Outpost

Getting There

Acadia

Assuming you don't drive all night (which would make a vacation quite unenjoyable), the drive to Acadia from any where in the Ohio Valley would take three days, and from further South or West four. You are actually closer to the Rocky Mountains (two days) than Acadia. And it's a hectic three days, since the interstates in Pennsylvania, New York and Massachusetts are full of tractor trailer trucks. Unless it's your first trip back that way, and you just want to see the country, we recommend you take Amtrak or fly.

Your FIRST option would be to take Amtrak. It's a very reasonable option. You could add an overnight in New York City and/or Boston and have a very nice experience. You would change trains at New York City's Grand Central Station (photo, above) and Boston and finish in Portland, where you rent a car and drive three hours to Bar Harbor.

But we recommend flying. From anywhere in the country you can make the trip in one day. You'll fly to either New York or Philadelphia (photo above), have about a two hour layover, then fly to Portland or Bangor. We recommend Bangor (photo, left), from which it's only a 40 minute drive to Bar Harbor.

Normally, we don't like flying because you can't carry on your backpack, airlines tend to lose checked backpacks, and they won't let you take knives, stove fuel, folding saws or stoves. But that's not a problem with Acadia because backpacking's not allowed. You can carry on your day pack and you don't need knives, stoves, fuel or saws.

We do recommend, however, that you make sure to buy tickets in one of the upper groups (#1-4) on the plane. The later groups (#5-7) are often forced to check their bags no matter how small the bags are. They just run out of room in the overhead bins or under seat spaces.