When we were planning our visit to Acadia National Park, we wanted to know the best things to do, but we also wanted to know how to navigate crowds. You may recall we had an uncomfortably crowded experience in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and weren’t eager to duplicate that.
Yet Acadia National Park is in the top ten most visited national parks in the U.S., with close to 4 million visitors a year. Keep in mind that most of the year, the weather here is dismal, so most of those visitations are crammed into a couple of months in the summer. Not only that, but out of 62 national parks, Acadia is number 49th in size (meaning – it’s tiny).
So to sum up: a lot of tourists crowd into a small area during the same couple of months. Given that news, how can visitors go and enjoy it? In fact, is it worth going?
Spoiler alert: if you’ve been here for any length of time, you know that I think every trip is worth it. But Acadia held a special place in my imagination.
I was born in Brunswick, Maine, yet moved shortly after I was born. While I don’t have any memories of the state, I still had some weird urge to see the land where I was born. Also, as a writer, I have forever had the daydream to go live in a small cottage on the coast of Maine, put on a big cable-knit sweater, and write for a living.Â
In short, Maine calls to me.
But I wanted the Maine that didn’t have tour buses.
We ended up taking our trip on a spring weekend in May, right as Bar Harbor and the Park were reopening, but before fees, tours, and reservations all went into effect. This was a brilliant time to go. Of course, we lucked out with two days of exquisite weather, so that helped. The weather in this part of the world is moody and can change in an instant. It makes it hard to plan too far in advance, so having a bit of flexibility is nice.
We did this trip without the kids (Mr. Family Trip and I try to do one trip a year just the two of us), and we had a brilliant time. Acadia National Park was romantic and offered so many things to do. It didn’t do anything to dissuade me from my writerly daydream. (All post-trip journaling actually indicates that this trip encouraged and fueled that daydream even more.)
Maine is rugged, inspirational, comfortable, and brave. I love it.
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Best Things to do in Acadia National Park (and what not to do!)
Table of Contents
Decide Which Areas of the Park You Want to See
Acadia National Park has three distinct sections. Those three sections are not contiguous. The most popular, and largest, is Mount Desert Island. Mount Desert Island has Jordan Pond House, a lot of the “main” attractions (like the Park Loop Road and Cadillac Mountain), and the town of Bar Harbor, are located. This is where we spent all of our time.
There is also the Schoodic Peninsula (read more about how to get there and what is on the Peninsula here) and Isle au Haut (read more about a day hiking the island here).
We visited Acadia before the high season began (in mid-May) and found the crowds in the Mount Desert area to be manageable. But I can imagine in high season (July and August) wanting to try some more remote parts of the park to escape crowds.
Where to Stay to Visit Acadia National Park
There are a LOT of places to stay in the area – something for every sensibility and budget. But I highly recommend staying in downtown Bar Harbor if you can, within walking distance to restaurants and bars. Downtown is quaint and fun, but trying to get there to park for a quick visit is complicated due to crowds and paid on-street parking.
We stayed at the West Street Hotel (and got a great rate since we were there right before the season officially started).
About the Park Loop Road (Hint: you can skip it)
We were in Acadia National Park before the busiest season (the high season) officially started, and it was still really busy. It wasn’t quite at the levels of our Great Smoky Mountains experience, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it feels that way in the summer. As I mentioned above, Acadia is popular.
There is a fee to enter here and whilst Acadia is 47,000 acres of land, the vast majority of visitors visit (and only see) the 27-mile Park Loop Road all on the east side of Mount Desert Island.
Park Loop Road is like an Icelandic model, where one drive has many scenic stops along the way. Thunder Hole, Sand Beach, Jordan Pond, and the entrance to Cadillac Mountain are all off this road. You kind of can’t avoid it, but you also kind of want to. (Although Park Loop Road is going to be the most accessible part of the park for anyone with mobility concerns.)
