Over the bubbles and through the woods

Our kayaking friends finally reach
the far shore of Jordan Pond.

One last chance to hike Acadia.  Our flight leaves from Bangor at 6pm, so we check out, store our bags, and jump on a park bus once more.  We head to Jordan Pond.  Not to have pop-overs, which sadly I will miss out on this trip, but to hike around the pond and over the Bubble Mountains beyond.  We set out on the pond trail and are surprised that it is almost entirely planks.  Not smooth boardwalk that would be handicap accessible, but two plank wide balance beams almost all the way.  The ground is not that rough, so I can only assume this is to prevent erosion.  For most of the hike we see noone save two kayakers who are fighting the wind and quite a few white caps in the pond next to us.  In fact, they may be losing the battle as we manage to keep up and eventually pass them as we walk . . .  It makes us grateful that we didn't go with "Plan A" today, which was in fact to rent sea kayaks.  We meet more hikers as we reach the far side of the pond, but quickly duck onto the side trail over the bubbles, two bulbous mountains that stand watch over Jordan Pond.  One of the Bubbles is home to the famous Bubble Rock, a perched boulder that has looked primed to fall over the edge for centuries.  The trail we are on goes up a saddle between the two and we also do the side trails to summits of both North and South Bubble before heading down the other side to Eagle Lake, and onto a carriage path that ends our journey at Bubble Lake just missing the bus by a 30 seconds.  So we got an extended rest as we waited 40 minutes for the next bus.  We roll back into town, catch up with Kat and Kathy (our friends from the Schooner picture) eat lunch at the Side Street Cafe for what TripAdvisor rates as Bar Harbor's second best lobster roll (#1 was closed today).  They were excellent and I doubt #1 could have been any better.  Out of time, we catch a ride to Bangor for our flight home.

On top of one of the Bubbles . . .
probably South Bubble.

Bubble Rock.

And we're climbing the staircase to . . .

With a handful of daylight hours to spare after the cruise, Bruce and I set out for a nearby hike.  We caught the Bus to Sieur de Mont and headed up Dorr Mountain.  The trail is almost straight up with a staircase carved directly out of the mountain's granite bedrock acting as the trail for most of the >1000 ft ascent (my fitbit registered over 100 flights of stairs during the ascent).  We reached the top where we got great views of the Bay (including the next cruise on the schooner) and of nearby Cadillac Mountain.  At this point it was nearing dark, so we weighed the several options: head down and back up a saddle to Cadillac Mountain where we'd have to hitch a ride (no buses up there), or three other trails that could return us to Sieur de Mont.  We opted for the North Ridge trail which ended up being a 30+ degreee decent through a boulder field, which very quickly left the ridge top onto the east side of the mountain where the sun had already set.  We somehow managed to avoid limb breakage in our dark stumble down and made our way back to the bus stop just as darkness fell at the base.  We took a brief tour of the gardens where I once again viewed the "bird home" that we first discovered back in 2004, and then waited in pitch darkness and building cold until the last bus arrived to take us back to town.

View from Dorr Mountain, including our schooner on its next cruise.

Wandering the ocean bottom

I'm so bad at selfies!

Our conference is at the Bar Harbor Club.  Immediately behind the club is Bar Island, which at every low tide becomes attached to the mainland when the water uncovers a large section of seafloor.  I've never actually made it out there at low tide, so today when I noticed during a break that it was low tide I couldn't resist, so I slipped away and walked along the bottom of Frenchman's Bay in my conference clothes (very appropriate).  I envision a Rockefeller probably doing this same activity in a tuxedo at some point, today even in a polo shirt I'm definitely the most over-dressed person out today.  Mussels, barnacles and beautifully encrusted rocks are everywhere and despite my expectation, relatively little smell.  A nice escape for a few minutes.

Trodding the Beehive

Met up with my friend Bruce from work and jumped on a plane to Bangor, Maine this morning.  We're headed to Bar Harbor for a conference, but the Maine attraction is nearby Acadia National Park.  It is my third visit to Acadia and its one of those places I can never get enough of.  We made it into town just after noon and immediately made our way to the waterfront for a lobster lunch.  It would seem extravagant anywhere else, but we were far from the only ones doing it today.  Bruce got extra points for managing a lobster tail squirt that was so spectacular as to attract comments from nearby tables.  He was of course bib-less and got soaked.

Acadia has an excellent bus system which is absolutely free (sponsored by LL Bean).   Not only does it make it easy to see the park without a car, but it also reduces traffic and makes hiking easier as you don't need to do a round trip, but can do point to point hikes.  I think its a great model for all national parks, even if a corporate sponsor can't make it free.  Our waitress at lunch had recommended we do the Beehive hike, so we headed to Sand Beach and set out.  Beehive is a combination between a hike and a climb and several areas are traversed clinging to iron rungs mounted in the stone face.  The hike is fairly short but strenuous, and the views are definitely worthwhile.  Looking up from the ground it seems impossible to find a hikeable route up this face that wouldn't be a technical climb, but its there.  We took a brief rest on top and then took off on a hike around the Bowl and then to the summit of nearby Gorham Mountain before making our way back down to the coast and hiking back through Thunderhole and finally back to Sandy Beach; where we caught the last bus to Bar Harbor as the sun set.

The beehive from the base.  We climbed this face.

Still stinking of hiking and half-day old lobster (its a miracle we didn't get confronted by a seafood-loving Bear on the trail), we found a seat on the patio at Jalapeno's for excellent Maine-inspired (seafood) Mexican dishes.

Volcano to the ocean

After I changed clothes in a parking lot and figured out how to hang all my clothes and backpack items around the car to perhaps dry.  I headed south along the chain of craters road.  As advertised there are a chain of craters, lava fields, and eventually sweeping views of the ocean.  Once I reached the sea, I headed east toward the end of the road . . . or at least the current end of the road.  That is to say where the road was ended by a lava flow a couple of years ago.  They actually have the road blocked a mile or two from where the lava flowed, so I parked and started walking.  Eventually there were a series of rough road ahead signs, then I was there.  They had bulldozed a rough road through the lava so that scientists and park officials could still reach the other side.  I decided to follow this and see if I found anything interesting.  A couple of miles in I crested a hill and realized that the lava flow still went as far as the eye could see.  I have to admit when I heard that a lava flow blocked the road, I imagined a narrow stream of lava, not a stretch miles wide.  I knew that it was like 10 miles to the area where lava was actively flowing, so I eventually turned back, but decided to do the return trip out in the lava field proper and saw an amazing variety of lava forms from mounds and pillars to braided ropes.  Very cool.  I even saw a weird turquoise colored lava formation.

Surrounded by lava

Lava flows meet the sea

Where the road was ended

Colored lava

Life finds a way

Swirly lava

Rain and Hiking

I awoke this morning to what can only be described as driving rain.  I got ready, went to breakfast in the Hotel Restaurant. Still raining.  Read a book and caught up on email in the hotel solarium, still raining.  In fact I talked to my waitress at breakfast and the rain first hit yesterday afternoon to the West and apparently washed out the road near the Black Sand beach I went to yesterday afternoon.  Which was when I drove through there, apparently people canceled last night because they couldn't reach the volcano . . . so I must have just made it.  In fact, I do remember it starting to rain as I was leaving (see clouds in pictures).  Thank you lucky stars.

Anyway, around 11 I decided it was enough waiting and headed over to the visitor center and talked to a ranger.  My plan for the morning had been to do the 4 mile hike into and across the adjacent and slightly less active Kilauea Iki crater.  The ranger said it should be doable in the rain, so I went for it.  I bought a "weather-proof" jacket at the hotel gift store and set out.  Within 15 minutes my new jacket was completely soaked inside and out, my shoes were soaked and muddy, but the hike was fun.  On the bright side the rain kept down the crowds and it kept it cooler.  The hike was supposed to take 2-3 hours, I finished in 1:45 and even stopped in the bottom for a while to explore and took a mile or so side-trail to the Thurston Lava Tube near the top.  Unfortunately the rain kept me from snapping too many pics on my phone, but it was definitely worthwhile.  The lava tube was neat, but after the relative seclusion of the crater, I got claustrophobic with the endless line of tourists trying to access this relatively short trail with umbrellas (eye poking deices) in hand.

View of the Kilauea Iki Crater and trail from the rim (look closely, there are people down there).

Black Sand Beaches, Carmen San Diego, and the Wind Farm at the End of the World

As I head down the coast I hit two National Historic Parks: Kaloka-Honokohau and Pu'uhonua o Honauna.  Both were important Hawaiian cultural sites.  I did a bit of a hike at Kaloka-Honokohau, but even at 10am it is so hot and the sun is so intense that I decide to take a shorter route.  Nice ocean views and some exhibits on traditional fishing practices.   Pu'uhonua o Honauna was known as a place of refuge and was somewhere that people could go to claim amnesty under Hawaiian traditions.  There were still original Lava rock walls and several wooden structures and statues present, as well as a expansive lava flats that were eroded by the sea.  I was enjoying the beautiful view and then it happened: I saw an unmistakeable scene from my childhood.  The carvings and structure that were in the background of Where in the World is Carmen San Diego when she was hiding out in Hawaii.  I later did some internet surfing and confirmed my suspicion.  Very cool!

