Acadia National Park - part 1

Last year's Labor day weekend trip to Yellowstone had me looking forward to another amazing trip this year. Fortunately my friends planned for Acadia National Park and we simply jumped in. Our journey started on Friday evening by about 6 from Edison, NJ and we made into Portland, ME by 1 in the night.

So the morning began with breakfast in the hotel we stayed at - Hyatt Place Portland, after which we headed straight for the park. There were 2 vehicles so we decided to meet up at a restaurant on Jordan pond in the park. We arrived at the visitor centre and made contact with the other party, they said they had just left the visitor centre, so we headed for Jordan Pond. Unfortunately after lots of confusion, no network and atleast 2 hrs wasted, we finally met, had lunch and started off towards loop road. As soon as we start of on  Paradise road there's a photo stop and the first glimpse of Bar Harbor and the ocean beyond. It a  pretty view. The weather was awesome so everything looked very beautiful.

Our next stop was Schooner's head viewpoint. After some deliberation and persuasion we decided to take the small trail to the bottom. I am glad we went it was so pretty down there and it reminded me of my college days. The rocks, sea, friends and hours spent at Worli Seaface Mumbai.

As we continued on the park loop road the crowd seemed to increase. We next halted at sand beach. It was nice and warm but the water was cold. We didnt stop there for long. We continued on the loop road and halted at Thunder hole. It was quite interesting with the smooth, colored rocks and the thundering sound made by a tunnel like hole in a huge rock.

We went along the coast enjoying the views of the Atlantic. Occasionally stopping for pictures. Our next major stop was Jordan Pond. It was sunset time, actually a little past sunset. The water was very clear. The reflections were beautiful and we had some nice pictures taken :)

After sunset there's hardly anything to do in the park so we left for our hotel in Brewer, ME. Takeout dinner folowed by hours of UNO ended our day. Did I mention we were a group of 8 adults and a toddler.

Yellowstone part 6 - Grand prismatic

Hello everyone! I know this is way too late. I was quite busy this past one year in various things - my little boy, sister's wedding, job changes, visas, immigrations, international and domestic travels and what not.

So i realized today that I never finished my Yellowstone series. I cannot emphasize enough on how Yellowstone has been my best trip ever!

So on this morning we had to head back to our hotel in SLC and we were going to be taking the straight route and not the scenic drive, which meant we had ample time on hand. Our group started to depart from the cabin by 8 am and we were amongst the last to leave at around 10. The darling that my husband is, agreed to head back to the park to see Grand Prismatic.

Once we reached there the parking was horribly full. So we parked along the road and while I stayed with Rishi, V did a quick tour of the Grand Prismatic. He took some amazing pictures! Once he was back we headed to fairy falls trail head and did not have too much trouble finding a parking. Without wasting too much time I prepared my little backpack with water, SLR, my HTC m8, a pack of cookies and set of on the trail to see the most amazing sight of my life.

It is a fairly simple walk on a gravel road for the most part. After a walk of maybe half a mile I started to climb up the hill. You dont need to look for it really, the hill is overly crowded and you would just know - this is where you have to climb. I kept looking back to see if I was high enough to see it without any obstacles. I could see it pretty soon enough but I had a big zoom lens on my SLR and couldn't get the entire thing in one frame.  This one was 55-300 mm so I kept going higher and then I just decided to take pictures from my cell phone. I didn't want to take too long, was worried that Rishi was being difficult.

Well the descent wasn't too nice. Slippery mud all along! I think my shoes helped a lot. I hadn't hiked in almost 5 years and was a little rusty too. I tried my best to get back as soon as possible to relieve V from Rishi.

We headed towards firehole lake road, stopped to see White dome geyser, the wait was about 30 minutes. I guess we had just missed the previous eruption. It was pretty. The lake area was beautoful not to mention a small hot spring we stopped by a while. Then we moved down to another spot near Madison that we hadnt seen. We had lunch at the picnic area, picked up some brochures, saw an amazing view of the valley and headed for a long drive. It was almost 4pm I guess.

V enjoyed driving back too. He had fun driving on 80 miles limit roads. This route is pretty scenic too. I still had one small regret of not seeing the Tetons :(

Well well well we saw them from the road. Totally loved it. Someday I hope I will make it back to Yellowstone, do some hiking, visit Tetons, some sections we couldn't cover and still hope to be back again!