Fun Time Temporarily Suspended

Well, it's the first day back from vacation. Acadia was everything I hoped it would be. The cottage had a hammock on the back porch overlooking the ocean. I spent a lot of time knitting to the sound of waves lapping on the shore. The side of the island we were on is called quiet side. I'm guessing this is because the waves don't crash too much over there...at least they didn't while we were there.

After we were rested up and settled in, we went for an easy hike around Sand Beach. Most of this hike was spent hopping from rock to rock to stay as close to the ocean as possible.

We ended this hike in Thunder Hole where nature has carved out a hole in the rock face that creates the sound of thunder whenever the waves come crashing in. One of the highlights of this trip was the young guy we met in the shop at the end of the hike. We had packed 2L of water...should be enough, unless you don't figure in the two water guzzling teenagers, which we hadn't. By the end of the hike, we were out of water and parched. Unfortunately, none of us had thought to carry any cash. I was seriously thinking of using the water from the melted ice in the coolers behind the shop when the guy working the counter threw us two bottles only asking us to "Pay it forward". I haven't really found an opportunity to match that generosity yet. I mean, we were really thirsty and that was a life saver. I'm keeping my eyes and ears open for a chance to rescue someone else in distress.

The next day was a bit of a killer. We packed up our bikes with the intention of a relatively easy ride around a pond. Unfortunately, the supposed paved path wasn't and we ended up riding up out of the valley to get to the park loop. It was only 16 miles, but we're not used to climbing that much and according to my bike computer, we climbed 700' at one point. The funny thing is, I felt pretty great about that ride when it was over. I wasn't sure I could climb that well on my new bike, since it doesn't have a granny gear (It's a Fuji Team Issue. I think the idea is if you can afford to buy a bike that nice, you must be in relatively good shape and don't need a granny gear!)

Day Three: Easy day hiking up the bubbles. Very short hike with a rewarding view at the top. The SigO once again did his part to keep nature intact

despite the best efforts of his daughter and her friend

Day Four: A pretty strenuous 4.5 mile hike up a gorge path to reach the summit of Cadillac Mountain--the highest peak on the eastern seaboard all the way down to Buenes Aires. We picked wild blueberries as we climbed this behemoth. Great views from the top of this too, obviously. This particular view shows the cranberry islands. No idea why they're called that.

We had to rush down the other side of the mountain in order to reach our car in time since we were scheduled for the 4:30 Whale Watch boat trip. I'll bet I took about 30 pictures trying to catch a good shot of some of the whales, dolphins and seals. This is all I got. You'll just have to take my word for it that there were many Finback whale sightings (I think we actually only saw 7 different whales, but they surfaced dozens of times), hundreds (literally) of white sided dolphins and a handful of seals. It was my first ever whale watch trip and was very exhilirating.

The next day we slummed it up, goofing around Bar Harbor.

Our last day there was another short hike up to the top of the beehive. It's less than 2 miles round trip, but it's an exciting hike since in several places you're hanging over the side of the mountain clinging to some iron rungs nailed into the rock face. If you enlarge this picture, you can actually see some of the hikers on the mountain. It looks like they're very precariously perched on a dangerous trail, but it's really pretty tame...unless you're afraid of heights, which the SigO's daughter was. And yet, she persevered and conquered her fears. It was very inspiring.

Of course, this blog makes it sound like we were superheroes, hiking and biking all day everyday. Ha! Of course I managed to find a yarn shop (or two) and scored some good sales

I found this sock yarn in Southwest Harbor at The Lilac Lily

along with this Wool in the Woods yarn which was 40% off. By now, you've no doubt realized I'm very fond of Wool in the Woods yarn, so I'm very disappointed to discover they've sold all their yarn, dyed and undyed, and will no longer be producing any stock. *Heavy sigh*.
Why is it always this way? You find something you love, be it yarn, handbags or makeup and they go and discontinue it.

At Bee's Inc in Bar Harbor, I found some Malabrigo. This pic is awful. The colorway is Autumn and it really is a gorgeous batch of merino

And last, but definitely not least, my first pair of socks is complete. I only have this picture of the one, but I promise, both are done.

I also got some pretty good progress done on my top, but all this needs to be put on hold now for some homework for the knitting retreat in Mass this November! Woo Hoo!! I got in!! The only question now is To drive or not To drive. After driving to Acadia, I'm not sure I can do that again!