Acadia captured

Introduction

2009-01-24T15:09:00.000-05:00

Pssst... don't tell Denise!

...written on June 3, 2008

I thought I'd start this journal for Denise. I think we'd better keep it a secret for a few days though, so please don't tell her. I want her to be surprised!

Oh! Maybe I'd better introduce myself in case you haven't met me before. I'm Rover. I'm a little red dog, and I've been traveling with Denise since (almost) the beginning of her ride across America back in 2002.

Denise's mind is still wrapped around work, and her out-of-the-office focus is on our trip to Zion National Park later this week. I really can't believe that we're going to Acadia almost right after we get home from Zion. Wow! We're going to be wandering in two favorite parks on opposite sides of the country with only four days separating the wonder.

This trip to Acadia is a last-minute unplanned wander. I thought that we weren't going to make it there this spring - or this year - but a couple of weeks ago Denise decided she needed a longer escape than her already planned short long weekend to Zion. Instead of trying to extend that trip, she decided that some wandering around Mount Desert Island might be in order. Riding Park Loop Road, walking on the rocks along the coast, perhaps a wander to the Schoodic Peninsula, relaxing, rolling down the road on two wheels, walking on two feet... Two feet for Denise, four very red paws for me!

We'll be staying at a bed & breakfast in Bar Harbor - the Holland Inn - using that as our base. I'm sure we'll be riding every day, and I know that Denise's cameras will pull us into interesting places. Do you think the sea gulls will pose for us again?

I think Denise will be happy that I started this journal for our trip. At least I hope she'll be happy... I'm going to be writing the entire Zion journal, but I have a feeling that Denise might want to help with the writing of this one.

Recognize these rocks? Yes, this photo of me is from out last wander in Acadia back in September of 2007. I'm so excited that Denise decided it's time to visit there again!

2009-01-24T15:08:00.001-05:00

For now, please use Blogger's list of posts in the sidebar to follow my trip in reverse sequence. I plan to flip this blog on its head so that the posts flow from oldest to newest (like the table of contents in a book), adding a real Table of Contents and a Page by Page sidebar entry, and adding (better) next and previous links at the bottom of each post.

I probably won't be able to make these changes for the next several weeks.

...Denise, January 24, 2009

Word play

2009-01-08T19:58:00.003-05:00

Ah, a new toy! I was introduced to Wordle today, a tool that, in the words of its creator, is a toy for generating 'word clouds' from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. I played with it with my blog, and then I thought it would be interesting to see the word patterns it created from my journal.

Image created by www.wordle.net
Curious? Wander over to Wordle and play with your words too!

Camera happy

2008-06-22T19:57:00.000-04:00

...photo galleries

I was busy playing with words while Denise was busy playing with her cameras. And she was really busy...

There are photos in this journal, but there are more in Denise's photo galleries. And you can view them in the photo galleries splashed across your whole screen if you'd like - just click the slideshow button in the upper right of the photo gallery window.
(Oh, if you're in the gallery slideshow, you can get control of your computer back again by moving the mouse and clicking "return to gallery" or by just clicking the Esc key.)
You can enter the galleries at Acadia captured to see five photo galleries for this trip. Or you can jump right into a specific gallery:
Around and around and... contains photos from our trips around Park Loop Road. It felt like we kept going around, just one more time!
Schoodic wonder captures some of the beauty of the Schoodic Peninsula, including sea gulls happily splashing in the water.
From a mountain top, views from Cadillac Mountain.
The other half of the mountain, from Southwest Harbor to Ship Harbor to Bass Harbor Light.
Evening wanders, images that jumped into the camera as we walked around Bar Harbor in the evenings.

And yes, this is still Rover writing! I wonder if Denise will let me jump in and help write her blog entries. I don't think I can wait for our next trip to write again. But oh! That next trip shouldn't be too far away.

Photos: Words from Rover

2008-06-18T19:54:00.000-04:00

Oh, what fun! I can dance among the rocks on the edge of Jordan Pond!

