From http://www.nps.gov/acad/photosmultimedia/Earthquake-Effects.htm

There’s a joke that goes: things are so bad in California, even the earthquakes are moving east. On October 2, 2006 at 8:07 PM a 4.2 magnitude earthquake rocked Mount Desert Island. The epicenter was in the ocean just off Schooner Head, north of Sand Beach. We felt it here at your Acadia vacation apartment, SeaCat’s Rest. It was kind of like a big invisible gravel truck driving through our house. Nothing fell over and I’m sure our west coast friends would laugh at our reaction. One response from San Francisco to the Virginia quake of August 2011 was, “We eat 5.9 for breakfast.”

Reported effects, 10/03/2006, from http://earthquake.usgs.gov

What a shame they can’t let us have a little excitement! But really, the effects were quite mild. The worst damage was done to trails in Acadia; primarily precipice trail, where true to its name there are sections where the steep ascent got littered with rocks, some quite big. Fortunately there were no hikers on this trail at 8:07 PM on October 2.

From http://www.nps.gov/acad/photosmultimedia/Earthquake-Effects.htm

The rocks that fell were part of unstable formations anyway, subject to frequent similar events usually due to freeze/thaw cycles. Besides the precipice trail the only other affected spot was on the Park Loop Road, which was closed for a while until heavy equipment could clear the rubble.

So how common are earthquakes in Maine and what does it say about our plate tectonics? A report in the Seismological Society of America says,

No seismically active geologic structures have yet been confirmed in the northeastern United States (Ebel and Kafka 1991).

According to the report, small tremors in the area can be attributed to remnants of ice age glaciation; layers of rock still rebounding from the weight, which I interpret from their “minor offsets of glacial striations”. But the report goes on to caution,

Nevertheless, the persistence of small-earthquake activity over time and the historic occurrences of past damaging earthquakes (e.g., Ebel 1996; Ebel 2000; Ebel et al. 2000; Ebel 2006) indicate that there must be some seismically active structures in the region that are capable of hosting earthquakes above magnitude 6.0. Because such earthquakes are capable of causing significant damage, there is great incentive to learn which structures are seismically active in this heavily populated region.

Our earthquakes are  “intraplate” earthquakes, we have no clashing tectonic plates below us. A map of historical New England quakes looks like a shotgun pattern. The only area which can be considered an exception is Quebec, where the top of Lake Ontario and the Gaspé peninsula show clusters of quakes. We had two other notable quakes, one in 1940 and another in 1755. These were dish-breakers and chimney-topplers, but not killers. Besides these, there were many rumblers, and we can expect many more. If the past is any indication, Mainers and visitors should not be too worried.

Humpback whale, from C. O. A.

One of our recent guests to SeaCat’s Rest wanted to come in early October, but was concerned that the whale watching cruises would be over by then. I contacted Bar Harbor Whale Watch Co. and they told me that the usual end point for whale trips was anytime after the middle of  October, and the reason is that the whales pack up and leave, and arrive again in May (cruises start in June).

The twenty-first century “whaling industry” is much different from the 19th century, when whales were hunted for their fat content in pre-petroleum America. Besides the whale watch trips, which are not as disruptive and invasive as you may think, College of the Atlantic has a major program of whale study, including the  Adopt-A-Whale program and stranding rescue. Both these programs are done by Allied Whale, and more can be learned by visiting the Bar Harbor Whale Museum. Whale adoption helps to fund research and is quite affordable. For $30 you can adopt a finback or humpback whale and for $40, a mother and calf pair. You get adoption papers too! A great Christmas gift idea.

You may think the whale watch boats chase down the whales and bother them. Actually, once the boat is in the area, the whales like to come by for a visit. They like to roll around and show off, seeming to enjoy the encounter. Whales are very intelligent animals, a finback’s brain weighs 6.9 kilograms, five times a human’s. If the boats were bothering them I think they’d let us know, and the College of the Atlantic (C.O.A.) and Allied Whale would not accept funding donations from the cruise operators.

