We had a great Shabbos with the community in Bangor, Maine.  Including me and M, we had a minyan for shacharis.  I ended up doing a portion of the Torah reading, which wasn’t pleasant for anyone, but eventually we got ‘er done.  In the afternoon we visited and played a couple games of dominoes, which thanks to Grandpa Glenn and Edna we already knew how to play.

Today we left the RV at Bruce and Naomi’s house in Bangor and drove down to Acadia National Park.  We stopped in at the obscenely crowded visitor center and picked up Junior Ranger workbooks for the kids.  Our first stop was Cadillac Mountain, the highest mountain on Acadia’s Mount Desert Island.  At 1530 feet above sea level, it’s the highest coastal mountain on the US east coast.

From the summit, we looked out over the island group in Frenchman Bay towards the Schoodic Peninsula beyond:

We followed the loop road around to Sand Beach and Thunder Hole, but the parking areas were full, so we continued on to visit Little Hunters Beach.  When a large wave receded, the cobbles rolling towards the ocean made a wonderful sound:

The Junior Ranger workbook required that we attend a ranger program, but this program was for the younger set, so we didn’t stay:

The kids completed their workbooks and received their Junior Ranger patches:

Near the visitor center, we toured the “Wild Gardens of Acadia”, which is a series of planted areas that simulate the various biomes found on the island.  In the “woodland stream” area, a toddler ran up to us and told us that we had to come see an owl in the tree:

We drove to the southwest corner of the island and visited the area called “Seawall”:

Nearby, we visited Bass Harbor Head Light:

This was our last stop before we drove back to Bangor.  Acadia was worth the visit, but I didn’t find it to be remarkable compared to the Oregon coast.

See the trip map for today’s drive.