Let's see, we had days of gray skies, we had wet stuff, there was (almost) a total lack of blue. This morning was misty, wet, gray. The edges of the island were still obscured by fog as we started our long drive home. The gray persisted as we rolled further inland.

And then... Look! Bright blue!

Seriously, while Denise & I would have loved to have some sunshine during our visit, the gray skies brought their own kind of beauty. And we loved that too.

Photos: A misty Park Loop Road

2008-06-18T19:49:00.000-04:00

I thought this sign was a bit odd... We were standing on the hiking trail that leads around Jordan Pond. I suppose the sign might be needed though, since the carriage roads that are so popular with people on knobby-wheeled bikes are not too far from here.

I wonder if many people try to ride on the hiking trails here (which is definitely not allowed).

A wet start, and then...

2008-06-18T19:42:00.000-04:00

...a mystery ride!

It had dried out so nicely by the end of the day yesterday that I thought we'd be able to start today with an inside out loop. Oh, you're right - I'd better explain that! Denise was hoping to do a loop that would take us both inside and outside of the park. She was thinking we'd head over to Northeast Harbor, up the eastern edge of Sommes Sound, then back to the east and into the park to ride Park Loop Road once again. That sounded good to me too, but then we woke up and looked outside...

It was a very gray morning, wet pavement - and what is that stuff floating out there? Is it fog? Heavy mist? Rain? It was hard to tell. We could see it, and we could feel it too. Wet.

Instead of starting on two wheels, we packed up and headed into the park in our fossil-fuel powered vehicle. Denise though that we'd wander the loop road once more before we headed towards home, And she figured that we would find better riding conditions somewhere between here and home, and that we'd just stop driving when our bicycle insisted on going for a ride.

Out closer to the edge of the island, a gray curtain dropped over (almost) everything. It was so foggy that there was no one sitting at the bottom of Precipice Trail. That was unfortunate, because we didn't realize until late yesterday that the spotting scope set up at the base of that trail wasn't pointed at people. It was pointed at birds, and oh! now we need to go back to Acadia again (as if there was any question about that). From the hiking trail difficulty sheet on the Acadia web site: "*The Precipice Trail and portions of the East Face, Jordan Cliffs, and Flying Mountain Trails are generally closed from March 15 to August 15 to protect nesting peregrine falcons." Apparently on non-foggy mornings the rangers set up a telescope to share peeks of the baby falcons. We weren't able to visit with the birds on this trip, but we did find a photo of four peregrine chicks on the park's website.

We did a bit of walking along the coast, sheltered by an umbrella. I could have handled a little bit of water, and Denise was decked out in her cycling rain jacket - but she wanted to protect her cameras. Hmmm... I suppose that was a good idea.

We stopped at the last beach before heading up and back into the woods. And oh! the daisies and wild roses were all wearing clear droplets of water. What amazing patterns!

We drove as far as Jordan Pond where we were greeted by a tiny patch of blue above us. The roads were almost dry. It was time to ride! We had a bit of a mystery ride, in the park along the back side of Park Loop Road, and a bit on roads outside of the park too. We stopped to capture some photos of water droplets on webs, of scenery slipping out from under heavy clouds and fog. We even stopped to have some conversations with fellow travelers on two wheels. No, they weren't on bicycles, they were riding Harleys!

I'm so glad that we were able to have a dry ride today. It was pretty cool, with temperatures in the low 50s. But cool and dry makes for good riding conditions. It was a funny clothing day though. I tried to tell Denise that she needed one more layer, but she insisted she was OK. She was wearing a sleeveless long underwear top under a short-sleeved jersey, and biking shorts with knee warmers. I thought a windbreaker would have been helpful, but Denise told me she preferred to be a little chilly when we were whipping downhill. She said if she was wearing a jacket she would have been too hot when we were climbing. Don't you think it would have made more sense to stop and change layers? Oh well, whatever makes her happy works. And I was quite warm riding in the TailRider with the big camera. I could even stick my head out and let my ears fly in the wind. That felt good!

