I was a year or two older than Kaeli when my family made a car trip up the northeast coast, ending with a visit to my father’s birth town. I remember many of the stops along the way, but my favorite was our day in Bar Harbor. When I hold my memory against the current city, there are many differences. Cities change and grow over time, but this may also be due to selective memories from our trip.
I recall eating clam chowder at a restaurant that overlooked the water. I had been taste testing clam chowders along the coastline that summer, trying to determine my favorite. I don’t recall which city won in my private contest, but I remember savoring each delicious bite. After our meal, I remember walking along the road with my aunt, looking at the wildlife along the coast, stretched out on the rocks. I know I saw puffins from the town and believe I saw seals, although it’s possible I’ve meshed my memory of San Fransisco with this one.
Puffins now only nest on one island and can only be viewed by boat. When I learned this, it made me so sad to see how much tourism has impacted the natural habitat of this unique creature. I let my mind roll down the rabbit hole of pollution, climate change and our natural resources, their value and our lack of priority in this world to protect them. After that brief sad sojourn and my incredulity that we would not be able to see puffins from the streets of Bar Harbor, we made other plans.
The Sand Bar
When John first read the description of the sand bar, I felt a light bulb go on, but couldn’t access a picture of it from my memory. This is unusual for me as I tend to store information in episodic memory, only recalling facts as part of a story. We drove around town so I could get my bearings, then parked the car in the plentiful street parking near the sand bar. It was a little tricky parking Dennis in the tiny spots, and maneuvering the beast through the tiny streets was a slow and tedious process. To park here, you enter your license plate number and payment at a self pay station, then leave the tag on your windshield. We are still driving around with temporary plates from Indiana where we bought Dennis as the Maryland Department of Motor Vehicles has not yet processed our registration and plates.
It is possible to drive on the sand bar, but we weren’t entirely sure we understood the tide window during our first trip and elected to skip this. We determined that pedestrians are able to move more quickly than vehicles (trying to avoid the pedestrians) and still didn’t want to see if Dennis could float in case we miscalculated our tide window on our subsequent visit.
The sand bar is a very unique area between Bar Island and the mainland of Bar Harbor. The island itself is located in the city of Gouldsboro, not Bar Harbor as one would assume. During Low Tide, the sand bar is exposed, creating a natural walkway between the two land masses. There is a “tide window” when the walkway is exposed gradually, then recedes gradually. There are multiple signs on both the mainland and the island warning visitors that the walkways will disappear at High Tide. There are specific instructions on how to access a water taxi if you are stranded (as seen below).
When we explored the island, we also saw a lean-to shelter of logs and wondered if it was built by individuals trapped on the island between Low Tides.
Bar Island is part of Acadia National Park, and signs ask guests to have a national park entrance pass to enter the island path; however, this is not checked in anyway. I do not believe that the sand bar, which is the main feature, is technically national park land, so it would be pretty crazy to try to enforce this.
When we returned to explore the island, we were all feeling tired from hiking Bubble Mountain the day before. The path up Bar mountain is an easy, gentle path through the island. The first section of path snakes through some forested area and is wide enough to accommodate a vehicle. There is some lavender growing where the forest meets the plain. We stuck some of the lavender inside our mask filter pockets and were met with a beautiful, light fragrance for the next week.
The next area is wide open like a plain and we saw deer romping while the sun beat down incessantly. It reminded me of a scene from the Lion King introducing the Pride Lands. Ginny even enjoyed this stark contrast, frolicking in the tall grass on our way back from the summit.
The easy walk was hindered by our sore, fatigued legs and hot sun. The whole trail is only 1.1 miles. When we approached the summit, the terrain changed to rocky.
It wasn’t difficult to traverse, but we saw many strollers, that has easily made it up the majority of the path, left behind in this section. This was not due to a mad rush back to beat the Tide Window; no babies were harmed in the hiking of this mountain. There is a large pile of stones which the kids enjoyed climbing up near the summit.
Similar to our experience at Shelving Rock, the summit is not the end of the journey, although many people turned around at this point. Continuing around the corner and down a path, we found a smaller clearing that provided the best views from Bar Island.
The views are beautiful, but it was anti-climactic after our Bubble Mountain views from the previous day.
It was funny to hear other hikers, some self-proclaimed New Yorkers who boasted that they had never missed the subway and wouldn’t miss the tide window, while others were just beginning their hike when we returned. The kids decided to drag a huge piece of driftwood all the way down to the beach on their descent, enlisting John’s help stop times.
By far, the best part of the experience is the Sand Bar itself. There were some places to rest on the clearing at the edge of the island, but these areas were too crowded for our comfort level. John and I tried perching on various rocks, but they weren’t too comfortable, covered in barnacles.
All of the rocks in the sand bar have ocean growth, from barnacles to snails and other creatures, left behind and hoping to survive until the next high tide.
The kids loved wading through this area and finding creatures. It is a magical space, like walking on the ocean floor without scuba gear. John and I found this place to be “nice,” while the kids thought is was “spectacular.”
