The last time I was in Maine was in 1995, on a rainy June evening when we just barely drove over the border to eat supper. We were hitting a bunch of the New England states but didn't have a lot of time for Maine. We watched my Dad eat lobster (while we ate something else...lobster didn't interest the rest of us) and then went back to our campground. That was my experience with Maine until this past June.
I am not entirely sure how I became aware of Acadia but it's been a place I've wanted to visit for years. I looked into going a few years ago but when I realized the drive was further than driving to the Gulf Coast...we went south instead. But now, with our boys at the ages they are, and having survived our 20.5 hour drive home last summer...I knew we could handle the drive to Acadia. I had the bones of this trip planned a whole year before we took it! (And the details planned about 3 days before we left.)
I have posts coming the next few days about our day in Bar Harbor and another with all the specific hikes we did in Acadia, since reading details from others made planning our trip much easier for me! This will cover our hours at Niagara Falls, and some of the logistics of our trip.
Mount Desert Island, home to Acadia National Park and Bar Harbor, is 1,100 miles from our home in Northern Indiana. That drive needed broken up. When I saw that Google Maps recommended we drive right by Buffalo, New York, Niagara Falls seemed like a natural stop. It was only about 6 hours from home but we could fit in a stop at the Falls in the afternoon/evening and then be back on the road in the morning.
We spent 5 nights in Maine which gave us 4 full days to explore there. It was quite a bit of driving for those 4 days but the whole family agreed that it was worth it. We spent 45 hours in the car (that includes our driving around Acadia) but we all LOVED Maine. It quickly became one of my favorite places I have been.
Where We Stayed
On our first trip through Buffalo, we stayed at a Home 2 Suites which was wonderful: good breakfast, had a curtain to separate our bed from the boys' pull-out couch, dark curtains (not that we got to sleep in much), a ¾ size fridge (very nice for our cooler full of food!) and recycling bins in the room!
In Maine we stayed on Mount Desert Island, in a Deluxe Cabin at a KOA.
I had picked this place YEARS ago and booked it almost 6 months before
our trip (my parents are still going to the same place later this year
and my Mom booked their site even before I did!). We LOVE a deluxe KOA
cabin, they work very well for our family right now and what we are
looking for on vacation.
This one had our favorite layout to date. The boys had a small bunk room, Matt & I had our own (slightly larger) room, we had a full bathroom, a kitchen table, a couch, tv, mini fridge, microwave, and a good amount of outdoor space! When our car was parked (which was all the time we were at camp), our fire pit area was very private and Matt said the gas grill at our site was nicer than ours here! It was WONDERFUL. We were very busy seeing the sights in Maine so we didn't have a lot of extra time at camp but it was perfect for when we were. And only about 25-30 minutes to Acadia or Bar Harbor, depending where in the park we were going!
On the drive home we stay at a Tru by Hilton in Buffalo again. This gave us a 12 hours driving day followed by 6 hours (flipped of the drive out). It would have been helpful to maybe split it up to slightly more even days but, mentally, it was very nice to know we were well over half way on our drive back. Plus, I found that Tru in literally the same building as we had stayed at the Home 2 Suites on the drive out. I cannot tell you how delighted I was to pull off the highway after 12 hours of driving (plus stops) to a place we were familiar with (we knew when we stayed the first time that we'd be back in the same building 5 nights later) . The breakfast and check-in desks were the same, the rooms different, but I still find it hilarious that we stayed at the same, but different, hotels two weekends in a row. (We also did a Tru by Hilton when we did one night before Kings Island about a week before we left for Maine and that was also a good experience, we're fans of the chain now.)
This is the first time we've split up a drive and it was very much worth it. The driving 20.5 hours home last summer kinda killed any desire to do those overnight drives again and I did not regret spending money for a hotel on the way home.
Niagara Falls
Our hotel was about 30 minutes from the Falls but right off the highway. We prioritized getting going quicker on Sunday over a little more driving time on Saturday. So with dropping off our things at the hotel (at least the cooler and things we'd need overnight), we got to Niagara Falls about 5pm. We did metered parking on 3rd Street, $20 for 4 hours but if I had to do it again I'd try for the parking at the Niagara Falls Visitor's Center which I think was $20 for 24 hours. It would have been closer to the falls and felt a little less in the middle of nowhere. But our street parking was fine, just a little more walking.