Besides smaller marine mammals and birds, the whales you are likely to see on the whale watch boats leaving from Bar Harbor are finback, humpback and minke. Occasionally the endangered northern right whale is sighted. At 130 tons and a length of up to 89 feet, the finback is the biggest in the area, second only to the blue whale. Humpbacks come in second with a length of 56 feet and a weight of 45 tons, but they’re the most athletic, as the above sequence of pictures reveals. Finally, the minkes weigh 5-10 tons and are up to 35 feet long.

The trip out to the whale habitat is long, about to the middle of the Gulf of Maine, or halfway to Nova Scotia. This is serious ocean out here and the waves are often big swells. Until the new catamarans (twin hulls) were adopted, the journey was unpleasant for folks with sensitive stomachs. Now it’s much better, but the motion can still be a factor. The twin hulls also mean a faster trip so more time is available for watching and less for getting there.

Most of the activities in and around Acadia National Park are environmentally benign and the whale watch cruises are no exception. At around $62 for adults ($11 for kids under 6 and $31 for older kids) the price for a trip is not cheap but also not outrageous. Spend the following day on a hike for free (scroll down for one) and the daily cost averages lower. Thanks to youtube poster Richard for this fine video:

Guests of SeaCat’s Rest, our affordable Acadia lodgings, often ask what the best trails are in Acadia National Park, and I am called upon to recite pros and cons about the dozens (hundreds?) of trails available. So from time to time I write about one so that guests can find better info from this website instead of my fallible memory.

Guidebooks will often lead with the most popular trails and at some times of the year these trails may be a bit too crowded. The Beech Cliff Trail is off-the-beaten-track enough to almost guarantee an uncrowded experience. An instant measure is how full the parking lot is. If a trail lot is so filled with vehicles they are spilling out onto the roadside, you may wish to keep looking. It is no accident they call the west side of the island the “quiet side”. This is where the Beech Cliff Trail is.

Fomitopsis sp., growing on spruce

There are actually two ways to get to this trail. One starts at the Echo Lake beach lot at the bottom of Echo Lake just before Southwest Harbor on Route 102. This option involves a very vertical ascent and narrow cliff-edge trail suitable only for a mountain goat. This section is also known as the Beech Cliff Ladder Trail. Instead I would advise option two, entered from the other side of the ridge. Rather than driving to the bottom of Echo Lake, find Beech Hill Rd., just at the south end of Somesville. Turn right (west, assuming you are going south on 102) and when possible take left turns until you find yourself at the trailhead lot, about 2 miles from Somesville.

The first half of this short (.6 mile) trail winds through spruce woods but gradually becomes steeper and a bit more challenging. Finally you emerge at the cliff edge where you see Echo Lake and the ocean beyond. I hope you brought your camera!

Many times I’ve walked the trails of Acadia National Park wondering whether the trail I was on was worth the effort, or just a random cut through the woods, perhaps following an old deer trail. Then I emerge on a waterfall, panorama or other breathtaking vista and I remember that this area was loved and trekked by America’s first generation of  “rusticators” who felt that it needed to be protected and preserved for all. Most trails in Acadia are like this, works of natural art discovered 100 years ago and handed down to us intact.

The Beech Cliff Trail is often closed in the early summer because it is a nesting site for endangered peregrine falcons. To find out if the trail is closed call 288-3338 or go to www.nps.gov/acad.

http://www.eregulations.com/maine/hunting

The daily (except Sunday) banging of firearms coming from the woods, is over for another year.  True, Acadia National Park is always closed to hunting. In fact, some park roads are closed in firearms season to discourage poaching. For the rest of us, we can now venture outside without wearing orange. This hunting season in Maine, during which deer, bear, and moose  can be shot, ended Saturday, November 26. Duck season is still on though. Sea ducks can be hunted with guns until January 31, 2012 and regular ducks until December 24.  Sea duck hunting goes on right off our shore, and it’s a little nerve-wracking. Admittedly, the boats are about a mile away, due north of Mount Desert Island, but the sound carries well over the water. The urge to duck (pardon the pun) is hard to resist. I have to remind myself that steel bird shot (lead is prohibited) will probably travel no further than 800 feet, about 1/7 of a mile. Bad for the duck but harmless to us.

http://www.eregulations.com/maine/hunting

So how does Maine do, safety wise, in hosting the primal hunting ritual? Actually not bad. This year was worse than the past few, with one fatality and two gunshot injuries but compared to 1970, when there were 52 incidents in the Pine Tree State we’re looking pretty good. Consider we’ve lost 4 hunters from fatal gunshots from 2000-2010 while Pennsylvania has lost 29 and Arkansas 36. That’s actual numbers, but in per-hunter statistics we don’t do bad either, averaging 42 incidents per 100,000 hunters in the ten year period. That’s 4.2 per year. Compare that to New Hampshire’s 5.6 per 100,000 per year and Vermont’s 5.5.

