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Kittery, Maine
I guess maybe I asked for it, but who am I to say
I have been to Maine (and specifically to Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park) before. In fact, I have been there so many times that I’m at the point that I can no longer tell you how many times I have been there. If I had to guess, I would say its somewhere in the low thirties. I have climbed every mountain and walked (I think) every trail on Acadia’s east side, I have eaten so many blueberry pancakes that I can rank local restaurants with confidence, and right now, as I type, I am looking at five copies of the exact same Acadia trail book, meaning that at least four of these times I got up there, remembered I didn’t bring a trail book, and decided to buy the exact same one. Again and again and again and again.
So if I’ve been to Maine well more than half of the years that I have been alive, why am I going back in 2021? Well that answer is easy. If you are someone who has actually read all of the slideshows, you’ll remember that 2020 wasn’t my best year for travel (see “I think we’re alone now, there doesn’t seem to be anyone around,” Slide 1 of 1, 2020). By Fall 2021 I was eager to go somewhere, and no somewhere is better than a somewhere you’ve been to over thirty times.
My first trips to Maine and Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park were camping trips to Blackwoods with my family when I was still in elementary school. We drove for a lot of reasons, one being that when we went camping we took a lot of things with us. In fact, I was well out of graduate school and working before I realized that you could even fly up to Maine. Continental (now United) offered flights to Newark Airport direct to Bangor, only a little more than an hour or so away from Bar Harbor. Or you can fly an impossibly small plan right to Bar Harbor Airport, although to do that you’re going to have to change planes at Boston Logan and deal with exceptionally variable rental car rates that will always be notably higher than what you would pay at Bangor. Once I even tries flying to the awesomely named Portland Jetport, but the three hour drive proved the worst of both worlds, with hassles at the airport followed by a drive longer than you expected, and one you hoped to avoid by flying in the first place. It was at least 20 years since I drove the eight and a half hour drive, but in Fall 2021, eight and a half hours in a car seemed safer than anytime at all in an airport or on a plane.
As for that eight an a half hours, it is the time it would take if you drove straight through (80 to 287 to the Merritt to 91 to 84 to 90 to 290 to 495 to 95 (to 295 to 95) to 395 to1A to 3) without stopping, not counting a stop on the Massachusetts Turnpike for gas. But unless you’re doing that eight and a half hour drive overnight (which I have), it’s going to take longer. There will be traffic and construction and lunch. And even though I have done this drive a lot, I never really found a great lunch place along the way, until now. For whatever reason, I have driven by The Traveler Restaurant many times without noticing it, and only found it this time by looking at the Camera Obscura map to see if there was some interesting roadside attraction or oddity worth seeing along the route. The Traveler Restaurant was not listed on Camera Obscura because of its damn tasty onion rings (highly recommended) but rather because all guests are allowed to take free books with them as they leave, a wonderful gesture and experience at a place that is worth whatever time it might add to your eight and a half hour ride.
One advantage of driving to Maine is that it encourages you to find a place to stop overnight in order to break up the drive. This trip included a stop at Ogunquit, Maine, as lovely a seaside town as you could expect or hope to see.
And… we’re back.
This is a popover at the Jordan Pond House, an iconic snack that is instantly recognizable if you’ve been to Acadia National Park even once, and kind of confusing to explain to anyone who hasn’t been there at all. It’s located at Jordan Pond (which makes sense), with an iconic view of the Bubbles (twin mountains) and the pond and the lawn. You can eat outside and be part of the view, or avoid the bees and the rain and eat inside instead. If I have been to Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park over thirty times (and I have), then I am sure that I have eaten popovers at Jordan Pond House at least twenty times, if not more.
That’s the thing about visiting a place so many times- when you’re there it is still special, but you also know deep inside that you’ve seen a lot of it already and that you’ll surely be back to see it again one day- if not next year, then the year after that or the year after that. This results in a wonderful calm familiarity and an opportunity to just be there without a lot of the usual pressures I often put myself under while traveling. There are no checklists of things to see, no worries if the weather turns ugly, no disappointment if I can’t get into a restaurant or if a trail is closed, and this time there’s not even a specific time I need to be at Bangor Airport to leave. For once, I can just enjoy being there one more time.
If you visit a place over thirty times in your life, you start to develop favorite places, and the Asticou Azalea Garden in Northeast Harbor is one of them for me. I like it so much that I sometimes avoid going there when I’m in Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park, just so it doesn’t feel like it’s becoming a routine stop and so that the next time I visit, it will feel even more special. I realize the inherent contradiction of writing about visiting the same place over thirty times and then saying it’s better not to visit the same place over thirty times, but I am a great big ball of contradictions so let’s just go past that and appreciate the gardens, especially as the soft colors of fall make a special place even more special.
