My wife and I just got back from Maine celebrating our 15th anniversary (two years late).
We wanted to go in September to miss the summer peak season but still have some good weather and hopefully see some leaves starting to change colors. Our plan was to basically follow Lonely Planet’s “Classic Maine” itinerary which follows the coast from York to Acadia National Park over the course of a week.
We waited too long to get accommodations, though, because they were slim pickings. We intended to have at least a night in York (“the Yorks”? I’m still confused if a town named “York” actually exists), but could find zero accommodation that wasn’t outrageously expensive. Additionally, many inns had two-night minimum stays which further limited our options. Surprisingly, many of the accommodations in the Lonely Planet book had closed, changed owners (and sometimes names), or had shifted to booking through Airbnb.
Our schedule ended up being:
- Saturday: Atlanta to Boston to Portland
- Sunday: Portland Head Light, LL Bean, and Bradbury Mountain State Park
- Monday: Eastern Promenade, Portland Observatory, and Victoria Mansion
- Tuesday: Hiking La Verna Preserve and Sailing in Camden
- Wednesday: Biking Acadia National Park
- Thursday: Hiking Acadia National Park
- Friday: Bar Harbor to Boston
- Saturday: Boston to Atlanta
Saturday: Atlanta to Boston to Portland
We flew out of Atlanta around 2:00pm, scheduled to land in Boston around 4:30pm. We were lucky that Hurricane Lee had largely moved north of the airport by the afternoon. I think that if we had a morning landing we would have been delayed. Our flight was fine, with a bit of turbulence at the end, but a surprisingly (and welcome) smooth landing.
Since we were unable to get a place to stay in York, our first night was in Portland, a 1hr 45min drive away. We stopped in Portsmouth, NH for dinner at Street. We sat at the bar, which we never do, so I guess we’re bar sitters now? I had the Cemita sandwich with the fried chicken thigh, Megan had the Noodle Bowl, and we split an order of Yuca Fries. I enjoyed a Lawson's Hazy Rays, a NEIPA, in it’s natural habitat (New England). It was all very good and the vibe was great: casual and lively.
We continued on to Portland from there. Our room in Portland was one that seemed to have been a hotel and shifted to Airbnb. Interestingly, it was originally built for Charles Morrill, the “M” of B&M Beans!
Sunday: Portland Head Light, LL Bean, and Bradbury Mountain State Park
Sunday we breakfasted at Tandem Coffee Roasters. We split a Breakfast Biscuit (egg, cheese, smoked paprika mayo) and a Sweet Loaded Biscuit (butter and strawberry jam). I had a cappuccino and Megan had a latte. The cappuccino was legit: the right ~5oz size and good texture throughout. Both biscuits were very good, too. The butter on the loaded biscuit was an indulgent half-inch thick.
After breakfast we drove to the Portland Head Light and Fort Williams Park just south of the Portland peninsula. We walked around the lighthouse and the park surrounding it which was full of the ruins of defensive battlements. The location was gorgeous with rocky shorelines and vistas of the lighthouse.
A Bite into Maine food truck was at the park, and we split a lobster roll for lunch. I was surprised at how expensive the lobster rolls were, and we kept an eye on prices throughout our time in Maine and never saw them get cheaper.
We then drove up to Freeport to see The L.L. Bean store and then to Bradbury Mountain State Park for an afternoon hike before heading back to our room in Portland.
For dinner we went to Slab, a Sicilian-style pizzeria. The Sicilian-style is on a a very thick crust and the menu comments that each piece is one pound. We split a slice of the mushroom pizza, and I enjoyed a full liter of Liquid Riot Festbier. Both the pizza and the beer were great. The one slice was plenty for both of us. After dinner we walked to Old Port, and Megan got some gelato at Gorgeous Gelato.
Monday: Eastern Promenade, Portland Observatory, and Victoria Mansion
Monday was rainy and forecast to be rainy. We got our morning run in and then went to The Holy Donut for breakfast. Their known for their potato donuts. It was a small space with just a few chairs for sitting and eating. Megan got a chai and a toasted coconut (I think?). I find donuts too sweet, so I went for an old fashioned and a savory bacon cheddar. The old fashioned had no icing, so it wasn’t too sweet. The bacon cheddar was like a donut panini: plain dough with the cheese and meat in the middle. It was exactly the type of non-sweet option I wanted.
We took our coffees to go and headed to Fort Allen Park where we parked and embarked on the Eastern Promenade Trail. This paved path follows the shoreline along the end of the Portland peninsula. We took streets back into town.