How did we achieve this goal? Two laws. One is the mandatory wearing of a very specific color of orange on the body and head. Still, according to a post on thefirearmsforum.com:

Blaze orange will not protect you from being shot by a color-blind hunter, and there are a lot of us out there….The thing that others need to be aware of is that Blaze Orange is the same color as Grass Green to me – make all the arguments you want to on the basis of wavelengths and stuff, it’s perception that counts. And more specifically, it’s the perception of the color-blind guy with a .30-06 three hundred yards away that counts.

And the other law requires a mandatory hunter’s training course. The training course law had an immediate effect on fatalities when it went into effect in 1986. Another law, called the positive identification law, requires hunters to ID their targets before pulling the trigger. Sounds like a no-brainer, but I guess some people need to think about it.

The first full winter I spent in Maine there was a terrible fatality. A young mother of year-old twins stepped outside her house wearing white mittens. She was shot dead in her backyard. Some people actually criticized her for her choice of handwear, I was appalled. The hunter was initially charged with manslaughter but not indicted. He was a scout leader and well loved in the community. The surviving husband and twin girls moved away shortly after the grand jury decision. Fortunately, this was the worst incident of its kind as far as I know in recent memory, and I think of it every year around this time.

As the reader can probably infer, I’m not big on hunting. But hunting season does bring cash into Maine at a time of year when not many folks want to be here, and the vast majority of hunters are careful and respectful of private property, and human life.  Now deer season’s over and I can walk through the woods without fear, which I will do as soon as I’m finished typing this. I think I’ll still wear orange.

Fall is barely showing its face to us on the shore of Frenchman Bay, yet we can see the end of our tourism season.  Not even the most creative liar can present November in Maine as something worth experiencing (weather-wise, at least), so SeaCat’s Rest will soon be empty once again. Still, this has been our best year so far, and even 2012 is starting to fill up (fair warning). The reports from Spring of 2011 indicated that visits to Acadia National Park were down 17% from 2010 in the first 5 months, but the weather was unusually rainy. Soon we’ll know how the rest of the summer went.

Here at SeaCat’s Rest  for 2011 we had visits from 13 states and one country besides the US, and the results are below. One group each from Maine, Vermont, NY, CT, MD, VA, FL, MN, WI, MI, WA and HI with 3 visiting groups from Pennsylvania. One family came all the way from Norwich, England. Our Hawaii visitors actually have a summer home nearby and used our place for overflow during a family reunion.In the spirit of catching up on SeaCat developments, we got the water analysis for our new well.  How many of your other vacation lodgings publish their water analysis? Bottom line, our water is safe to drink. We have a bit too much iron and manganese but that doesn’t affect human health. The most important part of the report, performed by the Maine State Health and Environmental Testing Laboratory is our low arsenic, bacteria and uranium.

PH   8.4    (highest allowed limit 8.5)

E. Coli   less than 1 per 100 ml

Coliform, total   less than 1 per 100 ml

Chloride   21 mg/L (highest allowed limit 250)

Fluoride   .05 mg/L (highest allowed limit 1.7)

Total hardness   71.9 mg/L

Nitrate Nitrogen   less than 0.05 mg/L

Nitrite Nitrogen   less than 0.05 mg/L

Arsenic  2.0 micrograms/L  (highest allowed limit 10)

Calcium 20 mg/L  (no limit set by EPA)

Copper .023 mg/L   (highest allowed limit 1.3)

Iron 2.1 mg/L   (exceeds aesthetic limit of .3)

Magnesium 5.5 mg/L  (no limit set by EPA)

Manganese .074 mg/L   (exceeds aesthetic limit of .05)

Uranium 5.1 micrograms/L  (highest allowed limit 30)

A website called mentorseries.com pairs up professional photographers with paying guests for treks to different parts of the world, and in September they are coming  here.  Leading this trek will be Daniel J. Cox, a veteran nature photographer and frequent contributor to National Geographic, National Wildlife and Wildlife Conservation; and Layne Kennedy, whose work has appeared in over a hundred different magazines world-wide on subjects as diverse as wolves in the Northern Hemisphere to boat builders in the Caribbean.