We went to 5:30pm Mass (it was a Saturday) at St. Mary of the Cataract and then had 2.5 hours left! Time to find the falls!
We walked through the state park and eventually came across the falls, they were harder to find than I expected! We knew the general direction and just kept walking and eventually came upon them. I had been in 1994 with my family (both the American and Canadian sides...turns out I mostly remembered the Canadian and riding Maid of the Mist) and Matt didn't think he had ever been. So the American side felt pretty new to all of us!
We walked along the falls, which are stunning, and then paid a whole $3.75 to go out on a viewing platform (Sam was free!). We got a better view from up there of the Horseshoe, Canandian, Falls. (My Dad informs me that we drove over that bridge in the background to cross into Canada in 1994 but I have no memories of that. My boys know I HATE high bridges like that so maybe I just blocked it.)
Our $3.75 also let us walk down closer to the falls (where are the blue ponchoed people are from Maid of the Mist) which was a bit misty and muddy but we stayed dry. By this point it was almost 8pm and we were starving, took us a bit to decide what to do about supper. We picked up burgers and a hot dog to go with 5 minutes before closing at Flip Burger which seems to be an NY chain. Matt said the burgers reminded him of Shake Shack. So we got to eat outside and then walk through a bit of Goat Island t of Goat Island (if we had planned better we would have done more and gotten to see more of Horseshoe Falls). It was a PACKED 4 hours. A lot of walking (quickly) but we felt like we saw enough to make the whole thing worthwhile! It was a great start to our trip! I'd especially recommend that viewing platform. $3.75!!
The next day was a full 12 hours in the car. TWELVE HOURS, that was just driving. A LOT of New York State and then a lot of Massachusetts. It was about another 4 hours after getting to Maine. I was mostly proud that we did it with just 3, very efficient stops, 2 tanks of gas. Ate all our meals out of the back of the Pilot or while driving. We made very good time, a lot of withholding drinks to limit our stops!
Maine is known for blueberries, a fact I knew from my aunt visiting (what seemed like) often when I was a kid. I had a blueberry angel ornament that sits in my Nativity angel choir that she gave me sometime in the early-mid 1990s. Blueberries have long been one of my very favorite fruits, particularly perfectly ripe and freshly picked one, and I made it my mission to embrace blueberry flavors in Maine.
This was at the Jordan Pond House in Acadia, popovers and beverages (the boys were DELIGHTED that they got free ones...Luke loves a root beer). This was blueberry tea which was delightful on our first rainy, cold day there. It was good but a box to bring home was $26 for about 12 servings. I passed.
There was also blueberry hard cider, made somewhere in Maine (we try to buy local, at least from the same state, alcohol when traveling. Matt has much more luck finding local beer than I do local hard cider, although I was successful this time!) Drank some of this while we were supervising the boys playing in the water at the campground, not much swimming, just wading and searching for treasures. I thought it was cold (note the sweatshirt, I was wearing jeans too) but Luke especially loved it.
There were more blueberry items like actual blueberries although they were from Georgia, bought and eaten in Maine, since Maine's weren't in season yet! I think I did pretty well on the blueberry front! As well as blueberry pie, both at a restaurant with our lobster meal AND the half a pie I bought at the grocery store that we enjoyed at camp (the grocery store one was better).
Other Food Notes
We packed almost all of our meals, only eating out supper in Niagara Falls, lunch and supper on our Bar Harbor day, supper on the road on the drive home (a very disappointing McDonalds at a rest area on an NY toll road, literally the only thing within miles of the highway), and then two days of complimentary hotel breakfast. We did buy a few treats like mentioned above but all our full meals were packed from home (other than some produce, milk, alcohol, and pie we picked up at a grocery store in Maine). We packed all the rest of our meals over 7 nights. Gas was around $5/gallon when we were driving 2,500 miles so saving a bit of money on food was helpful (although we also buy plenty of snacks we only eat on trips so...it was still more expensive than a week of eating at home).
After a few days in Maine, Matt remarked "Maine does not disappoint." which is about the highest praise I've heard from him on any trip we've ever taken. It did not disappoint and I have framed MANY pictures of our trip since (switched out a lot of our family pictures around the house!). It was a wonderful experience that started our summer with a huge hit.
Bar Harbor is up tomorrow!
No comments:
Post a Comment