Post by Grubb.
Sunday morning we got up early and headed over to the ocean edge of Acadia National Park to climb the peak of Gorham Mountain. All 525 feet! Welcome to a world where mountains are the size of what I’ve been accustomed to experiencing as hills in New Mexico. So at the start today the proportions looked to be Lilliputian. That was before we saw a sign at the bottom of the Gorham Mountain Trail pointing to a path of tumbled together granite slabs that seemed to be meant for a race of giants. Okay, back to the Brobdignabian realm. You have to be on your toes in this topsy-turvy dimension!
If yesterday we were walking on flat wooden planks around a lake, today we were hiking on stone steeply uphill. And it wasn’t always clear what direction we should take over the jumbled jumbo-size rocks. The only trail markers were blue swatches of paint that didn’t always crop up when needed. Because we hit the trail, or rather, stone staircase, before the late morning hordes appeared, it was lightly traveled and we couldn’t rely on family noise to guide us in the right direction. But as we neared the top, the trees thinned revealing a grand shoreline view that, because of the precipitous drop, kept us on our hard rock course.
In another flashback, picking my way over the uneven eroded stones reminded me of half-hopping over the lava bed of New Mexico’s El Malpais National Monument outside of Grants—the same fierce attention had to be paid. Reaching the peak we joined a gathering of hikers recording, like generations of hikers before them, the sweep of the Acadian seashore below.
Descending Gorham Mountain towards Sandy Beach, we trekked through groves of bright red maple and yellow poplars catching light from a sun that had been obscured by vaporous clouds yesterday. Glancing up behind us, we saw a winding line of climbers giving name to the rock as they groped their way up “The Beehive” (a route we had decided to leave to those genetic marvels with goat DNA).
Sandy Beach was, well, just that. The trail that led from the beach to where we were parked passed Thunder Hole, a large outcropping of sheer stone that allowed waves to crash against the rocks and spray onlookers. It appeared to have attracted bus loads of families. (We’ve noticed that family groups materialize after eleven and swarm the sights en masse.)
It was almost noon and time for us to flee the area. Northeast Harbor, where we were staying, had a relatively quiet marina and a charming cafe where a blueberry scone and a mango smoothie were the order of the hour.