Acadia National Park

Acadia National Park (on the rock-bound Maine island of Mount Desert - pronounced like dessert) was one of our favorite places to visit and we spent 4 nights there. It was the first national park east of the Mississippi and the first to have all the land donated by private citizens  The 45 miles of carriage roads made biking the park a real treat.

The dining traditions of Jordan Pond House date back to the late 1800's.  During that era teahouses were established to cater to the growing number of sophisticated summer visitors. The famous popovers and chowder with oyster crackers on top at Jordan's pond  was a nice break in a day of biking the carriage roads.

We visited Cadillac Mountain during the day as well as getting up early to see the sun rise on the USA

We had a great time exploring the rugged coast, the interior meadows as well as the stony beaches.

                                                   

 The National Park programs are always a worth while experience.  This ranger was a wealth of information as we enjoyed a boat tour of the area where we saw houses on the coast, osprey nests, seals and visited Cranberry Island.

Watching the tide roll into Thunder Hole.

It wouldn't be Maine if we didn't visit a light house....Bass Harbor Lighthouse.
What did we learn at the evening Ranger lead campfires?

• Acadia is the most polluted national park because of air pollution from coal burning electrical plants and cars in the states south.  Wind from the south gets caught over Acadia because of the land mass of Canada to the north.
• Barnacles have a sexual reproductive organ that proportionately would be like a man having the empire state building in his pants!
• The barnacle has two plates on it's house that traps a drop of water to keep it alive at high tide.
• The bubble fish is newly discovered and has a transparent head with a mouth, two nostrils and eyes that sees above and below at the same time.
• "Diva" crab is newly discovered at very low depth of the seafloor over warm vents.  It waves it's feathery claws over the vent to collect bacteria that they then run through their mouth.  The picture of one looked pretty cool.  The ranger was telling the children that there is still a ton of new things for them to discover in the oceans.
• Popping wrack seaweed has air pockets that allow the seaweed to float and photosynthesize in the sun.  The end claw looking bubble has all the reproductive material in it... hhhmmm and we like to pop those?
• Eagles are opportunist eaters and will sit above a Lune's nest until they hear the peeping inside the egg and then will attack and eat the eggs.
• Cod is almost non existent due to over fishing
• Lobster buoys are shaped like a torpedo to go with the waves.  The colors they are painted are registered with the state and match the colors on the flag on the lobster boat.
• Water from the arctic makes Maine Gulf cold which is good as cold water holds more oxygen.  The warm water from Cape Cod shoots over to Europe and doesn't reach Maine.
• Lobsters will eat each other if their claws are not banded.
• Lobsters have to be 6 inches to keep.  Ones with eggs will get their tail notched as an egg producing one and thrown back in the water.
• People should rinse their hands before exploring tide pools especially if the have deet bug spray, sunscreen, etc on them so you don't pollute the tide pools.  Don't wade into the pools and stoop and watch until the animals get used to your shadow and then they will reappear.
• Food chain from phyto plankton to a 100 gr. tuna sandwich takes 300,000 grams of phyto plankton to produce the tuna sandwich since only 10% of the plankton successfully moves up the chain.  
• It is estimated that between 70% and 80% of the oxygen in the atmosphere is produced by marine plants, of this phytoplankton is responsible for more than 45 - 50 %. Phytoplankton consumes barely half of the earth’s annual carbon-dioxide, together with algae it also should be about 80 %, so serious pollution may indeed cause a serious atmospheric crisis.
• Seastars (mistakenly call star fish) have little cutters on their spiny back which keep it clean of seaweed and barnacles, etc.  Flip a seastar over on your arm and feel it cut away the hairs on your arm.
• Seastars are pentaradial which means they will  have rays in multiples of  5, 10 or 15.  They have an eye on the end of each appendage.   They can eat prey bigger than their mouths by throwing their stomach outside their "body" and moving it into a shell or on a bigger animal to start digesting it until it is small enough to bring back into their body.
• Seastar not a star "fish" because a fish needs: water, gills, scales, backbone, has fins and is coldblooded.