A walk on the quiet side

I feel like I've been in constant motion since I started my wanderings. Today? It was time for a quiet day, starting on the quiet side of the island.

Long Pond was my first target of the day for a walk along the western shoreline. The trail was sometimes right on the edge of the water, more often just a short distance inland. The water was always close. I can see myself returning there another time, perhaps combining the shore path with one of the mountain trails to make a loop instead of today's out and back walk.

Is there a difference between a lake and a pond? Until I moved to Massachusetts I thought that lakes were larger than ponds, but in Massachusetts that seems to be flipped. Now as I look at a map of Acadia National Park, I see that size doesn't appear to matter. I was at Long Pond this morning; it is larger than the body of water on the other side of the mountain, Echo Lake. On the other side of the island, Jordan Pond is smaller than its neighbor Eagle Lake. I suppose there aren't any naming rules (or someone is trying hard to confuse me!).

Next stop, Milagro Coffee & Expresso in Southwest Harbor. My decaf Americano was accompanied by a cranberry ginger scone. What a nice flavor combination, and better yet, energy for more walking.

I continued south, stopping at a couple of spots in the Seawall area of the park. One of the "beaches" was made up of beautiful rounded rocks. I love the looks, but walking on them is a bit challenging. How can perfectly dry rocks feel slippery?

My next stop was the Ship Harbor nature trail. It's a figure-8 trail that can be walked as a true set of loops or it can be walked as two out-and-back semicircles to stay close to the coast. The real beauty of this trail is at the furthest point where there are rocks, views across to the other side of Ship Harbor, and ocean views too.

Moving back to the eastern side of the island, I stopped at Eagle Lake to enjoy the light of an interesting gray sky afternoon.

It was a quiet day.