At this point the rain started picking up so we made our way to the Portland Observatory and did a tour. The Portland Observatory was a watchtower for boats coming into the harbor. People at the harbor couldn’t see boats around Cape Elizabeth, so an observer at the observatory would look for incoming ships with a telescope three times a day. Flags were hoisted that correlated to the type of ship arriving and, if the company paid a yearly fee, a company flag was also hoisted. This allowed workers at the port to start gathering work crews and arranging dock space. The flags were eventually replaced by a telephone and then radios obsoleted the system altogether. The tower and history were very interesting.
We made our way to Sisters Gourmet Deli for lunch. It was a lively spot in the downtown area with lots of to-go orders getting picked up while we were there. Sisters is a wraps and hot pressed sandwiches shop. I had the Dagwood and Megan had the Cordon Bleu in a wrap. They hit the spot after a morning of walking.
While the rain started coming down, we toured Victoria Mansion. This mansion, named for Queen Victoria not for its architecture, which is Italianate not Victorian, is renowned for having a huge portion of its original late-1800s furnishings. The original owners sold the house with everything in it to a family, who occupied it for decades without changing hardly anything. After them the house was abandoned before being purchased to serve as a museum. So two owners and almost everything original. If you like old ornate things, you’d love this mansion.
We went to Central Provisions for dinner, opting for the walk-in downstairs bar instead of reservations (we’re definitely bar-eaters now). This was the most foodie restaurant we ate at for the whole week. We shared the Bread + Butter, the Sweet + Sour Eggplant, and the Bone Marrow Toast. Megan had never had bone marrow before, so I suggested that one, but we should have comprehended the description better: there was no discerning the marrow over the strong accompanying ingredients on the toast. The Bread + Butter was very good with butter smeared on the plate with seasonings and an orange sauce dolloped on top making the whole thing look a fried egg with toast. The Sweet + Sour Eggplant was also good, despite our lack of taste for fennel. I don’t recall the beers I had here, but I know they were local and tasty.
After dinner we walked across the street, and Megan got some gelato at Gelato Fiasco.
Tuesday: Hiking La Verna Preserve and Sailing in Camden
Tuesday we grabbed breakfast sandwiches at OhNo Cafe. We split the #1 and the #2, a bagel with prosciutto, egg, cheese, and tabasco and an english muffin with turkey, egg, avocado, tomato, and gouda, respectively. They were both good. We found the tabasco quite pronounced on the #1. Personally I would have been just as happy to have gone to Tandem Coffee again, but it’s nice to try new places, too.
We drove up the coast, following US 1 with a detour to La Verna Preserve between New Harbor and Round Pond. There are a few trails there that go to the coast with dramatic rock formations and pools. We got several fantastic photos there.
We continued back to US 1 towards Camden, stopping at Moody’s Diner for lunch. Moody’s was the perfect lunch after the hike. I had a haddock sandwich, Megan had the chili special, and we split a whoopie pie, which is apparently a Maine thing.
Many of the noted midcoast cities we went through, Damariscotta, Rockland, and Rockport, for example, were very cute but also very touristy. Camden fit this mode also.
We checked into our hotel, Whitehall, and then walked down to Camden harbor to check in for our sunset windjammer sail on the Schooner Appledore. Once out of the harbor, passenger volunteers helped the crew hoist the sails, including Megan! She did a great job. The outing started with some overcast clouds and a prediction of a sprinkle from the captain, but that turned into a downright rain before he turned us back out of it to wait it out a bit. He kept us out of it after that, but we were all soaked. It was a wonderful way to spend an evening and felt very “classic Maine.”
After the boat outing, we ate dinner at Sea Dog Brewing Co. This place was a disappointment. It felt generic. I had the fried chicken sandwich and Megan had a salad and a cup of chowder. I don’t remember which beer I had. It might as well have been an Applebee’s. We were hungry and the food was fine, though.
Wednesday: Biking Acadia National Park
Wednesday morning we went out for our morning run. I opted to run the trail up nearby Mt. Battie while Megan chose to take the road to its summit. Once I hit the trail, my run quickly became a power hike. The trail followed a dry creek bed, which wasn’t very dry, and then a rock face scramble to the top. Megan and I met each other at the top and then ran down the road together.
We packed up and drove US 1 to Bar Harbor. The drive was gorgeous with a particularly stunning bridge over the Penobscot River. We were pushing to get to Bar Harbor by lunch time, but needed to stop at the Acadia National Park visitor’s center for information and park passes.
The visitor’s center was packed. We waited in lines for info on trails, a park pass, and a hiking map and continued on to Bar Harbor.
Bar Harbor was bustling with tourists. It’s a cute town with narrow streets and lots of cars and pedestrians. It is definitely a tourist town. There must be more B&Bs than residences. We found our way to our B&B, Thornhedge Inn, and were able to check in early.
On the drive up we decided to do a partial day biking, a full day hiking, and potentially another morning of hiking, so we called up Bar Harbor Bikes to make sure they still had rentals available and walked that way, looking for somewhere to grab-n-go a lunch. That ended up being Hannaford, a local grocery chain. We got some pre-made sandwiches and snacks and continued on.
We got our bikes rented and some advice on how to get into the park from there as well as how much we could realistically cover before needing to return the bikes by 4:30. We set off for the park.
Acadia National Park has a network of carriage roads that are off-limits to cars but open to cyclists, hikers, and horses. We wanted to bike a loop around Eagle Lake and Jordan Pond, but the bike shop advised we wouldn’t get that in before time was up. So we did Eagle Lake with a little spur to Bubble Pond. The carriage roads were in good shape and full of cyclists. Eagle Lake was large and beautiful, but not very photogenic. Bubble Pond was smaller, but huge for a “pond” and very photogenic with it’s calm waters reflecting the trees and sky.
For dinner, we went to Rosalie’s Pizza. It’s a find-a-table-then-order-at-the-counter type of place with an upstairs and downstairs. Sit upstairs, order at the upstairs bar; sit downstairs, order at the downstairs bar. We sat upstairs. We ordered a Rosie’s Choice pizza which had spinach, mushrooms, and garlic and oil, and I had a Baxter’s Coastal Haze. The pizza was good, but the medium size was a bit too much for us.
After dinner we relaxed at Atlantic Brewing Company. This is the type of brewery experience I like: a low-key bar with some tables and places to hang out. I had their Mountain Hopper IPA, which was good, and I could happily spend an afternoon here. Then we went to Mount Desert Island Ice Cream for Megan.
A hiccup in our week happened right before going to sleep: Megan went out to the car to get something and the car wouldn’t unlock. I was able to find the hidden key in the fob and get in the car, but battery was acting dead: both fobs wouldn’t work, no internal lights, no buttons worked, and it wouldn’t start. It was a push-button ignition, which I don’t really have experience with, but pushing the button resulted in absolutely nothing happening.
Thursday: Hiking Acadia National Park
Thursday we breakfasted at the inn and then set off for the bus to the park. A free bus service operates on Mount Desert Island in and around Acadia National Park, so our dead car wasn’t a problem for this day. We took the bus from the Bar Harbor Village Green to the North Ridge stop in Acadia.
Our first hike of the day was Cadillac North Ridge Trail to the summit of Cadillac Mountain, the highest point in the park, then the Gorge Path spurs over to Dorr Mountain, then descending Dorr via the Schiff Path and Homans Path to Sieur de Monts. Cadillac Mountain is so popular there’s a road to the summit, but you need to reserve a time to drive it in advance. Correspondingly, the Cadillac North Ridge Trail was also very popular. The mountain summit isn’t at the top of the road, however. You have to go a little bit onto the Cadillac South Ridge Trail to find the USGS marker noting the summit. The general summit area was very busy, with lots of folks milling about. After a brief rest and snack, we hunted down the Gorge Path and began the descent into the gorge.
The Gorge Path is a trail leading up the gorge between Cadillac and Dorr mountains, but it has a spur trail to both Cadillac and Dorr summits. We were able to descend the spur from Cadillac to the gorge, and then climb back up to the summit of Dorr. It was slow going, with less of a path and more of a boulder field to navigate. We only saw a few people on this section of our hike.
The summit of Dorr Mountain was more conspicuous: a giant mound of rocks with a wooden sign post on it. We took some pictures and chatted with some other hikers, and then began our descent. The Schiff Path descends from the summit and then cuts across the mountain, so after a more strenuous start it eases into a nice trail. At its end, several paths lead down to Sieur de Monts, but Homans Path was recommended to us.
Homans Path has lots of steps cut into the stone, including some narrow sections and some small tunnels. In general Acadia had a vibe of wilderness with a touch from humanity: cut stone steps, channels for water cut into stone paths, and large flat stepping stones across streams, to name a few examples.
We arrived at Sieur de Monts just as the bus was pulling in. We hopped on and took it to Sand Beach.