As I headed south I passed through the Kona coffee producing region.  Kona is far from the only place you can grow coffee in Hawaii, but it is a 15 mile stretch of mountainside that has an optimal combination of altitude, temperature, rain, and super rich volcanic soil.  As such it was where the Royal Hawaiians got their coffee, and it is still prized for its flavor.  I had been looking forward to visiting a Coffee Plantation.  Unfortunately, I discovered they are all closed on Sundays.  Luckily I did find a roadside coffee shack, so I could at least have a little taste while I drove through.

In this area, I also by chance passed a sign that said "Painted Church" and pointed down winding mountain roads.  I took a quick turn and a few miles later discovered this tiny white church perched on a hill.  I went inside and discovered an amazing array of murals on the walls.  Apparently the priest who built the Church in 1899, who had no artistic training, just started using common house paints to start beautifying the church in his spare time.  For someone with no training the murals were very impressive.

Further south I started to see the influences of the more active Mauna Loa volcano.  This included more lava fields, impressive sea cliffs, and beaches with interesting colored sand.  I made a side trip to South Point.  Which is just that, the most southerly piece of land in the United States.   While there I watched people dive off 200 foot cliffs and discovered that our most southerly point is also the site of a large wind farm.  Nearby was supposed to be a green sand beach, one of four in the world, unfortunately there are no roads to the beach.  I started the walk and reached the ocean after a mile or so, but then found out that after reaching the ocean it was another two and a half miles to the actual green sand beach.  It was in the mid 90's, high humidity, and I had no water left.  I was torn, but ultimately abandoned the quest.  Later in the day I talked to some tourists from Austria (who ironically used to live in Charleston).  They had paid some locals to take them to the beach in 4 wheelers.  They reported the beach as being tiny and not really green.  So I'm feeling a little bit better about my decision.

Lava flows and the wind farm at the end of the world

I consoled myself by finding a nice black sand beach at Panaliuu.  It wasn't very sunny, so I don't know if the photos do it justice, but it was quite a beautiful place. 

Panaliuu black sand beach

A unplanned drive in the mountains

I left work early today with the intent to drive South and make it for J's son's Bday in Georgia.  Unfortunately, I hit traffic everywhere and when I say everywhere, I mean the middle of nowhere, not in the cities where I expected it.  I'm already going on less sleep than optimal, so by the time I was only about 2 hours from the house and I had been in traffic for over 4 hours, I exited and drove west.  Ended up in Morgantown, WV where I found a hotel.  I spent the weekend wandering through the mountains of WV and VA, dodged some rain showers, drove a little of the Blue Ridge Parkway, and spent some time hiking near the Peaks of Otter and the James River.  Not the same as getting to see J and fam, but a spontaneous and welcome diversion!

Cool railroad bridge

My future homestead

A walk in the woods

A Peak of Otter

Skye

This morning we woke to amazing views and a nice day.  We packed a lunch and set off to explore the island.  I can't begin to describe the beauty of this place and I know that the photos below don't do the scenery justice, but we will share them anyway.  :)

Sunbeams!

Waterfalls!

Mountains!

Moors!

Highland Cow (fellow strawberry blond)

Old Man of Storr

More Storr

Kilt Rock

Sharing the road

Sheep at the beach

Pretty!

Amazing!

oooOOOooo!

 ~Sara

Unintentional Geocaching at Hadrian's Wall

After an excellent stay at the String of Horses Inn in Faugh, we set out eastward along Hadrian's Wall (yet another World Heritage Site).  The wall was built by the Romans in the second century A.D. to keep the unconquerable Picts in Scotland and marked the Northwestern extreme of the Roman Empire.  It was quite a feat spanning the entire width of the island from coast to coast over 80 miles.  It was also built along some of the most forbidding ridge lines in the region adding both to its security and difficulty to build.

Mom at Hadiran's Wall

After exploring a couple sections of the wall we came to an area called Cawburn Pass.  The Romans built milecastles every mile along the length of the wall, Cawburn has the ruins of one such outpost (Milecastle 42).  We hiked about half a kilometer to the wall.  There are gaps in the wall which we learned were due to quarrying of rock throughout the centuries, often removing the entire ridge that the wall was set upon.  But in areas where the wall still exists it is an impressively strong structure considering it has been exposed to the soggy, windy climate of the borderland moors for almost two millenia without maintenance.