Parking lots overflow, people park in the right-hand lane of traffic, crowds stream over the roads to get to trails and cars. In short, it’s a mess (and, again, we weren’t even there in high season). The official Acadia NPS website warns:
During spring, summer, and fall months: The Park Loop Road can be very crowded. Have a back up plan if the area you wish to visit is full, or come back at a later time.
They recommend the free shuttle. While we did the Bubble hike off the Park Loop Road, we honestly weren’t impressed with the Park Loop Road for the amount of congestion you have to contend with. We liked biking into the area, but what we enjoyed the most were our experiences off the beaten path. Dorr Mountain was a tough hike but less visited. The other side of Mount Desert Island was also less visited. While we didn’t have time to do the Schoodic Peninsula or Isle au Haut, I can imagine those being very rewarding, too.
About Jordan Pond House: The Popover Scoop
The Jordan Pond House is the only concession stand inside the park. There are nice toilets and a gift shop, as well. The deck looks out over a field, the pond, and the two bubbles in the distance.
Jordan Pond House restaurant is also famous for its popovers. I’d say it’s outgrown its reputation at this point. This place is packed (uncomfortably so) when the restaurant is open. This is also on the Park Loop Road, which lends to its popularity.
Popovers are delicious pastries, think a muffin made out of a puff pastry that puffs over the top of the tin. (They say popovers are the American versions of Yorkshire puddings.)
The restaurant opens in mid-May, and although there is a concessions stand on the floor above the restaurant, the only way to get popovers at that time is to get a table in the restaurant. But the reservations system was broken when we went, so it was chaos. The wait is 1-2 hours, depending on the time of day.
Beginning Memorial Day weekend, they open a popover and prosecco “bar” on the lawn outside the Jordan Pond House, where customers can buy only popovers through an express experience.
Also beginning Memorial Day, they offer a teamtime event package you can reserve in advance that offers popovers as part of the menu.
Pro-tip 1: The parking lot isn’t big enough to accommodate all the visitors. So use the bus or bike in.
Pro-tip 2: We learned through talking to someone who lives in Bar Harbor that a former employee of Jordan Pond House uses the exact same recipe and sells popovers at The Stadium coffee shop in downtown Bar Harbor. This little coffee shop doesn’t have any indoor seating, but you can get a delicious popover to go (complete with blueberry jam and maple butter) without having to deal with the crowds at Jordan Pond House.
What Hike to do in Acadia National Park - Bubbles and Ladders
We’ll share some of our hiking in a separate post to capture all of the details, but our best hiking was NOT on the Park Loop Road.
We intended to do the Beehives Trail and skipped it when we saw the line of people going up and down (no thanks!).
We couldn’t do the Precipice Trail as it was closed for peregrine falcon nesting.
What we did do, though, was great. We got our legs under us by doing the South Bubble Trail then walking the Pond Loop to the Jordan Pond House.
After that, we did an epic ladder hike up Dorr Mountain.
We also went to a different section of Mount Desert and did a very easy ramble on the Ships Harbor trail.
While we skipped the two most popular hikes in Acadia, it is a lot of fun to do a ladder or iron rung hike in the park. This blog post is a great round-up (although I would include Dorr Mountain). You do have to have a moderate level of fitness to do these, but a lot of people take their time and enjoy the creativity of the trail.
Drive Up Cadillac Mountain (What to Know)
Honestly, there is no reason to walk or bike up Cadillac Mountain. (If you are going to hike to a peak, go find one where there won’t be heaps of people in flip flops and skirts waiting for you at the top. Go be remote!)
But driving up Cadillac Mountain is worth it. The summit is 1530 ft and it is the highest point on the eastern seaboard. The road to the top is three miles long and not as crazy as the drive we did up Mount Washington. At the summit, there are bathrooms, a little shop, and some short trails that meander around the top so you can get different perspectives.