It always seems like our "going home" day comes too soon. I suppose that's a good problem to have, isn't it? It means we're still enjoying our wandering time.

Time to hit the road for that long ride home. Almost five hours. Hmmm..... do you think we should have ridden home? Not this trip! Drive, drive, drive, until we were home again.

And now I need to start bugging Denise about planning our summer trip. She already has a trip planned for September - we're going to England for a photography seminar, and I think we're going to do some hiking too. But we need a biking trip too, don't we? I think that we need a sort of a non-plan for our wandering in late July or early August. I know she was toying around with the idea of a combination Maine and Nova Scotia trip. In fact, she stopped by The Cat office in Bar Harbor to ask some questions. And then there's some far off spot she was looking at in Quebec. Or something closer to home. She was thinking about taking the train from Boston to Portland, wandering over some new roads (for us!) in Maine, and then riding home. Or maybe... Well, I'm sure that wherever we go will be interesting. You're going to watch over our shoulders again, aren't you?

And oh! I like writing these journals. Thank you for joining us!

--- Rover

Photos: One more evening

2008-06-17T19:38:00.000-04:00

Photos: The view from the top

2008-06-17T19:33:00.000-04:00

Photos: Looping

2008-06-17T19:27:00.000-04:00

Photos: Sand Beach

2008-06-17T19:05:00.000-04:00

Tell me, how do you forget just one shoe?

Photos: From a light to winding water

2008-06-17T19:01:00.000-04:00

Photos: Walking, south and west

2008-06-17T18:51:00.000-04:00

I wish we could have been closer to this beautiful creature. His simple name, red-winged blackbird, doesn't really do justice to his beauty. That patch of red just lights up his flight.

He flew right past our noses to perch on this sign.

What's that sound?

2008-06-17T18:21:00.001-04:00

...a day of walking

Denise woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of steady rain. Wet...

It was better when morning really rolled around. The drops had stopped falling, but the sky was still very gray and the pavement was covered with water. Denise thought we'd start the day with a drive and a walk.

We headed for the other side of the island. We drove over a big hill, skirted the top of Somes Sound, and then headed south.

Seawall was our first stop, for a walk along the ocean. Rocks lined the road, rocks with a slippery looking surface, rocks bearing people, and a few sea gulls. Denise was careful about where her feet landed. She wanted to remain on her feet and not slip on a seaweed-covered rock. I have to say that it's easier to stay upright when you have four paws for dancing across the ground! Looking away from the ocean, we found some ducks paddling across a pond. And they were happy to pose for Denise's camera.

Next, we hiked the Ship Harbor trail. It was beautiful trail that looped along the water and through the woods. There was something different to look at around every corner, every loop of the trail.

A little further down the road and we were at our southern-most point of the day, Bass Harbor Light. We saw a flash of red through the trees, a circling light. We walked down the path, and listened... there were bells ringing, bells on top of buoys, floating, moving in the waves.

Ah, it was time to reverse direction. Back on the eastern side of the island, our next stop was Sand Beach. It's really surprising to find a beautiful crescent of sandy beach nestled between the rocks. And behind the sand is waving beach grass and more water, water reflecting the trees behind it. Beautiful. (Oh, I keep saying that, don't I? That's because it is beautiful here.)

We made more stops to walk and play with cameras, driving a little bit, stopping, walking, looking. Our last stop along Park Loop Road was Little Hunter's Beach, a beach made of rounded stones. Those rocks were a bit slippery underfoot, even for me.

And then... we headed up Cadillac Mountain one more time. The top was clear of clouds this time, a first for this trip. I find it funny that the other people in the B&B wanted to have a clear day so that they could see Bar Harbor from the top. Denise wanted clouds and sun so that she could watch the interplay of the light as it highlighted and bounced off of the landscape and the clouds.