Even amateurs can find photographic opportunities here

Naturally, I can’t paste cool professional photos here, just one of mine, but I can link to the mentorseries website where you can read about signing up for the two day trek.  Also check out their slideshow of  Acadia photos here. Need a place to stay for your Fall photo trek? Our bookings for Fall are still as wide open as a Cadillac Mountain vista.

The economy today makes  folks with a job begin to think of how they might save some money on this year’s vacation.   Those with downsized or part time jobs might want to think of vacations closer to home.   Either situation might make a vacation in Maine just right for you.  People in Maine are very careful with their money.     That means if you know where to look, you too can save much money.

There are lots of things to do here that are free or low cost.

Start with muscle-powered sports.   Hiking and walking have the dual benefit of exercise and enjoyment in and around Bar Harbor and Acadia.   The carriage trails were designed for horses, but that means they are smooth and excellent walking paths.   There are no automobiles, only bicycles, an occasional horse drawn carriage or rider on horseback and other people on the path.     The most popular path is around Eagle lake.   However, one of my favorite walks is closer to Northeast Harbor.   Park at the Upper Hadlock Pond Parking area and cross the road.   Here is a link to the map of the carriage trails.

Take advantage of the free ranger lead talks and walks.   From the visitor center you can get the schedule of talks.   Be sure and arrive a bit early, because there can be quite a crowd that gathers in July and August.   Here are descriptions of one such walk.

Otter Point Walk (2 hours; easy to moderate 2-mile hike) Daily, Tue in French. Discover stories of history and nature along the strikingly scenic Ocean Path. Gorham Mountain parking area – Park Loop Road south of Thunder Hole.or join the night sky program or the Acadia at night program, where you learn to see like the nighttime animals do.   This link to the website has the schedules.    Some programs like the sailing adventures have a cost associated with them, but the majority are free.

This area that we live in has the best of both the sea and the woods for you to enjoy in one package.  You can combine camping out and  staying at a vacation home  here at Sea Cat’s Rest.    Our rental comes with kayaks included!  If your looking for a bargain yet this year, look about 10 miles away from Mount Desert Island.   The rates are lower, and you only spend about 10 minutes more in the car.   The town names to search for are: Lamoine, Trenton, Hancock and Surry.

Bring your own bicycle and you now have doubled the distance you can go with just a twirl of your pedals.   Bicycling is actually the most efficient way to get from point A to point B, plus you can put your bike right on those Island Explorer buses when you don’t want to bike uphill.

Like to read?   Don’t forget our small local libraries.   Read the local paper for free, read Downeast Magazine for free at the library in Ellsworth.   Read a local book, get internet access free at the library in the middle of the day.  Libraries on the island are many, and I will feature them in a future blog.   I especially like the Southwest Harbor Library, right across from the school.    You can cool off on the occasional hot day by spending an hour or two in the comfy reading rooms – and all of our libraries have internet access free – free wifi or on their computers.   Places in Ellsworth that offer free internet include the local coffeeshop The Maine Grind on Main Street, the library and MacDonalds.   In addition our town office here in Lamoine is a free WiFi spot.   Our house of course has free internet for our guests too.

SAVE MORE ON MEALS – cook for yourself.   By staying in a house instead of hotel, you can cook your own great meals, perhaps treating yourself to one or two days of great fresh seafood from cold Maine waters.   We can’t think of anything better than watching the lobster boats out in front of our place, and then enjoying lobsters from your own pot for dinner.   At different times in the year you can  pick the fruit that is in season: blueberries, strawberries and apples.   If you are our guest, we share our garden bounty with our renters.   See our wild food blog for some other tasty treats.