Geocache at milecastle 42.

While at Cawburn, Mom noticed something lodged up under the wall.  I investigated and discovered that the English Heritage Trust had planted a geocache in the milecastle.  We opened it and found a booty of pirate related trinkets.  We left a note in the log and carefully placed it back under the wall (probably a tad more camouflaged than before).

Twice Brewed Inn and Pub

After Cawfield, we made a brief stop at the Housesteads Fort near a town called Twice Brewed (we couldn't resist stopping for lunch at the Twice Brewed Pub), before heading north for Scotland.  We arrived at the border by mid afternoon, just in time to see some strange guy back his car through traffic, so he could park it on the sidewalk next to the "Welcome to Scotland" marker and get a picture of it (it wasn't even that nice of a car) with the sign.  After waiting for him to clear out, we took a few pictures ourselves and headed for Edinburgh, where we arrived at our rented flat just in time to grab some fish and chips takeout and watch the season premier of Doctor Who on BBC-1!

Welcome to Scotland!

~Shawn

Hiking!!!

Today is a slow day at the conference, so I made plans to meet up with my high school friend Pete and do some hiking. Pete and I lost touch briefly after high school during which time we chose almost identical career paths and now get to reunite at most places where microbial ecologists congregate. I met up with Pete and his former labmates Stephan and Tim, as well as Tim's friend Elyse. We set out in Pete's rental car for points northward.




Our destination was the Boulder River Wilderness in Mt. Baker National Forest. After about an hour of driving we arrived at our destination. We hiked into the river valley, it was woody and remote and quiet. We climbed down to get closeups of hidden waterfalls, ran into some strange Germans, and also a friendly guy carrying a gun. In all we hiked about 7 miles and had a good time. It was great to get back out on the trail and catchup with Pete.

One last hike

Today we headed into Sequoia National Park. Having already visited the Mariposa and Grants groves at Yosemite and Kings Canyon we have already seen some big trees, but the Giant Forest at Sequoia contains the largest living thing on Earth, the General Sherman Sequoia, and a density of large trees that neither of the other parks came close to. We found a hike in the Lonely Planet guide which wound for 6 miles on various trails from the General Sherman tree to Moro Rock.



After the obligatory pictures and viewing of Sherman we quickly found our way away from the crowds and into what we found to be the much more enjoyable solitude of the backcountry. The hike took us by many other notable sequoia including the Pillars of Hercules, the Black Arch Tree, and the McKinley tree.



We eventually came to the Crescent Meadows where we were sadly forced to bypass the final mile of our trail due to a controlled burn in the area and took a shuttle bus to Moro Rock.


At Moro Rock we were faced with almost 400 often narrow steps to the top of this granite outcrop, where we were rewarded with beautiful views of the Great Western Divide and the southern Sierras. After a shuttle bus trip back to the car, we wound our way out of the Mountains one last time and headed toward San Diego.

- Posted by Shawn from our iPad

Location:Sequoia NP

The one where we were rewarded for walking long distances

Today we entered Yosemite National Park via Mono Lake. Mono Lake is a hypersaline lake which is 3 time saltier than the ocean. We took a few pictures, but then moved on to the main attraction. I have been to many national parks and have hiked many mountain ranges but the granite domes and forests of Yosemite are amazing and unique.



The three of us hiked to the upper cathedral lake and took in vistas that made us all repeat the words "beautiful" and "amazing" over and over again. The hike itself was 7.7 miles round trip and ascended over 1000ft to an altitude of almost 10,000 ft. The first assent was breathtaking, quite literally for me, but we made it. Even at Yosemite's peak season, we only encountered a few other people on the trail. It was one of the most tranquil and pristine places we had ever been. It made me think of Shangri-La. The sky was too perfectly blue and the greens so saturated that it didn't seem quite real. It was as if we were somehow transported into a work of art.

At the lake Emily had the idea to see if we could see the lower cathedral lake from where were. We trekked through the woods for a little while and were rewarded with the most amazing overlook yet. We had a snack break on a piece of granite that overlooked the lower cathedral lake and surrounding valley.


We decided that had we overused the words "amazing" and "beautiful" on this trip and so tried to think of new candidates. We tried out words like "fantabulous" and "splenderific" but in the end we decided that there were just no words that could begin to express the beauty of this place.



After the hike we started towards the bed and breakfast were we were to stay the night. We made the mistake of trusting Garmin to know where he was going and had to resort to looking for hard to see house numbers on dark and windy roads that never seemed to end. We found it though and it turned out to be a charming and cozy place.

- Posted by Sara from my iPad

Location:Yosemite National Park