We spent this past week in Ellsworth, Maine, a tiny town a stone’s throw away from Acadia National Park. From exploring the stunning park to romping around the storybook town of Bar Harbor, this was easily one of our favorite weeks yet.

We started out the week with an incredible hike in Acadia on Precipice Trail. Truth in advertising is alive and well because just 5 or so minutes into the hike, we were already getting gorgeous views of Maine’s rocky coastline from the side of a cliff. However, what made this hike (and so many like it in Acadia) so epic was the iconic iron rungs and rock scrambling throughout the majority of the trail. In fact, we scaled 1000 feet of elevation in just .9 miles, making it to the peak within 50 minutes (which is a humble brag believe it or not).

Precipice was one of two awesome hikes that we did this week. We also hiked a trail called Great Head with Winnie (Acadia is almost entirely pet-friendly!) on our last full day. While this one lacked iron rungs, it had plenty of rock scrambling, which Winnie handled like a champ. Like Precipice, this hike offered jaw-dropping views of the Maine coastline, including hundreds of buoys marking lobster traps sprinkled across the coastal waters.

After Great Head, we stopped by a rocky beach named Little Hunter’s Beach. Winnie, as expected, avoided the water at all costs. This was fine because we found a much more thrilling way to occupy our time: building cairns and, of course, subsequently sabotaging each other’s creations with targeted rock-throwing.

When we weren’t in Acadia National Park, we passed our time with running around Ellsworth, binge-watcing The Amazing Race, drinking blueberry wine (a staple for blueberry-rich Maine), and shopping for antiques. Despite her affinity for spending money, antique-shopping turned out to be a disappointing venture for Ellie due to her distaste for being surrounded by (how to put this kindly…) substandard junk.

All in all, Maine was easily one of our favorite - if not our most favorite - destination. We loved the rugged natural beauty, action-packed national park, and picturesque downtown of Bar Harbor.

• How likely we are to visit again: 10/10. We are already dreaming about our return.
• How likely we would be to live here: 4/10. Despite being one of our favorite spots, Ellsworth/Bar Harbor are too far away from friends, family, and major airports. Retirement, however, is a different story!