Tales & Trails of a Traveling Wiseguy

Maine Week Travelog #11
Acadia National Park - Thursday, 17 Jun 2021, 9am.

As I wrote last night we decided not to get up at 3:30am to visit the summit of Cadillac Mountain at dawn. Instead we reserved a pass for 8am. We set our alarms for 6:30am, woke up somewhat begrudgingly, pulled together our hiking bags for a day of adventure (this plus later hikes), and left by 7:30. We arrived at the access road to the summit at 7:45, a bit early for our 8am ticket, but that was okay with the ranger guarding the road. We headed on up to the summit at 1,529'.



The remainder of the drive took awhile so we weren't at the top until nearly 8:15am— nearly 3½ hours after sunrise! There were still 360° views, though. Including this view (above) across the Gulf of Maine to the Atlantic Ocean.

Turning slightly inland I also liked this view of islands near Bar Harbor:



The chain of four small islands stretching left to right are Bar Island, Sheep Porcupine Island, Burnt Porcupine Island, and Long Porcupine Island. The one with the quay near it is Bald Porcupine Island. Yes, someone coming up with names here a few centuries ago apparently had a porcupine obsession.

Putting the "Bar" in Bar Harbor!

While I can only speculate about why so many of the islands remind(ed) someone of porcupines, there's actually an obvious source of the name for Bar Island— and thus Bar Harbor and the town named for it.



Bar Harbor is the town on the coast in the mid-ground of the pic above. Bar Island is at the center-left, just beyond it. Note that brownish strip on the left side of the island connecting it to the mainland. That is actually a bar— kind of like a sand bar, though made of rock not  sand— connecting the island to the mainland. It is exposed at low tide and can be crossed on foot. Thus the "bar" in Bar Harbor! Now all we have to figure out is why Mainers call it Bah Habbah.

Maine Week Travelog #10
Acadia National Park - Wednesday, 16 Jun 2021, 10pm.

On many lists of things to do at Acadia National Park you'll find "Watch the sunrise atop Cadillac Mountain." Cadillac, the park's tallest mountain, is said to be where the sun first rises on the United States. Watching sunrises there is so popular the Park Service has instituted a reservations system for trips to the Cadillac summit, with tickets for sunrise often selling out within minutes of availability. But we're not going to do it. Why? Because sunrise is at 4:48am!

Instead we've bought tickets to go at 8am tomorrow. That means we only have to wake up at 6:45 or so, instead of setting our alarms for 3:45am or even 3:30 to wake up, dress, pack, and drive up there.

Latitude and Longitude

Does the sun actually rise first at Cadillac Mountain? Well, Maine is clearly the farthest east of the 50 states. Bar Harbor, at 68.2° W longitude, isn't the farthest east part of Maine, but the claim rests on the fact that Cadillac Mountain's 1,529' elevation means the sun strikes it before lower lying land that is further east.

Note I've said, "farthest east of the 50 states". The US territorial possession of Puerto Rico is farther east. San Juan, PR is at 66.1° W.

There's also the matter of when during the year. Bar Harbor, ME is at 44.4° N latitude. In the summertime, when days are longer further north, dawn arrives earlier than at places further south. But in the winter, the north's days are shorter than the south's. That's where it's important to understand how far east Maine is relative to other east-coast states. The Atlantic seaboard of the US is often conceptualized as running north/south. That's inaccurate. In fact it runs northeast/southwest. For example, Miami, Florida, is at 25.8° N, 80.2° W compared to Bar Harbor's 44.4° N, 68.2° W.

BTW, another conceptual inaccuracy about the geography of the US is that states in the northeast are far north. They are not. Bar Harbor's latitude of 44.4° N is south of Portland, OR (45.5° N) and the entire state of Washington. In terms of other counties, the entire UK is north of Maine.

Maine Week Travelog #8
Acadia National Park - Wednesday, 16 Jun 2021, 12:30pm.

Having paid with sweat and sore muscles to climb the Beehive (see previous blog) I wasn't going to leave right away. Hawk and I explored the summit and its 360° views from all angles.



It was also a good time to enjoy a light lunch that we'd brought in our packs.



(Lunch not pictured. Just the views.)

Climbing the Beehive was an epic hike. The thing is, it's a short hike. Epic, but short. Going up the front and down the back, looping back to the trail head, is less than 1.5 miles. Fortunately the Beehive is not an isolated point of interest. Nearby it are other mountains, connected by a network of trails. I planned to loop up and over neighboring Gorham Mountain and return along the coastal cliffs, bringing the trek to over 3.5 miles.

"We should also hike The Bowl," Hawk added. "It's right there."



"The Bowl" is another of the goofily named places in Acadia National Park. It's a natural lake that does not look at all like a bowl. (It's not even close to round.) But it's pretty and it's so close that it seems like no extra effort to visit that we headed down toward it.



The Bowl was pretty. It reminds me of Alpine lakes in the Sierra Nevada. And it added only 1/2 mile of walking with less than 100' of extra ascent.

To be continued....

Maine Week Travelog #6
Acadia National Park - Tuesday, 15 Jun 2021, 7pm.

Whoever named things in Acadia National Park had a weak way with words. They used up all the obvious name words like "Sand Beach" for a beach with, well, sand. When it came time to name a pair of knobby hills in the middle of the park all they could think of was Bubbles. So this afternoon we hiked first to South Bubble then North Bubble.



