Acadia National Park: Part 1

(At the expense of traveling like a travel brochure) Maine is where it's at during the dog days of summer. The weather is glorious, the people are friendly (and they're all Red Sox fans), mosquitoes are scarce, and lobster is abundant. And a trip to Maine is only made better when you go with friends.


In case you're unfamiliar with Indian people, specifically Telugu people, this is really all you need to know:

1. Wherever we go, we travel in packs (why bring three, when you can bring sixteen, amirite?)
2. We have food (we are obsessed with our own cooking)
3. We are always 2.5 hours behind (10 AM =12:30 PM)


Thursday

Four families we were, seventeen people in all, who set out from Westford bright and early on Thursday morning. It's about a five hour drive to Acadia National Park on Routes 495 and 1 North, and shuffling kids between cars along the way, we eventually reached our hotel in Bar Harbor by afternoon.

A bunch of Indian people. Oh wait, that's us. 

Horsing around by the Visitor's Center. No pun intended.

We drove up to  Cadillac Mountain that afternoon to see the sunset. But when we got to the top, the sun was nowhere to be seen. Instead, the entire top of the mountain was enveloped by cloud! Within minutes, we were covered in a layer of condensed vapor. We hiked for a bit on the mountain, slipping once or twice on the dew covered rocks.

So much fog! 

That night, Sindhu, Ramya, Prasant, and I took a moonlit nightly stroll down a road called Stony Brook Lane. Apparently, streetlights don't exist in Maine. Pretty soon it got wicked dark, and we were forced to link arms to avoid getting lost. I forgot how frightening the forest is at night. Later, we found that Stony Brook Lane led right to the ocean!! #Missed opportunity.

Friday


Bright eyed and eager, we set out to our first activity of the day: hiking the Beehive Trail on Champlain Mountain. Hiking up a mountain is not hard, but it can be scary in the beginning. When you're four inches away from the ledge below which there is a 200 foot drop, you tread slowly and carefully. We did this for about twenty minutes, and after realizing that we were in fact, not going to fall, we scampered up the mountain and reached the top, where we enjoyed a beautiful view of the harbor.

The great ascent

My mother in her infamous hiking boots. 

Hardcore auntieez

But going back down the mountain is worse, since you have to be a lot more careful not to slip or jump too far or you will ruin your knees. We finally reached the foot of the mountain, having earned a few dings and scrapes, and mutually agreed that the Beehive is no longer enough for us, and we will try the harder Precipice Trail next. We then picnicked out at Sand Beach.

You probably think beaches look like this.

Wrong. They look like this:

There are rocks. There is seaweed. The water is BLOODY COLD (this is summertime). Nevertheless there are crazy people who go swimming and bodyboarding. Vishnu built a sand volcano which I later accidentally on purpose destroyed.

Don't be fooled. The water was freezing. 

Our next stop was Thunder Hole, which is a little inlet carved by glaciers where you can stand and get soaked by huge waves spraying you at high tide. We scaled more rocks but then stopped after getting yelled at by our parents. That afternoon, we went to some tide pools, where we passed the time getting squirted at by snails, trying to skip mussels shells, and harassing baby crabs. By 5 PM, we were completely beat and returned to our rooms to rest, shower, and change.

Danger is my middle name. 

This is a cool picture of Vishnu

We went back up the Cadillac Mountain for a second try, and this time, were successful in viewing the sunset.  It was truly beautiful...sitting atop the mountain, being able to see 300 degrees of horizon, and watching the sun slowly disappear. And even cooler was the fact that right opposite to the sun, there was a full moon. And the sky was freaking purple.

The purpleness of the sky cannot be appreciated in this picture. 

We returned to sea level oohing and aahing, and headed to downtown Bar Harbor to get dinner. Praneetha and I succumbed to our intense seafood cravings and absconded to the Thirsty Whale, where we ate fried shrimp, fried scallops, fried haddock, clam chowder, and fish n chips to our heart's content.

This isn't my picture. I stole it from the internet. 

Needless to say, we all passed out on the car ride home. Of course, a night of rest would be necessary for the adventures of the next day!
See Acadia Part 2