Acadia

Rebel as I am, I will break my blog rules. So despite of it saying Wonderful walks in England, I'm gonna make it global and write about our trip to Acadia National Park. It was planned as a hiking holiday, so kind of goes with my blog theme.
We flew from London to Boston, where we rented a car and then drove (with some stops) to a small town called Bar Harbor.

Here's a little map to show you where we drove.

As we landed quite late and it was in the middle of nigh in English time, I had decided to stay for a night not too far from Boston. So it was only an hours drive. I had expected that the car has bluetooth or even gps built in, so didn't take a phone holder, only to discover that the bluetooth only worked for music. So my poor son had to hold the phone for me when he would rather have slept. Eventually we got out of Boston and from then on it was smooth sailing. Maurice even managed to fall asleep until our first stop in York. Unfortunately my daughter wasn't there. (She studies in University in York, England:)
Next morning, greeted by daylight we continued our trip towards Bar Harbor. As it was dark when we arrived, this was a proper first greeting from USA. It was roughly a week to Halloween, but almost every house had their decorations out.

Maine and New England area are known for their lighthouses, so I planned our stops to see some. And they did not disappoint. The weather was very nice too, which was an added bonus.

Cape Elizabeth

Patriotism and America go hand in hand, I guess

Our next bigger stop was Fort Knox and Penobscot Narrows Observatory. When I looked that place up, I was expecting telescopes and stars, but it turned out to be a tower bridge with a viewing platform. Which was still very interesting. And of course the view was amazing. Unfortunately the pictures are taken through the glass, so not of best quality. 

Autumn colours at river Penobscot

This is where we went up to.

View to Fort Knox

Our final destination is near the mountain in view - Mount Cadillac

After visiting the Observatory it was time to visit the Fort Knox - just to warn you, it's not the one with all the gold. As it was near to the Halloween, there were some great decorations. And to add to the reality, some of the rooms are completely dark. We managed to get lost, going in circles in order to get out. But it was a good place to have the stop. And great place to visit with teenagers. 

Halloween and pumpkins

This one had scary music playing too

Scary creatures

Finally we made it to our little temporary home town but as it was nearly dark, we couldn't see much. The next morning we drove to the Acadia visiting centre, obtained our pass and did the compulsory tour around the national park, visiting the main places of interest. 

Acadia National Park visiting centre

I don't know why, but this place  - Acadia - quite often reminded me of Estonia. 

Amazing colours. However great are the pictures, you still have to be there to feel it.

This really freaked me out as I wasn't sure anymore how safe the hiking routes are

Near Thunder Hole

Photographer in making

On top of Mount Acadia

From Bar Harbor you can actually walk to one of those islands during the low tide

My happy boy

When you read the blog, you probably don't realise, how long it takes to write it. At least it does for me. Mind you I'm much better now, when I know what I'm doing. Saying that, today I tried to do something new - adding the map - and it took me forever to figure it out. In the end it was much easier and I might start to add it to my walk posts too. What I wanted to say, was I have been sitting behind the computer for way too long and I will do another post with pictures from our hikes another time. So you have something else to look forward to. Hope you enjoyed this post and that I could show you in the slightest how amazing the nature in Acadia was.