Atop South Bubble is this interesting balanced rock. It is named— wait for it— Bubble Rock. While Hawk and I were content to admire it from various angles, every kid under the age of 20 who was up there with us— and not a few of their parents— immediately took it upon themselves to try to push Bubble Rock off the cliff. It'll be a shame when one of those knuckle-draggers succeeds.



Also at the top of South Bubble is an awesome view south across Jordan Lake and to the Atlantic Ocean beyond. It's hard to see much of the ocean, though, because of the fog layer remaining this afternoon.

Most hiking guides suggest following a loop trail down to the edge of Jordan Lake from this summit and then coming back around toward the parking lot. South Bubble's taller sibling, North Bubble, is given no love. We decided we'd rather visit both bubbles than see a lake up close in the gloom.



The trail to North Bubble is steep. The South Bubble trail was by no means flat, but getting up to North Bubble requires ascending several staircases of natural stone and following blazes across slickrock. That's familiar terrain for us, though. Bare granite trails are all over the pace in the Sierra Nevada range, and we love them.



Views from the top of North Bubble are occluded by trees— perhaps that's why hiking guides give it short shrift— so I've included this photo of Jordan Lake and South Bubble (left edge) from near the top of North Bubble. If it were at the top, South Bubble would seem shorter.

After climbing both bubbles we returned down the trail to our car. Sunset isn't technically for another hour or so, but with the fog layer in the sky it's twilight already. We'll head back into town after this for supper.

Maine Week Travelog #3
Acadia National Park - Monday, 14 Jun 2021, 6pm.

I presume it was the same, very unoriginal people who named a big meadow "Big Meadow" (see previous blog) that named our next stop along the park loop Sand Beach. It's a... beach... with sand.

We stopped unsure of how long of a trek it would be down to the beach. After all, weren't we up in the mountains? Ah, these coastal Maine mountains are not very big. The beach was only about 30 stair steps down from the parking lot. 😅



While this beach certainly lives up to its name (it's a beach with sand) it doesn't live up to what a lot of people expect from a beach. The weather's cool this afternoon, barely 60F (about 15° C), the water is frigid, and signs warn that strong currents will pull you away from shore if you go in the water. So, it's not a place to swim or sun yourself. But it is nice for photography while keeping one's clothes on... which is all I wanted to do.



We walked the width of the pocket beach. On the far side was an inlet to a pond.



Beyond the pond is The Beehive, a mountain we plan to climb while we're here this week. The views are supposed to be great, and the strenuous trail with rocky stair steps and iron rungs sunken into the stone make it seem exciting.

Speaking of exciting, there's a rocky staircase up & out the far side of the beach....



From down on the beach we could see people high up on the cliff above us. We wondered how they got there. Well, this trail looks like how. Time to go exploring!

Maine Week Travelog #1
Bar Harbor, ME - Monday, 14 Jun 2021, 4pm.

We kicked off our week in Maine today when we landed at Bangor airport (BGR). It's a small airport; apparently it has only 4 gates. It's not the smallest we've been to, though. That would be Chadron, NE (CDR), the one-room schoolhouse of airports. Small is good in this case as we got through the airport quickly. With our flight landing just before its scheduled time of 1:45pm, we were walking out the door with checked luggage and rental car keys in hand by 1:58pm.

Our flight up from New York City? I slept through most of it. Yay, first class seats with adequate leg, hip, and elbow room. Even if nowhere near as luxurious as on Friday's trans-con.

Try our Delicious 2nd Amendment Special!

Once out of the airport we started rolling toward Bar Harbor, or "Bah Habbah" as local Mainers pronounce it. We looked for lunch along the way, as first class tickets on today's flight only came with a cookie and a small can of soda, but the choices were slim. The city of Bangor ("Banguh") really puts the small in small town. We barely saw any restaurants, and most of them were of the "Mel's Hardware, Bait, and Sandwiches" variety. Oh, but there were plenty of guns. In the first 10 miles of our drive we passed by 4 gun stores, 1 proper restaurant (it was a Subway, so maybe not even proper), 1 fireworks store, and 1 church.

As we got closer down to the coast of ratio of guns:restaurants (and also guns:churches) improved. Still the restaurant situation wasn't good. We ate a late lunch at a gas station deli and then headed on to Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park.

Getting Oriented at Acadia

We made a quick stop at the park visitors center before checking in to our hotel. The center closes at 4:30, and we didn't want to risk missing it.

Like many parks seem to be doing post-Covid, the rangers here moved the information desk to an outdoors location where people can space out better and reduce risk by avoiding indoors spaces. It's good they did because the park is crowded right now! Especially for a weekday afternoon it seems busy. I'm glad we're here midweek and not on a weekend.

At the visitors center we bought a topographical map for hiking and got lots of suggestions from the rangers about trails to visit. Unfortunately one of the trails near the top of our list is closed right now due to nesting peregrine falcons. Dang hawks!

After gathering maps and info at the park office we headed down into town for our hotel. Well, not quite into town. The Holiday Inn we're staying at is a mile or two away from downtown Bar Harbor. It's on nice, spacious grounds with lawns and trees. We'll see how preferable that is to being in the center of the action in town.