Category Archives: News

News about Acadia National Park.

Artist in residence program a draw at Acadia National Park

UPDATE 07/07/2022: Deadline for applying for the 2023 Artist-in-Residence program at Acadia National Park is 9/30/2022.

Like generations of painters before him Robert Dorlac found inspiration along the rockbound coast of Maine, when he served as artist in residence at Acadia National Park this summer.

acadia watercolor

The many hues of Acadia’s granite contrast with the blue-green sea in one of Robert Dorlac’s watercolors. (Copyright Robert Dorlac. All rights reserved)

For photographer Jim Nickelson, it was the night sky and shimmering aurora borealis over Acadia.

And for the 16 others accepted this year into the Artist-in-Residence Program at Acadia National Park, the landscape in all its variety sparks the creativity, whether it’s expressed in writing or sculpture, collage or woodcut.

The program, also known as A-I-R, is one of more than 50 such residencies at national park units around the country, from Denali in Alaska to Herbert Hoover National Historic Site in Iowa, the Everglades in Florida to Cape Cod National Seashore in Massachusetts.

Artist in residence

The Northern Lights as seen from Cadillac, looking toward the city lights of Ellsworth, as captured by Jim Nickelson during his residency. (Copyright Jim Nickelson. All rights reserved.)

Every year, from 12 to 20 artists, plus 5 alternates, were selected for a 2- to 4-week residency by the park and its nonprofit partner, the Schoodic Institute. This includes housing for 14 nights provided on the campus of the Schoodic Education and Research Center, in the only section of the park on the mainland.

Those applying can be professional writers, composers, visual or performing artists. They are asked to participate in one public program each week of residency and donate a representative piece of work to be auctioned or sold, with the proceeds supporting the residency program. There is no stipend; the artists are technically considered volunteers. Continue reading →

Acadia National Park sets October record with 313,000 visitors

The highest number ever of October visitors to Acadia National Park may help make 2014 the busiest year in the park in more than a dozen years, despite November’s early snows, according to the latest park statistics and projections.

South Bubble Acadia National Park

Some of the visitors who contributed to a record-breaking October 2014 in Acadia National Park take in the sunshine and fall foliage from South Bubble. (Photo courtesy of Greg Saulmon)

“It does appear that this October was our highest by quite a lot,” said Charlie Jacobi, natural resource specialist for the park, who works with visitation statistics. A total of 313,323 visitors were tallied last month, while the previous October high was just over 301,000 in 2012, as reported on the National Park Service statistics Web site. Last year’s government shutdown led to artificially low October 2013 numbers.

“It’s the weather, the cruise ships, the gas prices perhaps, and just the general increase in shoulder season traffic. And maybe a summer publicity hangover,” Jacobi said in an e-mail. Earlier this year, Acadia was named America’s favorite place by viewers of “Good Morning America” and the No. 1 National Park by readers of USA Today.

Even with the snowstorms that hit Mount Desert Island beginning Nov. 2, closing park roads for days, it appears the annual visitation is “likely to be the highest in 12-15 years,” perhaps exceeding the 2.55 million figure from 2002, according to Jacobi. Continue reading →

Taking pride in being volunteers of Acadia National Park

Neither rain nor temperatures in the 40s could keep hundreds of volunteers from fanning across Acadia National Park’s carriage roads Saturday, to rake leaves and clear drainage ditches, and help protect against winter’s erosion.

Take Pride in Acadia Day

Some of the hundreds of volunteers during a sunnier Take Pride in Acadia Day in 2011. (NPS Photo / D.R. Hunt)

A rite of fall for 23 years, the Friends of Acadia’s Take Pride in Acadia Day is considered one of the most important volunteer efforts in the Maine national park, held the first Saturday every November. By preventing the damage of freeze-thaw cycles, the effort helps maintain the park’s iconic carriage roads for the enjoyment of bikers, walkers, joggers and riders on horse-drawn carriages.

The reward for the volunteers: Pride in a job well done; a traditional “CCC meal” of chili, cornbread and cider (plus a fourth “C” of cake), in a nod to the Civilian Conservation Corps that helped build the carriage roads during the Great Depression; and perhaps a fifth “C” of camaraderie.

