Acadia, Maine - Paul S

Aug 3

General tips:

If you want good parking, get to the trails pre 8am. You’ll have no trouble finding parking. But if you get there post 9am good luck, because I saw cars lined up for miles.
The seafood is tremendous. You got to have lobster while you’re there.

Acadia is quite a small park compared to other national parks so don’t expect a lot of long hardcore hikes. It’s much more geared to families and less serious hikers,
The Precipice trail is closed in the summer due to falcon nesting. If that’s a must do hike for you then you’ll have to do it in shoulder season,
The Beehive trail is quite nice even though it’s not as intense as the precipice trail.

I would highly highly recommend getting to the trail pre 7:30 am for good parking and to have less people on trail. We got there at 7am which was a great start, we parked right next to the trail head and got up the trail without much trouble.

I would not recommend hiking the trail later than 9am because you’ll literally be stuck in line waiting to go because there’s so many people doing it. It literally didn’t look fun when we saw it from afar,

I would recommend combining the Beehive trail with the Champlain ridge trail because you get great views along the ridgeline.
Going up to Champlain mountain there’s wild blueberry bushes in the summer that are safe to eat and are tremendous. Get foraging,
Sand beach is a quite nice beach. Too cold for swimming but if you bring swim trunks you can definitely jump in to cool off,
Jordan Pond is a super easy trail and has got some nice views of the lake and the mountains. The water is super clear so it makes it quite easy to see small fishes and other things in the water,
I’m not making any recommendations here but… if you have a sports car, some of the winding roads early in the morning are fun to drive on. That’s all I’ll say about that…
The drive to the west side of Acadia is nice. Southwest Harbor is a nice small town with some good shops and restaurants,
Bass Harbor Head Light Station is a nice stop by if you’re already in Southwest Harbor. Don’t forget to go on the trail down onto the rocks and do a little exploration if you’re the adventurous type.

If you have kids you’re going to love this town. It’s like the perfect touristy trapy town where you feel super inclined to buy souvenirs and honestly some of the stuff is pretty nice
There’s some nice restaurants in Bar Harbor. The Barnacle has great oysters and Leary's Landing Irish Pub has sensational fish and chips. I literally had it twice because it was so good.
Because there’s a lot of wild blueberries in Acadia there’s a lot of wild blueberry items being sold in the various stores. The wild blueberry soft serve in CJ's Big Dipper was excellent.
The Bar Island Land Bridge was alright. Not a ton to do if you don’t feel like wading in the water.
The Bar Harbor Nature Cruise was a lot better than we expected https://www.barharborwhales.com/nature-cruises/bar-harbor-nature-cruise/. We really enjoyed it and saw a lot of cool things. Pro tip, right on the right side of the boat for better views. At like 2 hours it’s a good thing to do if you’re feeling lazy

They also do 5 hour whale watching and puffin tours if you want to dedicate an entire day to it

Atlantic Brewing Midtown has good beer and good food. Would recommend
If you’re going in peak season be prepared to spend a lot of money on lodging. It’s not cheap to stay in Bar Harbor, but the closeness to everything and the amenities of the town I think make it worth it

Hawaii - Paul S