Acadia, Day 1

"The Maine man does not have to penetrate in depth to be excited by his coastal run; its flavor steals into his consciousness with the first ragged glimpse of properly textured woodland, the first whiff of punctually drained cove." - E. B. White

It was kind of last minute, our trip to Maine. We had wanted to do it in the summer, but we never really got a good chance. Then we thought that we would have to wait until the following summer to go. But then when I saw that Joseph got Rosh Hashanah off, a thought began to form in my mind. Soon we were booking a hotel and scouring websites and texting friends who had been to Acadia National Park.

As it turned out, if it had been any more last minute, we might not have gone since Kevin was in crunch time for his paper. He ended up spending every evening in the hotel frantically working to get it submitted soon. (It ended up that it wasn't submitted until January 12th, so the lesson here is carpe diem when it comes to fun stuff because work can be dragged out indefinitely.)

After a futile visit from the exterminator (how many mice we have spotted since then, alas), we hurried out the door and spent the night with our friends who had recently moved to Boston. The next morning, we managed to avoid most of the Boston rush hour and before we knew it we were in Maine. (The border really is just about an hour from Boston.) As Kevin drove, I took over the duty of tossing snacks back to kids. I did best throwing animal crackers one at a time and fruit snacks and worst at string cheese and granola bars. Little newborn Jacob did great for most of the drive, and before too long we were in Trenton, Maine, and then Acadia.

Our first stop that afternoon was the Bubble Rock hike. When we pulled up, Joseph was in deep, deep sleep and it took a lot of work to rouse him. Once he was awake he was a grumpy bear who didn't want to hike or say nice things. Kevin and I looked at each other in panic. He normally loved hiking! How could we do this hike in these conditions? Some fruit snacks changed the night to day, and now that things were no longer dark and dreary he hopped and skipped along, collecting sticks and  superhero poses.

It was a nice, short hike that was just right for small kids and parents carrying littles. But despite its length, we were still rewarded with beautiful views that reminded me of Mt. Naomi in Logan Canyon.

We really are a family of 5, even if you can't see the fifth very well.

After our hike, we had considered hiking around nearby Jordan Lake. But when we got there, our kids were content to throw rocks into the water.

Movie star hair

We then took a beautiful drive to the western part of the island, passing streets with great names like Flat Iron Road and 3 Dog Lane and Pretty Marsh Road (I also like Double Duck Road, Long Pond Fire Road, and Lady Slipper Lane). We stopped at Thurston's for dinner so Kevin could eat his long-anticipated lobster dinner. I had a few bites and liked it pretty well. I was more excited for the rolls, but Matthew threw one on the ground in a moment of passion, so there went that.

After dinner, we headed to Bass Harbor Lighthouse to watch the sunset. If we were to do it differently, we would have gone to the left of the lighthouse and watched it on the rocks. But with little kids, it worked okay to watch it in a fenced in area to the right of the lighthouse. There was a good little crowd there, and one little boy was so excited to have other boys his age to play cars with.

 As far as sunsets go, it was a lovely, pinkish one that took over the whole sky. A few minutes after the clock said the sun had set, we walked back up to the car. We secretly felt a little bad for the people who were showing up right then after the sunset had already finished.

I decided to nurse Jacob before we left. I looked in the side view mirror and noticed the colors becoming even more vibrant.

"We've got to go back!" I said, and we hurried back down to see this:

When we were more confident that the colors were gone, we headed back to the hotel. There was a mosquito in the car which bit Jacob and made it a very sad drive for him, but we all made it and he appeared to suffer no lasting damage from it. Everyone was pretty tired so we went to sleep (except Kevin who had some figures to work on), and we were glad we had decided to make this whirlwind trip.