Bar Island, Acadia National Park
17 September 2020
Jack is teaching from 5:00 to 8:30. He's over in the hotel's conference room. The tide is about to turn. I have an hour and a half to cross the sand bar to Bar Island, walk the trail, and turn around before sunset.
I'm not going to take pictures on the way over.
Well, maybe a few, from the island side.
It's an easy trail that people can do in sneakers. Jack and I were here in 2017. At the top there were people carrying drinks in open cups. That's how easy the walk is.
At first the path stays near the side of the island. Once in a while I can see down to the sand bar. The kayakers are coming ashore.
Here's a clearing where a tree fell. It reaches from the trail almost to the rocky beach.
That's the West Street Hotel over there.
Now the trail turns away from the water.
I'm alternating between taking my mask off when I don't see people and hurriedly putting it back on when I do. Most people I come across are heading back down. A pair of intense hikers marches past me.
I see them again marching back towards me only a few minutes later. Maybe the left something on the trail and were in a hurry to fetch it?
The path gets narrower, and I find myself climbing up roots and rocks. I don't remember this from last time. I make sure to remember landmarks every time the trail turns. It's sometimes difficult to follow. I don't remember it being like this last time.
This should be the opening picture for the blog post I'm going to write.
I climb another little hill, and here the trail seems to descend. That's not right. I think I made a wrong turn somewhere. I'm not seeing anyone else. I've been walking too long. I'm losing light. I need to turn around.
I pick up the pace. By the time I get to where the real trail is, which I find because there are no less than three arrows made of branches that I bleedin' stepped over, that point to the short trip to the trail's summit, I'm sweating.
When I get to the summit I peel off my jacket and sweatshirt, stuff them in the crook of a tree, distance myself from the two other couples who are up here, and take some pictures.
I have to pee. I'm going back onto the wrong trail to find a tree.
That I wound up on this trail isn't all a waste. On a small spruce I see a spider.
I start back down the trail towards the sand bar.
The sun is low in the sky, low enough to start looking orange through the haze.
Too low an exposure:
The sun sinks behind clouds. There might not be much more of a sunset than this.
I sit on the top of the rocky pile between the sand bar and the trail entrance. From my perch I take pictures of the island, the sky, and the rocks at my feet.
Since the tide is out, I'm going to walk along the shore as far east as I can before I run out of light. I've never done that before.
There's the fallen tree I saw from the trail.
Not all is natural on the shoreline. I don't know what this was, but it's been claimed. Anything with a barnacle on it is part of the ecosystem now.
From here, the rocks I was sitting on look apocalyptic.
Returning to the sand bar, I find it almost empty. I walk towards the harbor and take a seat on a concrete block by the park entrance. Far away, there's a band of light in the sky, all that remains of the sunset. I'm going to sit here and watch it for a while.
A band of red slowly appears above the orange:
My camera is having a terrible time focusing in this light.
When my camera can no longer focus, I head back to the hotel. Jack is still teaching, so I shower and sit on the balcony with my laptop and camera, uploading today's trove of photos.
Jack returns early. He calls Blaze for reservations. The best they can do is an hour from now. We'll wait. Then they call us back. There's a table open right now. We scurry.
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