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Day 3, Part 2: Bar Harbor, Maine
I left off in part 1 as we were leaving Acadia National Park. It was lunch time, and the drive to the restaurant was interesting and scenic and allowed us to see some other parts of the island. Well, at least the adults thought it was interesting.
Bill was a wealth of knowledge and knew who owned every fancy house we saw, told us all sorts of stories about celebrities who summer here, and knew the history of pretty much everything we passed. At one point, some other tourists even approached him with questions because they could tell he knew so much about the area.
I didn’t take many pictures at this point because once again, a moving car does not equal good pictures. But, we did stop at the Jordan Pond Gatehouse for a picture:
Acadia National Park was created from a land donation from John D. Rockefeller Jr., who was initially opposed to vehicle traffic on the island. So, he oversaw the construction of more than 50 miles of carriage roads, as well as 16 bridges and 2 gatehouses (where the paths intersect the public roads) which today are used for walking and bicycling in the summer, and cross-country skiing and snowmobiling in the winter. Here is one of the bridges, with the tunnel on the left for a creek and the tunnel on the right for a carriage path:
We eventually made it to Beal’s Lobster Pier, a cute local restaurant which was far from the port and thus not popular with tourists. It was not crowded at all, probably because it was 2:00 by this point so after the peak lunch time. Bill had menus in the car so we were able to decide what we wanted ahead of time and order immediately upon arriving, which was great because we were all starving! Except for the muffins, we hadn’t eaten since about 7:30 that morning.
It was too chilly to sit outside so we found a table indoors.
One of the girls got a burger:
The homemade chips were fantastic! I got a lobster roll which was my first ever and SO good:
My husband got the lobster grilled cheese which was equally amazing:
This place was amazing (though pricey – I think our order was $92) and I am so glad that Bill brought us here.
After lunch it was time to start driving back into town to end the tour. Bill asked us if we wanted to be dropped off right at the ship or on Main Street to do some shopping. We chose Main Street as we still had plenty of time before the last tender at 5:30 PM and we had souvenirs to buy. Bill dropped us off and we thanked him for a great day. I highly recommend At Your Service Tours (not an ad -we paid full price) if you are ever in Bar Harbor.
While the sun was now shining, the wind had picked up and it actually felt colder than it had earlier in the day (except for when we were way up on Cadillac Mountain). The downtown area is really cute, and we found several great souvenir shops where we bought some shirts and a magnet.
We were so cold that when we passed the Pink Pastry Shop, I had to stop to get some coffee. The pastries looked too good to turn down so we also picked out some lemon-blueberry whoopie pies (I think it was their specialty, but not in the photo below) which were amazing!!!
Our youngest decided she wanted to get ice cream across the street, so my husband took her over there while we waited in line. She ended up picking the blueberry flavor (made with local berries of course), and I didn’t taste it but my husband said it was incredible.
Next we decided to make our way towards the ship.
We came to Agamont Park, which was right on the water and so charming and picturesque.
This is another one of my favorite pictures from the entire trip:
From the grassy area, there was a great view of the ship:
A nice man offered to take our picture, but unfortunately there was no way to avoid getting his shadow on us (we tried). It was also super cold, sunny and windy so we look a little odd.
I wish we could have stayed in this park longer, but it was too cold so we headed towards the tenders and got in line where my child stole my coffee.
We got onto the warm tender boat and went back to the Magic. I just realized that the boat in the picture below doesn’t look nearly as big as the one we were on, so I guess there were different sizes.
We got back onboard about 4:45 PM and went back to the rooms to rest for a while. We passed these on the way, which I think are my favorite Halloween decorations:
I also stopped by deck 4 on the way to take some pictures of Bar Harbor from the ship. Since the sun was not out, the lighting was not great:
There was a tender boat right below me:
We pretty much just rested until the evening show, “Twice Charmed” at 6:15. I had skipped this on the previous cruise so it was my first time to see it since 2014.
After the show, I’m not sure what the girls did, but my husband and I went to 80’s Music Trivia in O’Gills Pub at 7:30. This was so much fun! I wish we had thought to go to these before now. I think they have a version every night, with different time periods. It is always super crowded though, so get there early if you want to be able to sit down.
At 8:15 we met the girls at Animator’s Palate for dinner.
The Black Truffle Pasta Purseittes (great):
The Tomato Tarte (great):
This looks incredibly unappetizing (not helped by the poor lighting) and I’m not even sure what it is. I think one of the girls ordered the Lemon-Thyme Marinated Chicken Breast, and I remember them raving about how juicy and flavorful it was:
I wasn’t very hungry, so I got the Jumbo Shrimp Salad (good):
The show started and the pictures came to life.
The Warm Sticky Date Pudding (great):
The Cookies ‘n Cream Sundae (great):
The Lemon Ice Box Pie (good):
This must have come from the children’s menu, which I didn’t photograph. It was a fancy strawberry shortcake:
After dinner, we were all super tired from our early morning and long day, and we were also moving the clocks forward one hour so we skipped karaoke (which didn’t start until 11:00, so really 12:00) and went to bed. I guess Abhay thought we needed some more romance in our lives because he had left this for us which I thought was very cute and thoughtful:
The girls only got this:
Natali Webman says
So, this is the second time I’m reading this trip report. I’m dying to do this cruise and it’s available for next year. My question is about the tour guide in Maine. Are the stops ones that you requested or is it a generic tour?
Disney Cruise Mom says
Hi Natalie! I’m pretty sure that you can dictate where the guide takes you if that is your choice. You can email them to find out for sure. When we started our tour, we discussed where we were going to go. The only place on my list was Acadia, so our guide recommended a route around the island that started there and we said that would be perfect! I loved Bar Harbour and want to go back and spend a week there. I also loved the cruise itinerary and would love to do it again.