Beautiful BAAA HAAbor.

Arrived at our campsite at the KOA in Bar Harbor via the stunning drive up the Maine Turnpike on 295/95. The trees are finally changing and it is really spectacular. Indiana has beautiful falls, but it does not compare to the fall colors here. The hills are studded with large dark green pine trees interwoven with the reds, yellows and oranges. I can certainly see why tourists make their way up here to take in the changing season colors. I also have to say that Indiana needs to take some lessons in highway construction/maintenance from the great state of Maine. Narry a pothole to be seen and they got 125 inches of snow last year, so I wonder what their secret is? We lucked out again and had a sunny, clear day for our drive.

I was not expecting much of the KOA here (trying to abide by my new, no expectations rule) and we were all pretty excited when we pulled into camp site 369. We are right on the water and can hear the lapping waves while sitting on the couch in the RV. Couldn’t get any better than that. Donny is a KOA camp host and brought us to our site. He said that the night before they had quite a storm and the wind was rocking and rolling everything, so we are very lucky we missed that. He told us that when it’s high tide the water comes right up to the camp site. My dad didn’t believe him, but about 7:00pm, the water was RIGHT THERE!

The coast line is like no other that I have seen with the huge rocks and boulders jutting out the beaches. Did I say it’s beautiful? Well I’ll say it again, it’s absolutely beautiful up here and I’ve only been here one day. We went to a small qaint restaurant in Bar Harbor called The Chart Room. Our waitress, Cate, is a year round resident and she waitresses during the “season” along with landscaping and in the winter she does house cleaning and a lot of caretaking for houses of people that are seasonal residents. She said that the roads are always cleared in the winter and she was used to the winters because she has lived there all her life. I had my first Maine lobster there, but I have to say that I’m lazy and prefer the tail. The whole lobster is cheaper then just the tail and I now know why….because it’s a lot of work. AND I’m not a fan of the tamale stuff…it’s just too gross looking, I don’t care if it’s a delicacy. Oh, and mom and I shared a piece of blueberry pie with blueberry ice cream. Yes, it was the best blueberry pie I have ever had. I am not exaggerating. It was SO good. We all got up in the middle of the night with horrible heartburn, so that has to tell you how good it was! Or that we had WAY too much butter..

Oct. 6:

We went whale watching today…..well….we “watched” for whales for about 4 hours and needless to say, we didn’t find any.  We did see a pod of dolphins, but not whales.  Unfortunately, what I mostly saw was a whole lot of people vomiting.  The boat ride out to the “whale grounds”, whatever that means, was over an hour and by the time we got there people were dropping like flies!  I had never in my life seen so much vomit or bags of vomit being carried around.  One poor woman ran by and went head first into the trashcan.  Ick.  My mom and I were luckily not effected by the unsavory display of puking.  As soon as the first person started retching, I made a beeline to the top of the ship to avoid being apart of the vomit domino effect.  I felt sorry for those people because they had another hour and a half boat ride back to shore.  It was also very cold and I couldn’t feel my feet by the time we docked, but I was NOT going to go inside where it was like puke-poloosa.  After that WONDERFUL experience, we did go to a restaurant and have some wonderful lobster bisque.  I did not let that vomitorama deter me  in my quest to eat lobster at least once a day while I was in Maine.  I also thank god that it was a nice sunny day and that I have a stomach of steel.  You have to be thankful for that.  I have a short video on my Facebook of the short dolphin sighting.  I did not video any of the vomiting……you’re welcome.

I think tomorrow we are going to Acadia and hike a few easy trails.  Mom and dad tell me that the Acadia lodge has the most amazing popovers that you will ever eat….so, I guess I’ll have to go there, if forced, to try them :). I’m not sure how I can endure such hardships! But, I’ll try.  Hopefully, I’ve seen the last of the motion sickness bags to last the rest of my life and tomorrow brings more sun, more lobster and less puke.

Happy Trails!