America the Beautiful Volunteer Pass

After 250 hours of cumulative volunteer time in Acadia, you can get an America the Beautiful Volunteer Pass that gives you free admission to the park and other federal recreation land for 12 months.

If you missed this year’s Take Pride in Acadia Day, there are plenty of other chances to volunteer in Acadia National Park, and help care for a park that brings joy to more than 2 million visitors a year.

Among some of the rewards of these other volunteer opportunities, beyond the satisfaction of giving back: A free 12-month “America the Beautiful Volunteer Pass” to the park and other federal recreation lands, if you donate a cumulative 250 hours of time; the right to be a “VIP” (Volunteers in Parks) and wear a special patch, if you’ve applied for one of the formal volunteer programs; or a free 2- to 4-week stay in housing on the Schoodic Education and Research Center campus, if you are accepted as an Artist-in-Residence and offer public programs in your particular art form. Continue reading →

Acadia’s Island Explorer carries record 503,000 passengers

Acadia National Park and supporters appear to be succeeding in their campaign to persuade visitors to leave behind their cars when they enter the park.

Island Explorer bus in Acadia National Park

While the Island Explorer bus is fare-free, be sure to get an Acadia National Park visitor pass to help support that and other park services. (NPS photo)

According to new federal statistics, the Island Explorer, the park’s fare-free shuttle system, carried a record 503,224 passengers in 2014. It was the first time the system cracked 500,000 passengers for its estimated 3.5-month season of operation.

“The bus ridership was way up this year,” said Stuart West, chief ranger for Acadia National Park, in an e-mail. He referred questions about Island Explorer numbers to Paul Murphy, general manager for Downeast Transportation, Inc., which runs the Acadia bus shuttle.

The numbers for the bus system came as the Maine national park is on pace to attract about 2.7 million visitors this calendar year, the most in nearly 20 years, the federal statistics said.

The bus passenger statistics, made available on Tuesday on a National Park Service web site, show that passengers on the shuttle system increased by about 15 percent from 438,737 in 2012.

Island Explorer operates from late June through Columbus Day. The propane-powered buses have run since 1999, or 16 years, carrying 141,000 riders the first year. Continue reading →

Acadia National Park visitors most in nearly 20 years

Acadia National Park is on pace to attract the most visitors in about 20 years, new federal statistics indicate.

According to new statistics from the National Park Service, total visitors to the Maine national park jumped by 4.3 percent through September to 2.202 million, the largest percentage increase since the end of the recession in 2010, possibly partly because of an improving economy, good weather and a burst of positive national publicity.

Bass Harbor Lighthouse in Acadia National Park

Moon rises near Bass Harbor Lighthouse. (Photo by Greg Saulmon)

“The stellar weather this year definitely had a hand in the high visitation,” Stuart West, chief ranger, said in an e-mail. “Since the bulk of our visitors are within a day’s travel, the park’s visitation is usually reflective of the weather.”

People who arrive on cruise ships also played a role in the increase, West said.

Acadia National Park visitors are on track to total around 2.7 million visitors this calendar year, the most in nearly 20 years, judging by the number of visitors for the last three months in some prior years, according to the federal statistics .

“Cruise ships, weather, media attention, better economy,” said Charlie Jacobi, natural resource specialist for Acadia National Park, listing the reasons for the jump in visitors.

Camping this summer at Acadia National Park also increased substantially.

Visitors to Mount Desert Island – the location for most of the park – increased by 5.3 percent through September, according to statistics provided by the National Park Service.

A total of 2.202 million people visited  through September to all parts of the park, up from 2.111 million in 2013.

There were 1.978 million visitors to Mount Desert Island, an increase from 1.878 million in 2013. Continue reading →

Hawk Watch inspires, changes lives at Acadia National Park

From high atop Cadillac Mountain in Acadia National Park, volunteers and scientists are marking a big milestone this year at perhaps one of the best spots to watch migrating hawks, falcons and other raptors in North America.

The annual Hawk Watch program on the mountain peak is marking 20 years of operation at the Maine national park.