Our second hike was the recommended Ocean Path. It's a very easy path between the coast and the road showcasing some of the park’s popular spots: Sand Beach and Thunder Hole as well as general rugged coastline beauty. Sand Beach is a popular swimming area. Thunder Hole is a spot where large plumes of water shoot into air at certain times during the tides. We were lucky to hit it just right and saw some spectacular splashes. There was a large crowd gathered, and the walkway extended to the rocks alongside the water feature, with posts and railings for safety. People would stand on that section and get soaked from the splashes.
The crowd thinned out after Thunder Hole, and we made our way to Otter Cliff for vistas over the ocean and back up the coastline. Once again the bus arrived right as we headed to its stop. We rode it to Jordan Pond for our final hike.
Our plan was to hike the Bubbles, two small summits near Jordan Pond, if we had the energy, but it turns out we were also running out of time. We were nearing 4:00, and the last bus out of Jordan Pond came at 6:10. We didn’t want to get stranded in the park, nor did we want to stay that late. Instead of the Bubbles and instead of the loop around Jordan Pond, we opted for a one-way hike from Jordan Pond, along it’s eastern shore, past the Bubbles, and on to Eagle Lake and Bubble Pond, which we had seen the day before. We could then catch a bus from Bubble Pond to the visitor’s center and then a bus from the visitor’s center to the Bar Harbor Village Green.
The terrain on this hike varied wildly, from easy flat path along the pond (with lots of cut out channels for water flowing from the surrounding elevation to the pond), to a rocky ascent near the Bubbles, to a muddy stream bed between the Bubbles and Eagle Lake. Along parts of the muddy section, boardwalks had been structured from sawn trees, good 2-inch thick planks of tree on pylons. We got to the carriage roads fairly worn out and took them to Bubble Pond and waited for the bus.
This was the longest wait for the bus, but we were tired and happy to sit. In true fortune, the bus that picked us up was heading to Bar Harbor after the visitor’s center anyways, so we didn’t have to wait ten minutes for another bus. We got back to the inn, showered, and went out eager for some good post-adventure dinner.
We ate dinner at the Side Street Cafe. It was a great little spot (on a side street) with a fun front porch and a lively vibe. Feeling like I needed some clam chowder before we left New England, I got the Lobster Feast which included a lobster roll and fries with the clam chowder. Megan got the roasted Brussels sprouts and the “cowboy“ mac & cheese. The clam chowder was fine. I wonder about the regionality of food these days; my clam chowder is at least as good as this cup. And, again, I was bothered by the cost for the lobster roll, it was also, just, fine. But it felt necessary to do a little more stereotypical-Maine things. The Brussels sprouts were great, but Megan didn’t like how the bbq pork was all mixed into the mac & cheese instead of added on top. I enjoyed a Orono Brewing Tubular NEIPA with my dinner, and it was great.
After dinner, Megan completed her ice cream/gelato tour of the state with ice cream from Ben & Bill’s Chocolate Emporium.
Friday: Bar Harbor to Boston
Friday was mostly spent driving back to Boston. After morning runs and breakfast at the inn, our host was able to jump our car and get us on our way. We might’ve done a touch more hiking if not for the uncertainty of the car, but oh well.
We took an inland route to see more of the state, through Bangor to Augusta where we stopped for lunch at State Lunch. The vibe was a bit more chic than we were expecting, but the menu looked really good: lots of Asian influenced items. I had the P’s Hot Chicken Sandwich, and Megan had the Vegetarian Black Bean Burger. The chicken sandwich was very good, very spicy but with a good flavor to it. I had another Maine beer here, but I don’t remember which one.
Once we got south of Portland, we shifted back over to US 1 to drive through Ogunquit and York, spots we missed because of our inability to get lodging there. They were cute, but traffic was really bad along this stretch of highway with a lot of ho-hum towns that looked like Anywhere, USA.
Once we got to our airport hotel, I took the car back to the rental agency, and Megan scoped out dinner options. We ended up walking to Orient Heights and eating at Angela’s Cafe. Everything looked good, but we went with the Grande Favoritos de Angela, a sampler of gorditas, tostadas, tacos, and more. It was perfect: lots of bits of different flavors to share and all of it delicious. I had a Pacifico, and Megan had the lime margarita.
Saturday: Boston to Atlanta
Saturday we packed up and got the hotel shuttle to the airport. Our hotel didn’t offer breakfast, so we grabbed breakfast at the airport. Flight left on time and landed in Atlanta around 2:00. Back home!