For the fan of Acadia National Park on your holiday shopping list: How about a membership to Friends of Acadia; a purchase from eParks®, The Official Online Store of America’s National Parks®; an annual park pass; or any number of other Acadia- or national-park-themed gifts?
Acadia National Park annual pass is $20, half off this year’s price, if purchased in December. The pass, good for 12 months from date of purchase, is proposed to go to $50 in 2015. (NPS photo)
There’s no need to fight the crowds at a shopping mall with any of these ideas for the holidays, whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanzaa. Plus you get the convenience of our doing some of the legwork for you with our research and links, and the satisfaction of knowing that some of your purchases may help support the park, certain non-profits and area businesses.
Here are gift ideas broken down by category:
Support the park directly or indirectly
– Annual Acadia National Park pass – If you buy the pass in December, the cost is $20, or half off this year’s price. The discounted annual pass is available at the park headquarters and winter visitor center on Eagle Lake Road, open daily in December from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., except for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. The discounted pass is also available Friday Dec. 5 at the Village Green park information center, during the Bar Harbor Midnight Madness Sale, from 8 p.m. until midnight. The fee for the annual pass is proposed to go up to $50 in 2015, while the 7-day pass is proposed to increase from $20 to $25. A public meeting to discuss these and other proposed fee increases, the first since 2004, was held Nov. 12. The park is taking public comments on the proposed fee increases via e-mail or US mail through Dec. 8. The increased revenue would allow the park to enhance services for the upcoming Acadia Centennial in 2016, according to the park service.
Part of the America’s National Park Series, this comes as either a pin or a magnet in this design, at eParks(R). See holiday sale details in sidebar. (Photo courtesy of eParks(R))
– Shop at eParks® – The online store for Eastern National, a nonprofit founded by park rangers to help support national parks, is offering special holiday discounts of 25% to 35%, plus free shipping on orders of $25 and up. Eastern National runs the bookstore at the seasonal Hulls Cove Visitor Center at Acadia, and also offers a virtual Acadia shop at eParks®. See sale details and links to eParks® in the sidebar and throughout this blog post. eParks® is an affiliated partner of Acadia on My Mind. A certain percentage of some purchases made via click-throughs from this Web site helps cover costs of this blog, but prices are no more than if you went directly to eParks®, and possibly less with special affiliated partner codes. Since 1947, Eastern National has donated more than $107 million to national parks and other federal sites, from Maine to South Dakota.