After work, we hauled anchor and raised the sails, bound for the anchorage behind Bar Island. The wind went light, and we eventually had to turn on the engine in order to make it before dark. Normally night sailing isn’t an issue for us, but with the carpet of lobster buoys all along the Maine coast, we have a rule against moving at night. We reached the Porcupines just as the sun was setting, so we decided to anchor by town. As we were looking for a good spot (and not finding anything both shallow and free of lobster traps), we noticed there were a bunch of moorings open, so we tried hailing Harbormaster to get one. We weren’t at all surprised to get no answer, so we picked up one that looked like it was intended for transients and kept our fingers crossed that we didn’t take someone’s private mooring by accident (we didn’t).
Saturday morning, we couldn’t wait to head into Acadia National Park. The Island Explorer buses are great – we were able to go from the Village Green to all the parts of the park we wanted to visit, and the buses are free (you still need to buy a pedestrian park pass). The drivers were all super nice, and they have ambassadors at all the major stops to help people find their way around.
We hiked out around Jordan Pond to pick up the Deer Brook trail with the intent to summit Sergeant Mountain. The trail started out pretty easy but quickly increased in grade with lots of stone/log steps. We crossed the stream before the carriage road (I loved the view of the bridge from there) and gained 900′ of elevation in about a mile. We misread the sign where the trail to Sergeant split off and thought it was 8 miles (it was .8 miles), so we decided to hike up to Penobscot instead.
I’m not a heights person at all, and I never would have done the trail in the past. I think because we were in the woods the whole time and didn’t have a clear view of how high up we were, it was easier for me. The last few hundred yards once the trail broke out onto the bare granite mountaintop were mentally harder – the trail was no more difficult than it had been (it was actually probably easier), but I had to forego taking in the views until I pushed myself to the summit. It took me a minute to get over my usual fear of heights, but the view was absolutely breathtaking (no, really, I was completely out of breath by then lol), and I was super proud of myself for making it up there. I’m so glad I pushed through – it was a really rewarding experience!
On the way back, we walked the other side of the Jordan Pond trail and since we had time before the last bus, we walked the Seaside trail down to Seal Harbor, where we soaked our tired feet in the nice cold water.
Saturday I was down for a good part of the day with a dehydration headache, but I rallied in time to be able to walk out to Bar Island, which we didn’t realize was part of the park. Even if there were a TON of people, the island was a nice little walk. Afterwards, we did some shopping in town – we both wanted to get hiking pants and a couple more water bottles (the two we’d brought the previous day were obviously not enough), and I needed to find stickers for our log book. I started getting stickers at each new port we visit (and sometimes at old favorites) and adding them to our log book a couple years ago, and it’s a fun remembrance of the places we’ve been. And of course we had to stop for ice cream at Mt. Desert Island Ice Cream.
Sunday morning, Jack woke me up early as he always does, and I caught my first glimpse of Orion for the season (and yes, I said good morning as I always do when we meet on an early morning watch). I watched sunrise, which looked like it was going to be obliterated by the clouds that were rolling through, but just when I was about to give up, the sky burst into color, and a rainbow formed off our bow. Nothing like a series of good omens to start the day!
Our first stop in the park for the day was Sand Beach, and we walked the Ocean Path past Thunder Hole (we were there at a good time for it, but it was too calm of a day) and Boulder Beach down to Otter Cliffs before turning back to the Gorham Mountain trailhead (we realized later we could have picked up the trail at Otter Cliffs too). We (read, I) decided to take the Cadillac Cliffs trail which splits off from Gorham. Our trail guide made it sound like a great little side trail, and they were absolutely right. It was a hard one – it started with scrambling over some rocks with a pit off to one side that wasn’t a big deal for anyone else who I saw pass us, but it scared me. I took my time, focused on the rock in front of me, and managed to get past it. The trail wound along stunning granite cliffs and caves, and the sunlight filtering through the forest was honestly magical. I found a few more surprises, like my first iron rungs (there were only two, so it wasn’t at all a big deal), but each time I reached a section that concerned me, I stepped aside for other hikers, took a deep breath and focused on keeping going one movement at a time. Once the trail rejoined Gorham Mountain trail, it was pretty easy the rest of the way to the summit.
After enjoying the summit views, we hiked down to the Bowl – a pretty little pond nestled in the saddle between Gorham and Champlain. We’d have liked to have continued on to Champlain from there, but we were concerned about having enough time to complete the hike and still catch the last bus, so we did another rock scramble that I would never have done before this weekend and followed the trail to where it joins the one coming off the Beehive to head back to Sand Beach. There was one steep, slippery section on the way down that I was not ashamed to take sitting down (as did most people), but otherwise the trail was easy.
When we got back to Sand Beach, we found ourselves with more time than we expected so we relaxed for a few before taking a final hike on the Great Head trail, which is only about a mile long and 150 feet of elevation. The views back over Sand Beach and the rest of the park are beautiful, and there are lots of pretty overlooks out over the open ocean. We were able to enjoy the views and still make it back in plenty of time to catch the last bus. Our time in Acadia was amazing, and I’m pretty proud of myself for really pushing my limits.
Monday after work, we made a run to Hannafords to provision. It was a pretty big shop since our hope is to spend the next couple weeks at anchor in places where provisioning won’t be possible. We’ve gotten good at meal planning for longer stretches off-grid, so it was still manageable to get everything back to the boat.
Each day, the hints of fall color became more pronounced, and it’s a strange feeling knowing our time is growing short on our sailing season.
