Vidhi had a beet salad.  She raves it as the best salad she has ever had.  Her mouth waters every time we talk about it.
• Hiking – We did a 2 mile hike up and about Flying mountain.  I showed the kids how to spot the trail markers and let them loose to scout ahead.  They did a wonderful job.  They were careful and made sure Vidhi and I were not far behind.  They were tired but they persisted to complete the trail.
• Walked the Carriage roads – These carriage roads are a great fun for walking and biking.  But I was on the mission to photograph some bridges.  I should have done some better research.  I later found out that they were only four bridges and we had already driven on them several times in the past few days.  I (thankfully alone) walked for 3 hours without seeing one bridge.  And things started getting worse… It started raining.  I made it back to the camp and we started packing as it was time to head back home.

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