Blue Skies Ahead (A Very Long Story, Part Two)

Day Two (cont'd)

After lunch, Monkey and I searched the island for two gardens that were supposedly open to visitors, but hard to find. They were. The first, Asticou Gardens, was right on a major road, but the sign for them was about a foot square and the letters were an inch high and were the same color as the sign. We drove by twice before we saw the entrance.

The Asticou Gardens were pretty. They were put together to showcase the rhododendrons and azaleas collected by some renowned botanist woman who used to live on Mount Desert Island. Many were in bloom when we visited, and the pond and sand garden were impressive, too. While we were there, the sky was misting, so, I'm sure the blooms are even more impressive in the sunshine, but we enjoyed them anyway.

From there, we headed a little further down the road to find the Thuya Gardens. They were also hard to find. Thuya is an inn that the Park Service operates, but it was still closed for the off-season. The gardens, however, and the Eliot Mountain Trail are still accessible if you can find your way to them. And the view from the terrace on the trail to the gardens is a nice overlook of Northeast Harbor below.

The hike up Eliot (not very strenuous) got Monkey a little overheated for some reason, but by the time we got to the top, she was feeling fine. The mist and the mossy conditions, a little different from the rockiness of The Beehive and Mount Champlain, gave this hike a Pacific Northwest feel. At times, Monkey and I felt like we were back in Oregon. Until we came back down to the views of lobster boats in the harbor--very un-Pacific Northwest-like!

After Thuya, it was back to the inn for showers and then off to dinner. Glorious seafood! And fresh! We were in hogfish heaven. A walk around the town of Bar Harbor and it was off to bed for us. The weather forecast was a good one for Tuesday. I dreamed I was a lobsterman, and all the mermaids were throwing me drops of sunshine....