Also for the frugal, coordinate your visit with music and art festivals.  Bar Harbor Brass Week offers free concerts at the park in Bar Harbor, or wander the free art fairs in the summer.     The Belfast Maine Celtic Festival on July 17-18 and the Bangor American Folk Festival August 27,28,29, (free – but donate what you can afford)  and The North Atlantic Blues  Festival July 10th, 11th in Rockland are some of those in our area.

Didn’t bring the right clothes to wear?  It’s cool here, cooler than most places   If you forgot that fact, you can pick up some bargains at the resale shops in the area.   Jalysa’s attic in Ellsworth on Water Street or our new Goodwill Store in Ellsworth both offer fleece jackets at under $10.00 for those colder than they expected.   Need more long pants?  They are there too.  You can also find Maine themed clothing there if you are lucky.   We locals often purchase Maine themed clothing when it is on sale in the fall, and we recycle the clothes when they get too small or we don’t find ourselves needing them any longer.

Go with a larger group.   Find a friend to stay with on the way.   Vacation where you can stay with relatives.    Going with a larger group, you can go in on lodgings and food.   It’s often cheaper to rent a larger house, and vacation with another family or group of friends.   Instead of having to bring along a friend for our daughter, we brought along another family, so that the kids had someone to do stuff with – and we had adults to hang around with.   Have Grandma and Grandpa take the grand kids (along with you) on vacation.   They are bound to help out with treats and special adventures (plus you get to share the childcare and get off by yourself for a while).    Borrow items you need for the trip.   Perhaps you can borrow bicycles, or some camping equipment instead of purchasing new items.

Trade adventures, if you live in a nice place for others to vacation, perhaps you can exchange visits with old friends.   Have friends living in New York while you’re out in the country, perhaps you can each visit each others’ destinations for a bargain vacation for both of you.

It’s been a tough winter. The economy, war, disasters and brutal weather. The news shows seem to all be paid for by drug companies as ailment after ailment roll by in commercial messages.  Are we really that sick? What we need is a vacation!

Consider the benefits of a relaxing trip to the Bar Harbor area. You will find the cool sea air charged with negative ions which some claim have beneficial health effects. The ions surround dust particles and bacteria and cause them to drop out. Hospitals use ion generators to sterilize the air in operating rooms. From firstscience.com:

At the New York State Psychiatric Institute, researchers found that negative ion therapy helped to alleviate the symptoms of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), a type of winter depression. During a trial, people were exposed to high and low rate flows of negative ions while they slept. Many of the patients that were exposed to a higher density of negative ions showed an improvement in their symptoms.

Admittedly, there are more important health reasons to come here than negative ions. Acadia National Park will get you outdoors and moving. Exercise is a life-extender, and within these pages are ideas for hundreds of physical activities, all in beautiful pristine surroundings. There are 120 miles of hiking trails and 45 miles of carriage roads throughout Acadia National Park.

Let’s not neglect the importance of fresh food in the health arena. From the Environment News Service:

Eating a small amount of seafood high in omega-3 fatty acids, such as shrimp, tuna, salmon, pollock and catfish daily can cut the risk of death due to heart disease by 20 percent, according to studies released at the Seafood and Health conference in Washington this week.

You won’t find fresher seafood than what’s available here in Acadia. So to recap: Our cool ocean breezes deliver ion-charged air and relief from the heat of the South or stale air-conditioned buildings. Our ample trails and shoreline offer unlimited opportunities for healthy exercise. And the seafood is fresh and healthy. Once you cross that Maine border your stress will lift like the morning fog. You will find that people are more easygoing and the noise level drops.  We’re close, we’re affordable. What are you waiting for?

On the Great Head Trail. Family Ericaceae, Genus ?

Sometimes I find myself wanting to post professionals’ photographs to convey the beauty of Acadia National Park, but that would be stealing. That doesn’t mean my readers can’t take advantage of what I’ve found, I just can’t paste them here. Suffice to say, as a photographer, I come up short. My camera is inadequate, my technique is hit-and-miss and this webpage is supposed to conserve bandwidth to allow access to folks with dialup connections, which means my photos have to be limited to a few hundred kilobytes. So right off the bat I’m going to recommend visiting the work of Vietnamese/French/American photographer Quang-Tuan Luong. His work is stunning. He uses large format traditional cameras (remember film?) similar to the work of Ansel Adams, only in color. He has a great section on Acadia, and he was included in the documentary The National Parks, America’s Best Idea, a film by Ken Burns, 2009.