From early October through early March, it’s the first place in the country to witness the sun rise. Going up at sunrise is the Internet’s most popular way to do Cadillac Mountain but we declined. Sunrise is EARLY in Maine, and we were on vacation. Also, with the fog and clouds that are frequently part of the weather in Maine, there is a very good chance (especially at sunrise) that the top will be in a cloud. That was, indeed, the case during our visit, which gave us more reasons to decline to get up early to do this.
It can still be pretty in the fog, but also a smidge disappointing if you had your hopes set on an epic sunrise.
We had utmost flexibility during our visit (we were there before timed entries were required), and it was great to go to the top when the weather was clear.
At some point, the park limits access to the Cadillac Mountain Road to vehicles that have pre-purchased a timed entry ticket. (The free bus doesn’t go up the Cadillac Mountain Road, unfortunately.)
Tickets to Cadillac Road can be bought here: www.recreation.gov
- 30 percent of the Cadillac Summit Road Sunrise and Daytime vehicle reservations will be available for purchase at 10 am (ET) 90 days in advance of the reservation date.
70 percent of the Cadillac Summit Road Sunrise and Daytime vehicle reservations will be available for purchase at 10 am (ET) two days in advance of the reservation date.
You get a thirty-minute window to arrive at the base of Cadillac Mountain.
The sunrise tickets (which in May and June, sunrise was around 5:00 AM and you need to get there an hour before) sell out almost immediately upon release. The tickets throughout the other times of the day are more available.
Pro-Tip 3: Consider skipping the idea of a romantic sunrise trip and go at a time when you know you can get a ticket and you have time to more accurately predict if the weather will be clear.
Bike the Carriage Roads
There are over 45 miles of beautiful biking/horse trails inside Acadia National Park. We found this a wonderful way to explore the park for a bit.
You can read more in our article, but we rented bikes in downtown Bar Harbor, took a quick 1.7-mile path into the park, and then spent miles exploring. We even biked back to the Jordan Pond House to see if the restaurant situation was any different/better (it wasn’t). But either way, biking was a fun and unique way to see a national park.
Get to the Other Side of Mount Desert Island
As I mentioned above, we never made it off the Mount Desert Island portion of the park to Schoodic Peninsula or Isle au Haut, but we did spend a day driving the entire Mount Desert Island and loved seeing the non-park coastal towns as well as other parts of the park.
This was an easy half-day trip, complete with some stops to get out and explore. But it felt calmer.
Bass Island lighthouse was a bit underwhelming (especially after the lighthouses in Canada), but it was still interesting to see. You can not go inside it, and there isn’t a great way to get a view of it from the coast either. It is occupied in the summer, a ranger mentioned, and I like daydreaming about a life lived in a lighthouse. It seems so romantic.
Walk Across the Sandar to Bar Island
Across the harbor in Bar Harbor, you can see an island that is part of Acadia National Park – Bar Island. When the tide is out, a “sandbar” is exposed and people can walk across water and over to the island, looking back on downtown Bar Harbor. (For the official website, click here.)
If you know when low tide is (our hotel handed out updated tide charts when we checked in for this purpose), you have 1.5 hours before and 1.5 hours after high tide to walk across. If you lose track of time and get stuck on the island, you are there for 9 hours (although there is a sign for a number to call to hire a taxi boat if you get stranded).
We walked across the Sandbar, up a little rise on Bar Island, and back. It was 1.2 miles with 61 feet of elevation to do this. There are more trails to hike on the island, but the weather was overcast when we went. (The fun for us was walking the gravel path that is usually covered by water.)
I thought it would be muddy and deep since it is usually underwater, but it was crushed stone and gravel. Pretty easy walking!
There are signs downtown that lead to the trail, but you can catch it down a side street right next to the Bar Harbor Club.
We felt we experienced some of the best things to do in Acadia National Park, and found some ways to avoid crowds. There is still so much to unearth and discover there, though. And perhaps when I move into my coastal Maine cottage to write, I’ll get time to explore it all. A woman is never too old to dream…
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