Starting to think about pre and post cruise. I'm thinking we may fly down and take a bus back, but not stay in NYC at all, just come down for the cruise. In a twist of life, I haven't been to Bar Harbor since the 70s (sigh...college days....and I live 4 hrs away go figure....) and this would have been my first visit since then BUT we decided to do a lighthouse tour cruise out of BH the end of July. So we will be staying up there a few nights for a long weekend. While I was researching the lighthouse tour, I found some other, shorter tours including whale and puffin watches. Hopefully the port day will have those options, as well as the obligatory adventures to Acadia National Park.
Here is the link to the schedule of the company we are using for the lighthouse tour. They came highly recommended, and I see they have some tours still operating end of Sept.
And while I think of it - don't forget warm clothes if you are going on an ocean tour - hats, mittens, scarves, layers of clothes, you will need them! I put spaces in the link as I"m not sure I can post it - just remove the spaces........
http:// www dot barharborwhales dot com /whale-watching-schedule-rates/schedule/
Bar Harbor is located on Mount Desert Island. Acadia National Park (note it's not Arcadia as may people mistakenly say and spell)- the top of Cadillac Mountain in the Park is the first place to see the sun in the US for most of the year!!! And then...... all of this! Hopefully the day is beautiful and you get to see all the beautiful scenery.
- Mount Desert Island is the second largest island on the East Coast of the United States, behind Long Island and ahead of Martha's Vineyard.
- Travel and Leisure has ranked it among "The World's Top Islands," which includes Bali, Kauai, and Maui. Conde Nast Traveler includes it among its "12 Enduring Edens" -- islands that have both extraordinary popularity and abiding beauty.
- Mount Desert Island has a permanent population of about 10,000, although over two million tourists a year visit the Acadia National Park.
- Acadia National Park, with 30,300 acres on Mount Desert Island, occupies half of the island.
- Although Acadia is one of the smallest national parks, it ranks among the Top 10 in visitors.
- At 1,530 feet, Cadillac Mountain is not only the tallest mountain in the park, but also the tallest mountain along the eastern coast of the United States.
- There are 24 mountain peaks on Mount Desert Island.
- Acadia National Park offers 125 miles of pristine hiking trails, providing views of glacial lakes, granite cliffs dropping into the ocean, and Somes Sound, touted as the only fjord in North America.
- Between 1913 and 1940, John D. Rockefeller, Jr. developed a system of carriage roads, widely acknowledged as the finest example of broken-stone roads designed for horse-drawn vehicles.
- Today, 45 miles of carriage roads provide cyclists a car-free system to weave around the mountains and valleys of Acadia National Park.
- The carriage roads feature 17 unique stone bridges crafted by masons from native rock.
- In 1922 John D. Rockefeller, Jr. also spearheaded creation of the 27-mile Park Loop Road system offering motorists outstanding views of Acadia's ocean shoreline, coastal forests, and mountain silhouettes.
- To design the Park Loop Road, Rockefeller retained Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., the son of the designer of Central Park who is generally considered the father of American landscape architecture.