Angi King Johnston, science associate at the Schoodic Institute, leads hawk watch at Acadia National Park

Angi King-Johnston, science associate at the Schoodic Institute at Acadia National Park, peers through binoculars over Frenchman Bay during Hawk Watch on Cadillac Mountain.

Located off the Cadillac North Ridge Trail close to the 1,530-foot summit, the viewing area is free to everyone and open from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. each day, weather permitting, until Oct. 31.

As the raptors soar over Frenchman Bay, amateur bird watchers or just regular people help spot the birds and specialists identify or confirm the species.

Angi King-Johnston, science associate at the Schoodic Institute at Acadia National Park and count compiler for the program, said Hawk Watch shows the beauty of citizens taking part in a science project.

“It’s the brilliance of Hawk Watch,” she said, standing over Frenchman Bay one day at the end of September. “I could not do my job without all the extra help.”

Hawk Watch recently became a collaborative effort between the park’s interpretive division and the institute’s bird ecology program. Continue reading →

Reopening the historic vistas of Acadia National Park

UPDATE 12/11/14: Added links to Acadia National Park Service page showing all historic views being restored, and new Friends of Acadia article on the project, at bottom of article.

For the first time in years, there’s once again a spectacular view at Schooner Head Overlook in Acadia National Park, out toward Egg Rock and its lighthouse, and across Frenchman Bay to Schoodic Peninsula.

Schooner Head Overlook view blocked

BEFORE – This was one of up to 100 trees blocking the view from Schooner Head Overlook.

On a recent Monday, with chainsaw in hand, Charlie Sanborn took down one of the last of the up to 100 trees blocking that easterly view. As he, Earl Smith, Ryan Meddaugh and Curtis Emerson, all part of the Acadia road maintenance crew, wrapped up for the afternoon, they stepped back and admired their handiwork.

Schooner Head Overlook panoramic view

AFTER – Taken from the same exact spot as the “before” picture, under partly sunny skies the following day, with the now-open view to Egg Rock and its lighthouse, and across Frenchman Bay to Schoodic Peninsula.

“It’s been a long time” since the view was visible, said Sanborn. “You couldn’t see the lighthouse before,” said Smith. The crew returned the next day to expand the vista toward Champlain’s Precipice, at the western end of the overlook parking lot.

Opening back up the panorama from Schooner Head Overlook is part of a grand plan to rehabilitate 30 historic vistas along the Park Loop Road, existing pull-outs and parking lots, according to Robert Page, director of the Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation in Boston, part of the National Park Service. Continue reading →

Party with the stars on Cadillac in Acadia National Park

Perhaps you’ve seen sunrise or sunset atop Cadillac Mountain in Acadia National Park. But have you seen the stars that make up the Milky Way or the constellations of Sagittarius and the Teapot?

Summer Triangle constellation

Map of the Summer Triangle constellation (via Wikimedia Commons)

Party with the stars on Cadillac on Saturday, Sept. 27, from 8-10 p.m., and you’ll see that and more as part of the 6th annual Acadia Night Sky Festival.

Your guides to the stars – Acadia National Park rangers and local astronomers – will offer 20-minute laser-pointer shows, and staff dozens of telescopes set up on the summit.

Fiana Shapiro, an Acadia National Park ranger who is serving as one of the guides at the Star Party, says she will be showing visitors some of the constellations that can only be seen this time of year, pointing up to the dark skies with a laser pointer.

“The Summer Triangle is a big one,” says Shapiro, and once you can identify those three stars of Altair, Vega and Deneb, visible this time of year, you can identify the constellations known as the Swan (Cygnus), the Eagle (Aquila) and the Lyre (Lyra). Continue reading →

Look, up in the sky – endless stars over Acadia National Park!

The days are glorious in Acadia National Park, but so are the star-filled nights.

Acadia Night Sky Festival

The official poster for the 6th annual Acadia Night Sky Festival. (Photo by Nathan Levesque)

Acadia, with the darkest skies along the US eastern seaboard, is where the thousands of stars making up the Milky Way can be seen, something that two-thirds of US residents can’t view at home because of city lights.

