Acadia National Park

 After a nice drive up the Maine coast we spent a couple of days at Acadia National Park.

First stop is usually getting a photo with the park sign.

 

The first day was mostly just driving around the park and taking photos. The scenery is amazing.

The biggest problem at Acadia and at maybe half the national parks we visited was too many people and not enough parking. Anywhere that was something cool to see or do, there was no place to park to see or do it. This was the road near Sand Beach, the backup started a mile before you got to the parking lot and the only parking left was along the road.

Thunder Hole. At the time and tide we were there it wasn't so much thunder. You also had to park a mile away on the road and walk back.

 

We didn't see much in the way of wildlife at Acadia, a few deer and some birds.

Random people posing for funny shots.

Travel day(s), Va to RI

 From Staunton Va we headed east to Norfolk then across the Chesapeake Bay bridge/tunnel. We drove through Maryland, Delaware and spent the night in Pennsylvania. The next day we crossed into New Jersey, then New York, Connecticut, and spent the night in Newport Rhode Island. Part of the plan for the trip was to go through all 48 lower states so we took a rather random path that made sure we crossed every state possible.

Chesapeake Bay Bridge/Tunnel.

 

While in Newport we took a drive on Ocean Ave to look at the summer mansions.

In the city most where behind all walls so you couldn't see much.

When you get to the ocean it was a beautiful scenic drive with lots to see.

Shenandoah National Park/Virginia Scenic Railway

 From New River Gorge we headed west through the mountains (fun twisty roads) to Staunton Virginia for a few days. From there we drove the Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. I've done the drive several times so there wasn't much picture taking, just slow, casual cruising and watching the scenery go by.

 

Not many places to eat in the park so lunch was bagels and fruit.

The day after Shenandoah we took a relaxing trip in the Virginia Scenic Railway from Staunton VA east to Ivy through the Blue Ridge tunnel and back.

View from our scenic car.

Pulled over on a side track to let a freight train pass.

Entering the Blue Ridge Tunnel.

In Ivy VA the trains stops and the engine swaps ends for the trip back to Staunton.

A passenger taking a free ride.

Just before we got back to Staunton we hit thunderstorms which made for a wet run back to the car after we deboarded the train.
 

New River Gorge National Park

 From the Smokey Mtns we headed north into Virginia and then West Virginia to visit New River George. The park runs along the New River and features hiking and rock climbing but may be known mostly for white water rafting. We've run the river back in college and it is a blast. This trip we started at the visitor center then drove the twisty road down into the gorge, across the river over the old bridge and back up to the main road.

 

The view of the bridge from the visitor center trail that winds part of the way down into the gorge.

You can drive the old road down into the gorge, across the old river bridge, and back up the other side. The road is narrow, twisty, and one-way so once you start you are committed. There is no where to turn around and it's one-way but a fun and scenic drive. It takes you directly under the new bridge.

The view down the gorge from inside the visitor center.

This is the old bridge that was the only way across the river until the new bridge was built.

View of the new bridge from the old bridge.

If you look really close you can see people under the bridge. There is a bridge walk you can do to view the river 800 some feet directly down, if you don't mind heights.

Great Smokey Mountains National Park

 I got kind of lazy during the trip and stopped posting every couple of days. We're home in Michigan now for a month long break before we continue. Our next stop after Congaree was the Smokey Mountains. We've been there several times so this trip we just drove through the park and enjoyed the view but didn't do any hiking.

 

The park lived up to its name, the mountains were covered in clouds most of the day. This was near the highest point, Newfound Gap overlook.

Add another state to the list for this trip. We tried to get photos every time we entered a new state but missed quite a few of them. Some of the welcome signs just popped up out of nowhere while we were driving.

I've driven through the park many times but never drove the Cades Cove loop road so we did that this time. I didn't realize it was a single lane, one-way road. The scenery was beautiful but a lot of it turned into a 15 mph bumper to bumper traffic jam. This was near the start of the loop.

We did see some deer but getting any good photos was tough because there was almost nowhere to pull over to stop and it was a steady stream of cars behind you.

 

The highlight of the loop road was seeing a some bears, a mother and 3 cubs.

They were playing in a field of knee high grass so I couldn't get any really good photos. Plus there was nowhere to pull over and as soon as people stopped a ranger ran up and started yelling at everyone to keep moving.

A turkey we saw at a spot where nobody was right behind us so I was able to stop and snap a few photos.