Photographing Acadia National Park could be the complete focus of a visit. Your specialty could be macro, like the flower above, telephoto for wildlife, landscape for the vistas and panoramas for the wrap-around presence. It’s easy now to download software to knit together photos into panoramas, but for the best results, bring a tripod. Tripods are a must for jiggle-free photos and panoramas require a series of individual photos with significant overlap but without up-and-down movement. The top of Cadillac Mountain is a place where panorama-making is a must.But I found that knitting photos of close water shots together doesn’t work unless the water is flat calm. The software can’t handle waves! The above was a series of photos united with a program called PanoramaPlus SE. The software compensates for stretching and exposure differences. It’s quite amazing.

Another great photography asset found in Acadia is our fog. It has a way of creating a mystical feel to your pictures. I’m no artist, but if you express your artistic side through photography, the Acadia area is a great place to create a work of art in 2011.

In continuation of my Top Ten series I’d like to list the top ten reasons to visit Acadia National Park this year. You may have many destinations to consider for your vacation; it’s a big world out there.

Bar Harbor from the top of Cadillac Mountain

1. It’s beautiful. There’s not much more I can add except to suggest watching the Jack Perkins video here. Otherwise, I’d use up all the space for this post just on this one topic. This video is the real deal, it really looks like that here.
2. Escape the heat. I put this toward the top because so many visitors come here for this reason. Even parts of the country nearby are much hotter in summer. This is because Mount Desert Island sticks out into the North Atlantic and is bathed in a cool ocean breeze throughout the summer. Imagine going to another park and not wanting to get out of your air-conditioned car. If you want to see the raw data, go here.
3. Affordability. Travel+Leisure Magazine rated our island at #1 for best island to visit in North America, and one of their 5 criteria was value. Accommodations are reasonable (especially here in Lamoine), activities are free or nearly so and restaurants are affordable.
4. Leave your car behind. The park is committed to reducing vehicular traffic and has a free shuttle bus service making it possible to get anywhere at almost anytime without a car. Also, the park’s 40+ miles of carriage paths are ideal for bicycling. Remember, you won’t need the car for air-conditioning, so why not give it a rest?
5. Nice people. Ever been to a travel destination where if you lay down your camera and look away it will be gone? Maine has the fourth lowest property crime rate in the country. Our folks are pleasant and helpful and our low-stress lifestyle makes them that way.
   
6. Get out on the water. Maine has a lot of shoreline, 3478 miles of it (more than California)  and you are missing out is you don’t enjoy it. Take the mail boat to Cranberry Island, rent a kayak or go out for a sail. See the seals and porpoises, puffins or blue whales. It’s all here on Mount Desert Island.
7. Exercise. While it’s possible to have a great visit to Acadia National Park without taking a hike, it is especially suited for physical activity. Even Martha Stewart wrote an article about it. Bicycling, horseback riding and kayaking are all available. Our breezy cool climate makes exercise a joy.
8. Culture and history. Acadia was the original vacation destination on the east coast and interesting people have been visiting and living here for centuries. Local museums cover the natural history and Native Americans, and guided walks feature the neighborhoods of wealthy summer residents. There’s a lot to learn about our history, so it’s best to read up before you come.
9. 

   Andrew Zimmern from discovery.com

   Seafood. How could we forget? Maine lobster is know the world over and this is the place to eat it. But there’s lots more: crab, clams, scallops, mussels, haddock, mackerel and shrimp. You can buy it fresh, have it at a restaurant or in some cases, harvest it yourself.

10. Nearness. Most folks considering a trip to Maine know that we are close to Boston (5 hours by car) and NY City (8-1/2 hours).  If you live on the east coast you will be within one or two day’s drive. If you are in Canada you will find us right on the way to Atlantic Canada from Montreal or Toronto. The Bangor International Airport, an hour away, has  non-stop flight to Detroit, Philadelphia, New York and Boston.

So when you decide about where to go this summer, keep this list handy and use it to compare with other places. We think we stack up pretty good. If you want some ideas about what to do when you get here, visit my Top Ten Things To Do In Acadia.