All you need to do is look up on a dark, clear night, and you’ll be starstruck in Acadia, as our nieces were in recent visits, Stacey at Thunder Hole, and Sharon and Michelle at the ranger-led Stars Over Sand Beach program.

To celebrate in celestial style, Acadia National Park, the Friends of Acadia, Schoodic Institute, local chambers of commerce and more than a dozen businesses and organizations, are holding one big party Sept. 25 – Sept. 29, the 6th annual Acadia Night Sky Festival.

Among the more than 30 events planned: Star parties, night hikes, kid-friendly activities, a boat cruise, movies and scientific and literary presentations, and bioluminescent canoe paddles.

But it’s not just another festival to help boost the Downeast Maine economy in between the busy summer and peak foliage seasons.

It’s also an important reminder of how dark skies are a dwindling resource around the world, affecting astronomy, ecosystems and even human circadian rhythms. And it helps highlight the estimated $2 billion a year being wasted with unnecessary lighting in the US alone, a statistic publicized by the International Dark-Sky Association (IDA), a non-profit founded in 1988 to reduce light pollution. Continue reading →

Photographer QT Luong puts focus on Acadia National Park

The grandeur of America’s national parks so inspired QT Luong, he quit a career in computer science, and embarked on a decades-long project to photograph all 59 parks, from Acadia National Park to Zion.

QT Luong and Acadia National Park fall foliage

One of QT Luong’s most popular Acadia National Park images is of what he calls “some of the most beautiful fall foliage on the East Coast.” (Photo by QT Luong/terragalleria.com all rights reserved)

Like Ansel Adams before him, Luong has lugged his heavy large-format camera to some of the wildest and most scenic spots in the country, at times carrying a 70-pound backpack, scaling cliffs or kayaking through frigid waters.

And long before Ken Burns featured him in “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea” in 2009, as the first person to have photographed all the parks in large format, Luong has been sharing his finely detailed photographs on his Web site.

With photography, Luong tells us, he aims to “convey my feelings of wonder and passion, to inspire people to go and seek the experiences that I had.”

QT Luong at work

QT Luong with his large-format camera. (Photo by Buddy Squires, courtesy of QT Luong/terragalleria.com all rights reserved)

In Acadia, he finds wonder not in the immensity of the scenery, as in Yosemite, his sentimental favorite. Rather, Luong writes us in an e-mail, “I always find the compactness of the park remarkable, that you can find such a variety of landscapes in such a small area.”

Among his favorite landscapes from the variety that is Acadia: The pink granite along Ocean Drive; the fall colors on top of Cadillac; the rugged coastline of Isle au Haut; and sunset skies over Jordan Pond, as seen from the top of North Bubble.

The park’s beauty lends itself well to large-format photographs because they “have such fine resolution that the prints show details that are usually lost to the human eye,” says Luong. “Acadia’s landscapes have a tremendous amount of texture, down to the single leaf, which are best revealed by this approach.” Continue reading →

Acadia National Park to hold hearing on Otter Creek trails

UPDATE Sept. 16: Since the original public hearing notice, Acadia National Park expanded the agenda to include update on the boat launch in the inner cove, and use and access to the outer cove fish house, as shared by Otter Creek Hall’s Facebook page.

Here’s the original story:

As part of a grand design to connect villages to Acadia National Park via footpath, two old Otter Creek trails slated for upgrading could be a boon for residents, campers and hikers, and may also address some of the long-standing tension between community and park.

Acadia officials will air the proposal to improve the trails at a hearing on Sept. 16, 6 p.m. at Otter Creek Hall, 82 Otter Creek Drive. Also likely to be discussed: The state of Otter Creek-park relations, which at times have been strained.

Otter Cove

Otter Creek residents hope to get improved trail access to Otter Cove.

The historic trails, long used by residents, would be rehabilitated and better marked, and would allow residents and visitors to walk from the village of Otter Creek, to newly opened park trails that connect to Gorham Mountain, Otter Cove and Blackwoods Campground.

The network of trails would create many long day-hiking opportunities, limited only by one’s imagination, map, or guidebook.

