…….goes pitter patter on the rain fly of your tent while you try valiantly not to need to get up into said rain to go to the bathroom. (Apologies to Eliza Doolittle)
From the wild Pacific Coast of Oregon to the beautiful stoney Atlantic coast in Maine, this was the week our epic road trip brought us all the way across the U.S.
We’ve been talking about how being in the U.S. and Canada for this portion of our trip makes us feel like we don’t have to do much research and can just go with the flow. We generally have felt that as long as we have lodging/camping reservations in the places we want to stay then the rest of it will fall into place. The “come what may” planning strategy sometimes leaves us out of luck for attractions that require reservations but gives us room to improvise and discover new things that might be considered “quirky” or boring or even mundane for others, but fit our needs and interests in the moment.
Two inches of rain on the first day/night we were in Acadia National Park led to just such an experience ~ the library in Bar Harbor, ME. We spent the day catching up on blog posts, answering emails, writing thank you notes and watching the rain through the open windows. The air was cool and the room was mostly quiet in that small oasis in the midst of a busy tourist town. The staff was gracious and the wifi was strong-ish ~ the only thing missing was a good cup of coffee.
Thankfully the rain cleared up and we were able to spend two glorious days exploring Acadia National Park. Acadia is a wonder to behold. This park includes wide carriage road paths that are almost exclusively used by bikes, hikes that include anchors driven into the rock to get to some of the highest peaks, and ocean views to die for. Every turn in the road brought us to a vista that was more beautiful than the last.
Our campsite was in the Seawall Campground and even though we couldn’t see the ocean we could hear it all the time. The high tide on the “super blue moon” made the sea especially rowdy. We spent three nights there and every one just got better and better. We can understand why people return often. The park is amazing and you can spend years discovering the hidden gems of this place.
How do you follow up an amazing time in one of the greatest National Parks in the U.S.? You “recover” at a Bed & Breakfast in Ogunquit, ME of course! Ogunquit, for those of you who haven’t been there, is a coastal town South of Portland almost to New Hampshire. We decided that if Key West and Provincetown had a baby it would be Ogunquit. Ogunquit is a queer haven with Pride flags hanging from several buildings, great restaurants and advertisements for drag shows on the Main Street. The little village is sandwiched between the Ogunquit River and a long, sandy beach along the Atlantic Ocean. The food was good, the bed comfortable and the drinks strong, everything you want from a couple of days at a B&B to recover from your camping experience.
What do a library in a tourist town and a bed and breakast on Coastal Maine have in common? They were both places we didn’t research in advance or go into with expectations about what our experiences would be. The meander is what you make it. Coastal Maine made this part of the meander wild, beautiful, touristy, crowded, unique.
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