The Blanch Herd: Vermont 2023 {Maine Day 1: Wonderland, Bass Harbor Head Light, Flying Mountain, Downeast Lobster Pound}

26 September 2023 - Tuesday was day one of our little side trip to Maine, specifically Acadia National Park. It took 6ish hours of very indirect roads to get to Acadia from Jay, but it was a lovely drive through New Hampshire and Maine to get to the coast. We headed first to the Bass Harbor side (Gregg calls it the "left lung" of Mount Desert Island) and went directly to Wonderland since it was low tide and this was a spot I read had good tide pools. It was a bit of a walk through an evergreen wooded trail, but soon it opened up on a rocky beach. We scrambled about on the rocks and slick seaweed and heard that someone nearby had spotted a little crab in a pool. We went over to watch that, which was so exciting. We continued to hop from rock to rock looking for any life we could spot. There were tons of periwinkles (or were they dog whelks?) that we couldn't help but crunch as we walked. We also found lots of bodacious seaweed - it was huge! We kept moving down the shore and around a little bend where we found lots of banged up lobster traps. Then we started finding the banged up lobster parts! That was kind of thrilling! We're in Maine!!

Pretty rocks!

Teeny, but actually really nicely grippy shells stuck
to the rocks.

Whatever this little snail is, Sam had fun
prying it from a rock.

Def low tide right now!

See what I mean by bodacious!?!
It felt so cool - really thick and rubbery.

Pretty pool.

There's the little crabby! (That red thing
in the middle.)

We could see him move!

Lobster trap!

Lobster claw! (It was so stinky!)

Lobster head!

I spy some lobster floats out there in the water!

Group shot! We wandered along the beach all the way from
that beach way back there with the trees.

I just love this stuff!

Whole lobster!

A few steps away from the beach you're
back in the piney woods and there are plenty
of great mushrooms here!

After Wonderland we backtracked down the road a bit to the Seawall Campground so we could stamp our passport, buy our annual pass and pick up Jr. Ranger booklets (there is no entrance station on this part of the island, but they do require passes to be displayed on your car if you park at certain spots, so I guess we were lucky we didn't get in trouble on our first stop). We checked out (the bathrooms) at Seawall and then headed back on the road past Wonderland and on to Bass Harbor Head Light. Wowza, that was a crowded spot with a tiny parking lot and a long, long, slow-moving/stopped line to get in. Since I had been here before when I came to Maine with Megan back in 2017, I hopped in the driver's seat and sent Gregg and the kids down the road to go see the lighthouse. By the time they were done checking it out, we were about five cars from the parking lot, so I switched with Gregg and he waited in line while I went to see the lighthouse with Sam. We lucked out to be by someone who had spotted dolphins (Sam thinks they were actually porpoises, since we learned that they live in Acadia from a video before we came) so we saw them, too! When we were done looking, Gregg had just parked, so we all hopped back in the car and moved on to our next stop.

Lighthouse bells and my boy.

The lighting was tricky, but there's a silhouette of the
lighthouse.

The last thing that we decided to do before the sun went down was a fun little hike on the Flying Mountain Loop. When we got to the top, we had excellent views of Somes Sound and the Cranberry Islands and other islands. The sun was starting to set while we were up there and it was beautiful!

Walking along this side had some cliff overlooks and
awesome peeks at the sound.

The moon came out and it was lovely!

Getting dark as we rounded the loop back to the car.

We finished up the evening with dinner at Downeast Lobster Pound in Trenton. We got a lobster roll (those things ain't cheap - this one was like $30!! and we actually aren't super lobster fans, but when you're in Maine it just seems like something ya gotta do!), clam chowder, lobster bisque and fish 'n' chips to share. YUM! It was a very casual spot, where you see the lobster in the tank right by the cash register and if you were ordering a lobster dinner, you could pick your own lobster right there.