Exploring Tidepools

Before arriving in Bar Harbor, we made reservations to attend a tide  pool program through the national park. I like to attend programs sponsored by our local metro parks and have attended programs in the Smoky Mountains National Park before. There was a fee to attend this program, but based on our previous experiences and since we were unfamiliar with Acadia National Park, we figured it would be worth it. The rangers were nice but the program wasn't anything we couldn't have done on our own. Thankfully the fee wasn't too much. Once the rangers gave us time to explore on our own, we decided not to rejoin the group. This program took place along the Wonderland Trail. Having an underwater camera proved handy for some nice pictures in the tide pools.


I felt bad for the rangers in those long pants. It was at least 95* & very humid.
This ranger is a school teacher in New York the rest of the year.

They found some quartz and were convinced they could make a little $ if they managed to break some off.

Later during vacation we explored the Bar Island trail. It's a sandbar between Bar Island and Bar Harbor that is exposed for 4 hours around low tide. You can actually drive across the sandbar to Bar Island and hike over there, but we stuck with exploring the trail. It was another foggy day, as you can tell by the cell phone pics I took. It was a really good day for finding tide pool treasures, though! The time we spent exploring this area was probably my second favorite part of our vacation. (Fishing was #1 for all of us. More on that later.)

 

This guy was trying to hide again after we discovered him: