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Camping on Mount Desert Island, Part II

Camping on Mount Desert Island, Part II

Thursday July 20

Dom wasn’t feeling well at bedtime and was feeling worse by morning. He assumed maybe it was food poisoning from some bad lunch meat. I took over breakfast and clean up.

After breakfast we headed straight to the Park Loop Road. We stopped at the Thunder Hole look out and walked along the rocky coast. The tide was high enough that we saw some decent waves at Thunder Hole– not the really dramatic stuff, but good enough. The kids were so disappointed last time we were here, it was nice to have something to get excited about.

The big kids did some scrambling on the rocks but it was warm and Anthony and Lucy were really too small for the steep climbs at that stretch of coast. So we pulled them away and headed to the picnic area for lunch. After lunch we went to Otter Cliffs and then headed back to Bar Harbor. Got some groceries and some medicine for Dom who was still feeling pretty bad. I bought some steak tip kebabs and potatoes and we cooked them over the fire, wrapped in foil packets.

The kids roasted some marshmallows and then we called it a night.

View from Otter Cliffs
Snake in the woodpile. Glad he didn’t come out in the car.
At the campground, kids running in the field.

Friday July 21

Our last day at the park. First, we went back to Cadillac Mountain because the kids love it so. This time we scrambled around on the other side of the parking lot for a little change of scenery. It’s all rocks and little scrubby blueberry bushes. Dom looked it up on the website, you are allowed to pick blueberries, visitors can pick 1 dry half gallon of blueberries per person, per day. There’s no way we ate even a fraction of that. But I’m guessing most visitors don’t know that blueberry picking is allowed or aren’t sure how to identify a blueberry or have it ingrained in them not to forage. Well, more blueberries for us. We found them everywhere, even on highly traveled trails.

After we’d done some rock scrambling we returned to the little mountaintop gift shop and got more blueberry soda, which was consumed on the spot. And then more chocolate covered blueberries, which I handed out later when energy started flagging a bit.

Then when we’d had our soda and said goodbye to the view, we headed back to the Loop Road. This time we stopped at the turnoff before Thunder Hole where the rocks are lower and more manageable. The kids were able to play in the tide pools and wander up and down the granite ravines.

We had our final picnic lunch at Fermi picnic ground and then back to Otter Cove one last time to play on the beach. The tide was much further out this time and we gathered seaweed and shells.

On our way through Bar Harbor we stopped again at the grocery store and picked up some haddock and lemon and thyme, which I cooked in foil packets on the fire.

Beaver pond.
Cadillac Mountain, blueberry foraging.
Ben on the rocks.
Sophie and Anthony on the rocks.
Mussels.
Tide pool.
Bella with seaweed.

Saturday July 22

Up very early again, about 5:45. Breakfast, clean up, then breaking camp. Ready to roll by about 9:30.

We headed south, sad to leave Mount Desert Island, wondering when we would be back.

We stopped for lunch at the Sea Dog restaurant in Camden and then stopped to watch the boats in the harbor. There’s a small fleet of sailing ships, schooners and the like.

After lunch we took a little detour to Fort William Henry/ Pemaquid Colonial State Historic Site. We didn’t have time to stay long, but we peeked into the fort, also there was a reconstructed fisherman’s cabin where reenactors talked about life in the colonial era.

We stayed the night with Dom’s sister, Auntie Francesca at her new house in Old Orchard Beach. Sadly, Bella got sick in the middle of the might. Dom’s illness wasn’t food poisoning after all but some kind of stomach bug. We missed Mass, not wanting to take germs to an unsuspecting congregation.

It took most of the day for Bella to recuperate and for us to feel it was safe to drive. We left at around 3pm. Stopped for pho on the way home and got home right at bedtime.

Ben makes a fort out of pine needles.
Fort William Henry, Colonial Pemaquid.
Fort William Henry, Colonial Pemaquid.
At Krispy Kreme.
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