The day started wet but ended dry, changing from gray to a sky with visible patches of blue. It was a good day for wandering by foot.

Tomorrow? It will be a day for riding, and for the long drive home too.

Photos: Clouds on Cadillac

2008-06-16T18:13:00.000-04:00

Photos: Just a few from the loop

2008-06-16T18:10:00.000-04:00

Photos: Heading back

2008-06-16T18:06:00.000-04:00

Photos: A little bit of bird play

2008-06-16T16:44:00.000-04:00

Wow - Denise had a lot of fun "capturing" these sea gulls!

Photos: Rocky Schoodic

2008-06-16T16:33:00.000-04:00

Photos: Towards the tip

2008-06-16T16:24:00.000-04:00

Morning blue skies, and then...

2008-06-16T16:23:00.000-04:00

Schoodic Peninsula

Morning rolled around to show a blue sky with puffy white clouds. Time for another good breakfast - eggs, french toast slivers, tasty kiwis & strawberries, yum! While we were all chatting and sharing stories of yesterday's wanderings, the weather wizard was busy. By the end of breakfast the sky was wearing a solid layer of gray once again.

The forecast called for a 30% chance of rain today, 70% tomorrow. Today sounded like there would be a possibility of some dry roads. Tomorrow? Well, who knows that tomorrow will bring? Today, it was time to ride.

Denise really, really, really wanted to ride the Schoodic Peninsula. She toyed with the idea of taking the boat to Winter Harbor, riding the peninula, and then riding back to Bar Harbor. That's a bit of mileage, and with the forecast for water falling from the sky Denise thought better of it.

OK, decision made. We'll use our bright blue car to get us to a starting point for our ride. Denise decided to park in Winter Harbor and to ride the Schoodic loop twice.
Oh, you want to ride this loop too? You can find details on this route on the Explore Maine by bike Schoodic Peninsula tour page.

We parked at the IGA in Winter Harbor. Denise even went inside and asked if it would OK to leave the car there for a few hours. The man in charge of the store was surprised - but pleased - that she asked.

Time to ride... and time to wait a little bit. The road in and around Winter Harbor was under construction, and there were sections with only one lane open. Not a problem, we were out of there after only a couple of waits. And we were headed down the peninsula with an ocean view on our right. The water disappeared for a bit, to be replaced by trees on both sides of the road, with patches of tall and very green ferns waving in the wind. Oh yes, it was windy! When we pulled in to Winter Harbor we saw a flag pointing straight towards us. Ah, that meant a headwind down and a tailwind back. That's not too bad.

Oh look - it's the end of the peninsula. No surprise, it's a rocky coastline, lots of big chunks of rock that we could waltz across. Denise's Chaco sandals - good walking sandals - hopped into her pannier, so she could happily wander across the rocks. I did remind her to stay off of the rocks that wore a dark color because I thought they might be covered with slightly wet and slippery seaweed. She didn't want to fall with her camera, so she listened.

We spent quite a while there, communing with sea gulls, soaking in visions of purple (iris) emerging from the rock, picking our way across dry rocks, chatting with other photographers, even speaking with a 4-legged friend.

That 4-legged friend? He was a funny dog who absolutely was in charge of his family. Denise stopped to chat with him and his 'mom'. She asked if she could say hello to him, and asked what he was. He was a cross between a Corgi and a black lab. He had the look of a Corgi, but he was much taller (and bigger) than other Corgis who we've met. And Bailey - I guess you're not the only dog who is in charge of his people!

Just as we got back to the car after our second loop it started serious misting. Good timing!

Driving, driving, back to Bar Harbor... It was late afternoon, and Denise wasn't quite ready to sit still yet. It was a chilly riding day, a day for wearing lots of layers, she wanted a quick warm-up shower before we headed out again to try to catch some mist over the ocean. We headed to Thunder Hole, which still wasn't thundering - probably because the tide was pretty low. We walked just a little bit before it started raining. Hmm... that was a sign that we should head back.

