SIMPLIFY

We return to Bar Harbor/Acadia Maine!

Last time we came here, Easton was 9 month old. We loved it so much, we promised to come again when the kids got older...and older they are!

We scored a great little house in the heart of downtown Bar Harbor. It's perfect and very affordable.

Sure, we would love a 2nd bathroom, but hey, we have to rough it a little bit!

Xander looking very collegiate.

Better than Disneyworld. This little rocky cove filled with shells and little creatures is my kids perfect escape.

This is Bar Harbor Island. The walkway to the island comes and goes with the tide.

Day 1 - we just barely missed it. Fortunately, we are 2 blocks away from this awesome site.

As we continue exploring, we hit this outdoor restaurant on the Pier.

Overpriced, yep. But a fun little experience.

What is your weight in lobster?

Loving the sweatshirts and fog.
We just left hot, muggy weather and this is like a dream!

Posing the way only boys can pose...looking up at main street in Bar Harbor.

Already wanting to buy things. I told them they can refer to the picture instead.

I actually wanted one of these adorable hand puppets.

Day trip to Jordan's Pond. The must-have Pop-overs with blueberry jam were amazing.

Yep, we also had blueberry soda. Did I mention it's blueberry season?

David's moose meatloaf.

Beginning our hike around the 'Pond'...a 3.5 mile pond.

We loved spying all signs of beaver life

Loving nature today.

As the tree roots crawl around the forest trail, a make-shift wooden-plank marks the way along a quarter of the pond.

Yep, hiked that too!

Bouldering on the way back down the mountain.

One morning, we decided to walk along the beach path.

Everyone balances rocks along the trails and beaches. Easton was a natural.

We enjoyed meadering along the bath, bouldering some more, and skipping rocks in the water.

This is some crazy big boulder that balances precariously on this outcropping of rock.

And after that nice walk, we enjoyed a little ice cream.

Yep, Easton got chocolate.

For dinner? Yep. Lobster.

Day after day of beautiful hikes. Can't beat the beautiful vistas and landscape by the water.

That whole series of pictures was the same hike...which ended up at the beach.

Does the hike end here? NO...it continues another couple of miles along the coastline.

Looking back behind Cache you can see where we started the hike.

Done! ...for today.

Now we are headed out for the ladder hike. It turns out we kind-of did it backwards, but it worked. We started out at the amazing look-out to Echo Lake. Then we climbed down and down iron ladders along the rock wall.

Once down to the bottom, we swam in the lake for an hour and climbed our way back up!

We finally hit the tide right and ventured across the land bridge to Bar Harbor Island.

Xander loves me the most!

David and the boys trying to catch lobsters, crabs, and any other creature.

Got one!

Another beautiful day ends!

Cadillac Mountain is the highest point at Acadia National Park.

And yes, we drove to the top and explored all around.

Then we headed across the way. Little did we realize that once we made it to the top of this neighbor mountain, we would see right where we just had been on Cadillac Mountain.

Don't be deceived. We thought these stone stairs were really cool too...until we climbed 10,000 of them! Seriously, this hike never ended. Stair after stair after stair. It was crazy.

With the many stops, came many pictures. They may look happy, but I was forcing them to smile. SO MUCH WHINING at this point. I love Declan's face throughout this hike as he reaches exhaustion.

Finally, a little change up in the path.

Scaling through some rocks and climbing a few more of our favorite iron ladders.

This point was actually pretty steep. The kids were scooting on their bums by this point.

But we were sure that meant we were close to the top...right? ....nope.

As we continued on, we went into some slick rock formations with great views.

This reminded me of Moah in Utah.

Are we there yet? ...nope.

WE MADE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!

The boys added their rocks to the structure and we enjoyed the nice breeze for a while before...yep...you guessed it...heading back down! At least it was a loop trail and there were much less stone steps on the way down. Not to mention all the blueberry bushes we found to maintain our strength.