Maine, Bar Harbor - Saturday, June 27, 2015 - Whale Watching

Whale watching today!!  I’m stepping outside of my comfort zone again today.  Since I don’t know how to swim I usually avoid being in a situation where I could possibly drown.  The advertisements said we would be going out about 20 miles from Bar Harbor into water that was 400 feet deep.  Sounded pretty scary until I realized I could drown in the deep end of a pool in someone’s backyard – might as well do it big if it is my day to go.

 

We had lunch at Stewman’s Downtown again today.  We watched a group of kayakers heading out.  That one headed for the pier ended up with its nose into it.

 

 

We really enjoyed our haddock sandwiches, mine was with sweet potato fries.

Our whale watching boat the Friendship V is similar to its sister ship.  We chose to sit outside at the rear of the second deck.  I wasn’t sure whether or not I would get seasick so this seemed like a good location J.  Not a problem, enjoyed every minute and it was a great picture taking location.

In the harbor the wind was pretty brisk.

The wheelhouse has lots of bells and whistles.

I made sure to check out the location of the life boats and the life jackets.

We are on our way.

Another picture of the schooner in the harbor.

The houses on the cliffs were amazing.  This one was my favorite.

This lighthouse isn’t always on the whale watching tour.  We were able to take a little longer trip today because the boat didn’t have to be back for another trip after us.  This is the light on Mount Desert Rock.  The lighthouse was built in 1847.  This lighthouse is further offshore (21 miles) and more exposed than any other on the east coast.  The “rock” is only 600 yards long and 200 yards wide.  It is frequently submerged by waves in storms.  The keepers of this lighthouse were paid more than keepers of other lighthouses, they had to be pretty hearty souls to be able to stand the isolation and barren location.  Rainwater was collected but drinking water had to be shipped in.  Electricity was provided by a small gas powered generator.  There hasn’t been a keeper on the island since the 1970’s when the light was automated.

In 2009 Hurricane Bill did a lot of damage to the house and outbuildings.  All of the furniture and equipment on the first floor of the house were ruined when it flooded almost to the ceiling.

Now the only inhabitants of the island are harbor and grey seals.  A few looked like they were coming out to greet us.

See the mountains faintly in the distance?  That is where we came from.  We ended up being 37 miles from Bar Harbor in water that was over 500 feet deep.

The whale we spotted today was a fin whale or razorback.  This is the second largest of the whales reaching up to 90 feet in length and about 73 tons.  They are called the “greyhound of the water” because they can reach speeds of over 25 mph.  Our captain clocked this one today at about 16 mph.  This species of whale is an endangered species right now.

The whale today never got completely out of the water.  This type of whale can leave the water entirely and then dive to a depth of 800 feet in search of food.

 

 

Since it had to come up for air about every 15 minutes we got several looks at it.

 

 

 

I know that since there isn’t anything in the picture to compare it to it is hard to judge it’s size (this could be a sardine swimming in a pan J)  You’ll have to trust me on this one – it was huge!

 

 

The water was kind of choppy in the harbor, but it was very calm out where we ended up watching the whale.

Although I started out on the outside of my comfort zone, I would do this again.  It was an amazing day.

Maine, Bar Harbor - Thursday, June 25, 2015 - Bar Harbor

The weather hasn’t been cooperating – it’s been rainy and overcast since we were last out on Saturday.  Temps are in the mid-70’s today but the wind is still pretty brisk.  It is supposed to be nice through the weekend so we have extended our stay here for a couple more days, we’ll be leaving here Sunday morning.  Then we’ll be heading south to York, Maine to meet up with Robyn, Jason and Maddie for a week.

Bar Harbor (that is pronounced bah ha bah if you are a local) was our destination for today.  Tourist season doesn’t officially begin here until July 4 but evidently all of the locals were out for one last hurrah before that since the weather was nice.  Our waiter at lunch told us that the locals don’t come out during tourist season J.  Since we are from Indiana I can relate this to being in Nashville, IN in the Fall trying to find a parking space at lunchtime – only worse.  This place is packed!!  We did manage to snag a prime parking spot but it had a 2 hour limit.

Since I had four days to review Bar Harbor literature, I had time to pick out a few sights I wanted to see.  Lunch was first on the list.  We cut through a small alley, not sure why no one else is in here, it is packed everywhere else.

 

 

Stewman’s Lobster Pound was our choice for lunch today.

Even though it was windy we chose to sit outside on the upstairs balcony.

This was the view from our table.  See that balcony off to the right in the second picture?  I’d love to sit up there in a rocking chair or porch swing wrapped up in a blanket and watch the storms come in.  Those picnic tables are another part of the restaurant, I think that is a little too up close to the water for a relaxing lunch.

 

 

My choice was a half ladle of lobster bisque, Greg chose clam chowder but I didn’t try to get a picture of his, he was already enjoying it.

We both chose Lobster Cobb Salads – I would highly recommend it.

The hotel across the street from the restaurant is bound to have some pretty spectacular views of Frenchman Bay.

There was supposed to be a cruise ship into the pier this morning according to a newsletter I was reading but it was nowhere to be seen, don’t know if it was late or the newsletter was wrong.  Our waiter said they were expecting 400 ships to come in during the summer season – he said it is really congested then.  We did see a couple of schooners.  I think these are the ones that take you on tours but they must not be running yet because there was no dock out to them.

And beautiful Bar Harbor Inn is right on the Bay.

During low tide there is a sand bar that runs from Bar Harbor to Bar Island, you can walk across but be sure to be back before high tide or you are spending the night on the beach or in the woods.

A view of some of the downtown shops.  Do you see the moose?

 

 

I’ll bet he is more obvious at night.

Another view of Main Street looking down toward the Bay.

One of the shops I wanted to visit was the Christmas Spirit shop.  We got a Christmas ornament to remind us of the good times we have had in Maine.

Our last stop was the Acadia Country Store – lots of blueberry stuff here.  Blueberry season is mid-July into August according to the lady in the office here at the campground.  They have fresh blueberries in the campground store during the season, that’s something we haven’t seen anywhere else.  Fudge (lots of it) was just before you go out the door.  We couldn’t resist.  We brought home a small piece of dark chocolate caramel toffee – yum.

Time to head back to the bike, our two hours is probably more than over.  Tomorrow we plan to be getting on one of these at 1:00 to go whale watching