Rain steadier, heavier... I thought we should to head back to our home away from home, but Denise saw some light patches in the sky and she decided she wanted to drive up Cadillac Mountain to see if there was any visible beauty. I tried to convince her it wasn't worth the drive through clouds - but you know what? She was right! The top of the mountain was still in the clouds, but there was a section just below the top where there were some amazing cloud paintings decorating a landscape of pink rocks and green trees. Wow. Sometimes taking a chance is a good thing.

Photos: Bar Harbor

2008-06-15T16:19:00.000-04:00

Photos: A glimpse from Cadillac Mountain, and...

2008-06-15T16:15:00.000-04:00

Photos: Around again with assistance from 4 wheels

2008-06-15T16:09:00.000-04:00

Photos: Around Park Loop Road on two wheels

2008-06-15T16:04:00.001-04:00

Stop and smell the roses

2008-06-15T15:29:00.000-04:00

Park Loop Road

Last night, I stopped to talk to a man (in Bar Harbor) who was smelling the roses. Funny, I know that roses have a wonderful scent, but I never translated that from roses in a garden to wild roses. The wild roses have a beautiful scent too, and they gave Denise another excuse to stop as we rode Park Loop Road.

First things first though... breakfast! Good food & good conversations were a great start to the day. We had what Evin called a spicy apple pie - an egg base covered with spiced apples. That sounded a little odd, but it was really good. And we had lemon pancakes too. Yum! (Didn't we have this conversation before? Yes, I like people food, and Denise always shares.) It was a good breakfast, good fuel for riding.

Today's destination? Park Loop Road. Once around by bike, and then around again to walk, to absorb the scenery, and to capture images. I've been traveling with Denise for quite a few years now, so I am quite used to her stop and go form of travel. And she kept stopping today. We'd ride a bit, then she'd see something she wanted to capture with her camera. We'd stop. Camera out, images captured. And we'd talk with people stopped in the same places. We even had a chance to share the fragrance of the wild roses with some of them. And hey - I spent some time smelling the roses too!

Park Loop Road is a nicely rolling circuit. A good chunk of the road is one-way which makes it really nice for the people wandering in their cars and for us too. Ride, stop, take pictures, ride, stop, and repeat. The loop starts down the east side of Mt. Desert Island so we were able to watch the ocean as we rode. It was very quiet today, no waves, no crashing sounds from Thunder Hole. For our second circle, it was very close to low tide. But low tide doesn't mean that there are no waves. So where were the waves? And while I'm asking questions, where were the sea gulls? It was a very quiet bird day. We would occasionally see a gull soaring above, and there were two gulls staking out granite blocks at the edge of the road, but the gulls who are usually prancing on the rocks along the coast? I don't know where they were hiding today. I guess that means we're going to need to spend more time on Park Loop Road ths week.

It was a cool day for riding, cool enough that Denise wore her knee warmers for the entire ride. She warmed up enough by the end of the first loop to get down to a single layer of clothing (for riding), but the layers came back for our walking tour. We jumped out of the car at Thunder Hole. We started walking. We walked on the trail, and then we wandered over the rocks. We looked down slots in the rock that gave us a view of the water far below. We saw bits of green grass emerging from cracks between blocks of granite. And we saw the occasional purple iris rising from the rock. We walked, and walked, and then we turned around and walked back. Water started falling from the sky just before we got back to the car. What luck!

I thought we'd head back to the B&B then, but Denise decided to see if the top of Cadillac Mountain was above the clouds. It wasn't. Instead it was encased in them. We drove up the mountain, following the curves of the road. Rain drops were falling, it was cloudy, but the road was still visible. And then... just below the summit, the clouds covered the top of the mountain. We could see the road just in front of the car, but no further. We were in the clouds. We headed back down, and the clouds stayed on the top of the mountain. The road surface was decorated with wisps of fog, and the rain drops continued. Denise's camera jumped out a couple of times - which meant that Denise had to jump out of the car too. It will be interesting to see if any of those very gray pictures show the emerging beauty.

