How I Spent My Summer Vacation

Fogged in, Bernard, Maine, Mt. Desert Island. . . .

Jon and I went camping in Acadia National Park from the 20th to the 23rd of June. As you'll see from most of my pictures, the weather didn't exactly cooperate, but I photographically made the best of it, although many of the 450+ shots I took were out of focus due to the incredibly heavy fog we experienced. But it was really comfortable for hiking and walking around, which was nice, and for sleeping.

The Black Boat, Bernard, Maine, Mt. Desert Island. . .

We camped at Smuggler's Den Campground (http://www.smugglersdencampground.com/main.html) in Southwest Harbor, on the right side of the island, if you're looking at the map. It's nice if you're looking to be away from the hustle and bustle of Bar Harbor, which can be kind of honky tonk, albeit fun!

Main Street, Bar Harbor, with streaming car headlights and people milling around stores. . .

The first day, we set up our tent and then headed out to Bass Harbor, to see the beautiful Bass Harbor Headlight. This is one of the most-often photographed lighthouses in America, but you generally see sunrise views of it because of its East-facing nature. Of course, there was no sun in evidence, so I focused more on the beauty of the pink granite rocks, leaving the lighthouse shrouded in fog in the background:

We spent the Summer Solstice Sunset on Cadillac Mountain:
And one of the rare times we had sun, we went to Jordan Pond. In the distance, across the pond, is a view of the twin mountains called "the bubbles."

And after that, since it was still sunny, we headed to the Asticou Inn's famous Thuja Azalea Garden, which is a traditional Japanese Garden. This is a little zen nook I liked, but it was too bright a day for good photos of anything but dappled shade:
I got a couple of interesting shots in Bar Harbor--this is the historic resort, the Bar Harbor Motor Inn, which sits right on the Shore Path, a lovely place to take a walk and see the huge mansions from Bar Harbor's glory days in the late 1800s and early 1900s:
And we raced out early (4:00 am) one of the last mornings we were there to capture "sunrise" in Bar Harbor, because a magazine, Maine Food & Lifestyle, had expressed interest in a couple of shots of Bar Harbor from me. This is about the best of what I got, as you can see!
So I was really only very happy with one photo (the blue lobster bots at the beginning of the post) but we had a wonderful vacation together and got to revisit our old haunts, as we lived there together back in 1991 when we were getting to know each other as a young couple. Hope you enjoyed the pictures. I certainly enjoyed taking them!