Acadia National Park is not a large park by any means, but there are two main sections to the park – the Schoodic Woods Peninsula and Mount Desert Island. From what we had read and been told by others, the Schoodic Woods Peninsula is smaller, but less crowded. Schoodic Woods is also north of Mount Desert Island, so we stopped on this side of Acadia first. It was about a hour and a half drive from Cutler Coast Public Reserved Land, but we took our time and stopped along the way. One such stop was Wild Blueberry Land, which was a literal blueberry shaped building along the side of the road that served kitschy items, and of course all things blueberry. Patrick got a nice slice of blueberry pie with a cup of coffee, and I got a small chocolate caramel truffle. We continued to keep our eyes peeled for a lobster roll spot, which we found in Deano’s Takeout. We got 2 rolls for $22, and they were tasty! Would definitely stop there again if we ever find ourselves along US Route 1 in Maine. A third, final stop was very impromptu as we saw a couple lobster signs when we were a couple miles from Schoodic Woods. This being Maine, we wanted to maximize our lobster eating experiences, so we pulled over for this sign. The stand was located in a local lobsterman’s family’s front yard and his two daughters were running it – Gyp’sea Chix. They were selling very reasonably priced fresh lobster and steamed it right there for us! We were able to eat it right in their yard (they had picnic tables set up with lobster eating utensils and even had lobster bibs). However, the highlight of this stop was the conversations that we had with the family about the lobster industry. Overall, such a great experience, would highly recommend!
With our stomachs full, we drove the final few miles to Schoodic Woods campground and checked in. We had reserved a hike-in site (H4) at the campgrounds. Since the campground is relatively new, the sites are all very nice – elevated gravel pads for tents and quality picnic tables. The hike-in sites offer additional privacy, but as the name suggests, you have to hike into the site from the designated hike-in parking lot. Our site was probably about 0.2 miles from the lot. The drive-up campsites do not offer much privacy or distance from the adjacent campsites, so we were pleased with our hike-in choice. However, since we were a hike-in site, we didn’t feel like dragging our cooler or stove to the site. There was a picnic area in the park not far from the campgrounds at Frazer Point, so we drove here to cook all of our meals. We were glad we did as this area offers great water views and plenty of picnic tables.
The first night we headed to bed when the sun went down and listened to our audiobook – The Crossing, by Michael Connelly. After a couple chapters, we looked outside and noticed it was a clear night, so we got out of the tent to admire the stars. The campground offers a great night sky for stargazing – we could see the Milky Way! The next morning, we went back to Frazer Point to cook breakfast. We then laid the blanket out and relaxed for a good portion of the morning. The Schoodic Woods Peninsula (and all of Acadia) offers great bike trails, so we watched a lot of people come and go on their bikes.
That afternoon, we drove down to Schoodic Point (a 5-minute drive from the campgrounds), which has great views of Mount Desert. A lot of people had brought chairs and were sitting on the rocks enjoying the waves crashing. We then did a 3 mile hike up to Schoodic Head for again, great views of Mount Desert (Alder Trail to Schoodic Head Trail to Anvil Trail). The hike took about 1.5 hours, but we were taking our time and snapping lots of photos along the route. After the hike, it was back to Frazer Point for dinner. One important note with the Acadia campgrounds is that there are no showers. There are pay for showers near the campgrounds, but we have a sun shower that we filled and let sit out in the sun. It can get up to over 100 degrees if it sits in the sun long enough. Unfortunately, our bag was not in the sun all day, so we rinsed off in our cold sun shower water. We had plenty of privacy to do so at our hike in shower. Then off to bed to rest up for our campground move to Mount Desert Island in Acadia the next day.
