Skip to main content

New England Road Trip Day 3 - Acadia National Park

The ultimate destination of the New England Road Trip was Acadia National Park.  We arrived at Acadia at about 1 pm along with our travel companion for the trip - known as fog.  Though the fog stayed with us for most of our time on Mount Desert Island - the time spend there was awesome.  And it is somewhere I certainly hope to visit again and spend more time.



664

As you can see the fog was with us for most of our time at Acadia.

We weren't able to do the entire loop road or get to Cadillac Mountain.  However, what we did see was some of the signature rugged coastline that Acadia and the Maine Coast is famous for.  The flickr set for the Acadia Loop Road is here.

One of the first stops on the Park Loop road is an overlook of Frenchman Bay.  The Porcupine Islands and the town of Bar Harbor are two of the main features of Frenchman Bay.

Heading into the abyss

Just prior to the park's main entrance station - there is a small offshoot road that leads to a scenic view of Egg Rock and allows you a chance to explore the rocky coastline.

574

576

Sea Gull Profile

You also can share your time with a feather friend or two.

Sand Beach on warm sunny afternoon's is a very popular spot.  It's not as much on a chilly foggy day'; however, the character of this little cove really comes through.

605

608

615

654

From Sand Beach to Otter Point - the opportunities to stop and take photos and explore the coastline are endless.

628

The rocky cliffs of Acadia National Park

Otter Cliff - at 110 feet above the Atlantic Ocean - is one of the most impressive - or frightening - spots in all of Acadia National Park.

660
658

As you can see it's a long way down!

663

668

After Otter Point, the loop road continues to run along the coastline at a more gentle slope.

684

Just beyond the Wildwood Stables, we headed off the loop road and back on to Maine 3 to head Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse which is one of the most popular spots on Mount Desert Island.  Once we got on ME 3, we came across this rather interesting highway shield.

689

Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse is the only lighthouse that is physically located on Mount Desert Island.  It has been in operation since 1858 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.  The lightkeeper's home is the residence of the commander of the local US Coast Guard Unit.

My set of photos from Bass Harbor is located here.


Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse

The best vantage point of the light, cliffs and waters around it is to take any of the trails to the left or the right of the lighthouse.  Be very careful on the cliffs though.  There are not any railing or other pathways on the cliffs.

700

704

711

Fortunately, the fog started to lift as we were there.

719

Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse is also the key feature in a modern version of the classic WPA style posters that Rand Doug Enterprises has made for Acadia National Park.  Now, that I have visited the park I will certainly be buying one to add to my collection.  (I need to blog about that some day).

Acadia and Mount Desert Island was a great visit.  I only wish we had more time to explore more of the park and Bar Harbor.  Cadillac Mountain and biking the numerous carriage roads within the park are still on the to do list.  Hopefully, I will get to do that next time.  But even if it is only for a half day to explore and drive around the park, it is certainly worth it.



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Paper Highways: The Unbuilt New Orleans Bypass (Proposed I-410)

  There are many examples around the United States of proposed freeway corridors in urban areas that never saw the light of day for one reason or another. They all fall somewhere in between the little-known and the infamous and from the mundane to the spectacular. One of the more obscure and interesting examples of such a project is the short-lived idea to construct a southern beltway for the New Orleans metropolitan area in the 1960s and 70s. Greater New Orleans and its surrounding area grew rapidly in the years after World War II, as suburban sprawl encroached on the historically rural downriver parishes around the city. In response to the development of the region’s Westbank and the emergence of communities in St. Charles and St. John the Baptist Parishes as viable suburban communities during this period, regional planners began to consider concepts for new infrastructure projects to serve this growing population.  The idea for a circular freeway around the southern perimeter of t

Hernando de Soto Bridge (Memphis, TN)

The newest of the bridges that span the lower Mississippi River at Memphis, the Hernando de Soto Bridge was completed in 1973 and carries Interstate 40 between downtown Memphis and West Memphis, AR. The bridge’s signature M-shaped superstructure makes it an instantly recognizable landmark in the city and one of the most visually unique bridges on the Mississippi River. As early as 1953, Memphis city planners recommended the construction of a second highway bridge across the Mississippi River to connect the city with West Memphis, AR. The Memphis & Arkansas Bridge had been completed only four years earlier a couple miles downriver from downtown, however it was expected that long-term growth in the metro area would warrant the construction of an additional bridge, the fourth crossing of the Mississippi River to be built at Memphis, in the not-too-distant future. Unlike the previous three Mississippi River bridges to be built the city, the location chosen for this bridge was about two

Memphis & Arkansas Bridge (Memphis, TN)

  Like the expansion of the railroads the previous century, the modernization of the country’s highway infrastructure in the early and mid 20th Century required the construction of new landmark bridges along the lower Mississippi River (and nation-wide for that matter) that would facilitate the expected growth in overall traffic demand in ensuing decades. While this new movement had been anticipated to some extent in the Memphis area with the design of the Harahan Bridge, neither it nor its neighbor the older Frisco Bridge were capable of accommodating the sharp rise in the popularity and demand of the automobile as a mode of cross-river transportation during the Great Depression. As was the case 30 years prior, the solution in the 1940s was to construct a new bridge in the same general location as its predecessors, only this time the bridge would be the first built exclusively for vehicle traffic. This bridge, the Memphis & Arkansas Bridge, was completed in 1949 and was the third