And it may also help ease some of the old conflicts between the park and the Otter Creek community, which was cut off from the waterfront after John D. Rockefeller Jr. bought land along Otter Cove in the 1930s, as part of his vision for the park. Continue reading →

Acadia National Park eyes Sept. 5 deadline for Isle au Haut comments

Time is running out if you want to have a say on the future management of Isle au Haut, a spectacular part of Acadia National Park.

Goat Trail on Isle au Haut in Acadia National Park

The contrasts are dramatic along the Goat Trail on Isle au Haut.

The National Park Service has set a Sept. 5 deadline for people to comment on a draft “Visitor Use Management Plan” for park-owned land on Isle au Haut, a 6,500-acre island off the coast of Stonington. Comments can be made over the Internet on the site established by the park service.

In the draft, the park service proposes to keep intact a “non-promotion” policy for the roughly half of the island it owns and administers on Isle au Haut. According to the longstanding policy, which is aimed at helping protect the fragile island from heavy use, visitors to the mainland sections of Acadia National Park generally will receive no information about Isle au Haut unless they ask for it. Continue reading →

Of puffins, wilderness and Acadia National Park

See Sept. 3 legislative update at bottom of post

Here is the original story:

People love puffins so much that visitors to Acadia National Park often ask rangers where they can see them, even though the seabirds with the colorful beaks are too far offshore to be visible.

It seems Atlantic puffins are to Maine what polar bears are to Alaska.

Atlantic puffins are listed as threatened in Maine

Atlantic puffins are listed as threatened in Maine. (US Fish and Wildlife Service photo)

Yet despite the public interest in puffins, and with Sept. 3 marking the 50th Anniversary of the Wilderness Act, a bill to extend wilderness protection to some of Maine’s puffin islands has languished in Congress for years.

When President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Wilderness Act on Sept. 3, 1964, the United States became the first country in the world to define and protect wilderness. Among the wilderness definitions embodied in the act: “…an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.”

In Maine, from Acadia National Park to the North Woods, from Kittery to Caribou, and even along the so-called 100-Mile Wilderness of the Appalachian Trail, there’s very little federally designated wilderness, a fraction of 1 percent.

Since 2005, the US Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed that 13 Maine coastal islands, some near Acadia, become part of the National Wilderness Preservation System, the strongest form of federal protection. This would better preserve some puffin habitat, but Congress has yet to act. Continue reading →

Visit Acadia National Park for free Aug. 25, other select times

Acadia National Park – already one of the best vacation bargains around at the normal entry fee of $20 for 7 days – gets even better on Aug. 25.

That’s the day Acadia is free, in honor of the National Park Service’s 98th birthday, along with more than 100 National Park-run units that normally charge an entrance fee.

Acadia National Park visitor center

Hull’s Cove Visitor Center in Acadia National Park

Every year on Aug. 25, the National Park Service celebrates Founders Day, marking the United States as the first country in the world to create national parks.

The National Park Foundation, a non-profit chartered by Congress in 1967 to partner with the National Park Service, has set up a Web site to allow people to wish the park service “Happy Birthday”, and to make a tax-deductible gift to help support what has been called America’s best idea.

In 2016, the park service will mark its Centennial, as will Acadia. And as the park service approaches its second century, the issue of federal funding and fee structure will be a continued source of debate, according to a recent article by National Parks Traveler. Continue reading →

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell shares agenda, personal notes at Acadia National Park

It didn’t receive a lot of attention, but U.S. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell revealed some nuggets about her agenda for National Parks — and her personal life – during a sweeping speech at Acadia National Park.

US Interior Secretary Sally Jewell

US Interior Secretary Sally Jewell. Department of the Interior photo.

In her remarks at the Schoodic Education and Research Center on Aug. 15, Jewell touched on a wide range of topics, including the challenges of stingy federal spending on parks, the need to start preparing a new generation of potential rangers and other National Park personnel, the scary effects of global warming on federal lands and the important role of the parks as science classrooms for youths.

Jewell, 58, the former CEO of REI, a national outdoor retail company, started on a personal note.

She said that her visit to Acadia National Park on Friday brought back memories of the first time she traveled to the Maine park 37 years ago. Continue reading →