Eagle Lake, Shore Path and Bar Island

Tuesday, September 19

Wendy and Dan headed out for a bike to hike to hammock adventure.  They rode their bikes from the Jordan Pond House, to Deer Brook Trail, hiked up the trail to Sargent Mtn. Pond, set up their hammocks near the pond and spent some quiet time together.  Looks like fun!

photo by Wendy

We drove to Eagle Lake and rode our bikes around the loop.  Not the nicest day...

A picture's worth a thousand words

We stopped a couple of times to takes pictures but it took maybe an hour and that included me walking part of the way up a looooooong hill because my knees and thighs were killing me!

It's usually really pretty but not so much today, unless you're a fan of fog, which some people are...

I thought these super tiny pinecones were cute and the spider web was pretty awesome, which admittedly I would not have seen and enjoyed if not for the fog/mist/rain.

These yellow flowers were everywhere, so we asked one of the rangers what they were and the answer...ragweed!  Apparently there are several varieties...who knew?

And these lovelies are New England asters.

We watched these three ducks forage along the edge of the lake for quite awhile.  I thought they might be loons, which they weren't and it was pretty hard to tell what they looked like because of the low light, so they remain unidentified floating objects.

Three UFO's

We drove to the Jordan Pond House gift shop where Bill bought a nice, lightweight, hooded t-shirt and I bought a postcard for Lori.  We ate our lunch in the car in the parking lot...boring ;o(  

From there into town, where we parked near the road to Bar Island because it was super busy.  We walked along the Shore Path and discovered a new park area, called Grant Park.  On a nicer day, we would sit and enjoy a cup of coffee; maybe next year.

You can't tell but there is a very large cruise ship out there! 

Walking back to the car, we took the short "hike" over the Bar Island since it was low tide and you can only get there 1 1/2 hours either side of low tide.  You can learn a little more about Bar Island here, including which town has jurisdiction over the island, which might surprise you.

We came home and read for awhile (well, I might have taken a nap) and after dinner we went next door to play dominoes with Wendy and Dan...Wendy was the big winner!

Thanks for stopping by...
;o)

A Hiking and Biking Day in Acadia

Monday, September 21, 2015

Cool when we woke up this morning (48*) but clear and sunny!  The four of us left Edgewater around 9:30 and drove into Bar Harbor to walk over the sand bar to Bar Island.  In all the years we have been going to Bar Harbor, this is one of the places we have never visited.  The island can only be reached twice a day, one and a half hours either side of low tide and we never seemed to time it right.  

It's a very quick walk, taking about ten minutes to cross the sand bar and reach the island, then another 15-20 minutes to reach the summit.  We were rewarded with nice views of Bar Harbor and Cadillac Mountain from a different perspective. 

Photo bomb!

Bar Island summit...or not

After returning and looking again at the map, I think we may have missed the summit completely, stopping where everyone else stopped, assuming it was the summit.  Good grief...

We wandered along the water's edge on our way back.

Wendy checked out the water temperature, while Bill played lifeguard...

Brrr, looks warmer than it is

The water was crystal clear.

  

There are lots of rock cairns built along the shore.

Photo by Wendy

If you look closely near the left edge of the photo, you can see the cruise ship docked for the day.

There's lots of life in the tide pools and Dan found one of them.

We arrived back at the car around 11:30, the temp was up to 70*.  

From there, we drove to the North lot at Jordan Pond House and rode the Jordan Pond/Bubble Pond Loop.  This beautiful pair of horses passed us on the carriage road.

We left at 12:25 and arrived at Bubble Pond at 1:10 where we stopped for lunch. It was such a gorgeous day!

There's just a hint of what's to come up on the hill.

We were back at the car and ready for popovers by 2:40; Dan said it was 9.27 miles, uphill both ways!!!

We sat outside today and the popovers were much better than yesterday, thankfully.

We returned to the cottage and enjoyed the remaining sun.

Thanks for stopping by...

;o)