The rain stopped just before we headed out for food. Dinner tonight was at Siam Orchid, tasty Thai food. Denise chose a dish called Drunken Noodle. I wonder if she chose it because of the name? Oh, you want to know what a Drunken Noodle is? Here's the description from the menu: 'Thai rice noodles with fresh basil, peauts, egg, vegetables and pineapple in a tangy spicy sauce'. Add some tofu for a well-balanced meal. It was definitely a good eating day today.

And then... we walked along the shore for a while. No visible colored sunset, but as we walked the gray sky changed to a deeper gray. The ocean was still quiet.

Photos: And a few from Bar Harbor

2008-06-14T15:26:00.000-04:00

Photos: On the edge of the park

2008-06-14T15:23:00.000-04:00

Green, green & rolling

2008-06-14T15:17:00.000-04:00

...and look at that purple!

The fact that Denise and I were wandering out west just a short week ago really opened my eyes to the differences in the areas. As we flew down the road in our motorized transport (Denise's bright blue car!) heading north and east, I absorbed our surroundings. Everything was green, and rolling. Green, so green.

And then there was the purple. You know how much Denise likes purple, don't you? All of a sudden I started seeing large patches of purple along the side of the road, purple waving from that sea of green. The lupine are in bloom. What a wonderful sight!

I wondered which road we would follow to get to Bar Harbor. I knew that we'd start on I-95, and that we'd follow that through the southern section of our drive. What I didn't know was whether we'd jump off in Augusta and head toward the coast or if we'd stay on I-95 as far as Bangor. Going straight from Augusta is shorter from a mileage standpoint at 101 miles, but driving to Bangor before heading toward the coast seems to be faster. 101 miles vs. 120 miles. Hmmm...

Last year we experimented with both routes, and I think Denise was finally convinced that the longer route through Bangor is an easier drive. And because more of the miles are on a highway, it probably takes the same amount of time.

Ah, we're here! We got to the Holland Inn and chatted for a bit with Evin (the innkeeper). And then... well it was 3:30 in the afternoon, the sun was shining, and our bicycle was calling. We headed out for a quick ride. Where did we go? I have no idea! Denise just let the bicycle roll down any road that looked interesting.

Oh, we did stop at the Wild Gardens of Acadia to see what kind of flowers were blooming. We didn't stay there too long because the mosquitos there thought that they would take a few bites out of Denise. They weren't bothering me, but biting bugs make us move fast.

After that short stop we just wandered. We looked at ripples in the water of a lake, we sought out wildflowers, we listened to the birds, and watched the silly squirrels running and hiding. It was a good ride, short, but good.

It's time to dream of tomorrow...
In case you didn't figure it out already, yes, this is Rover writing again. I enjoyed playing with words so much on our trip to Zion last weekend that I convinced Denise that she wanted me to write this journal too.

--- Rover

Denise did the driving, but I was navigating. And we didn't get lost!

Friday the 13th

2008-06-13T15:14:00.000-04:00

One more day...

Denise found this journal today, and she told me that she was glad that I started it. She spent hours this week going through the photos from our trip to Zion - and she had to work too - so she didn't have time to even think about tomorrow's departure.

It looks like the weather could be a bit wet. It will definitely be cool, with daytime temperatures predicted to range from the high 50s to the mid 60s and more than a chance of water falling from the sky. That will be quite a change from our very warm wander in Utah. I hope it's not too wet; after all, riding in the rain is not Denise's favorite thing to do. I just wandered through her packing though, and she has layers and rain gear along with her normal bike attire. And you know what? Photographs of gray days along the coast can be wonderful. I remember our wander on the Schoodic Peninsula in the fog last year (or was it the year before?). It was just gorgeous, enhanced by the floating gray mist.

A good night's sleep, and we'll be off, heading north and east, to the rocky edge of an island in Downeast Maine. Happy...