Tidepooling

For me, Acadia is all about tidepooling. Ship Harbor and Wonderland trails probably lead to our two favorite spots. At low tide there are fantastic little worlds left on the granite cliffs. Seaweed, limpets, periwinkles, mussels, crabs, hermit crabs, shrimp, sea urchins, sea slugs and starfish are all within easy view and reach.
It was even more fun than I remembered. And more challenging. Navigating wet, barnacle-encrusted, seaweed covered, slick granite with little kids is tough. The 4 and up crowd are probably happier here then the younger kids... There were many places Nik couldn’t go and he felt left out.
At Wonderland if you wade into the channel (when you reach the end of the trail look our on the spit; the channel is in the spit) and pick up the rocks you can see more starfish than I have ever seen anywhere. I saw at least 10 different species of starfish and brittle star ranging in size from my pinky nail to my hand.

If you have never picked one up, brittle stars are great fun to hold. They are so active that they will climb all over your hand. You have to be REALLY careful not to break their legs (hence brittle) so, again, this is probably only good for the 4 and up crowd. The brittle stars come in amazing varieties and shades of color. One had a beautiful striped pattern.

The look on Ben’s face as he held hermit crabs, sea urchins, and stars was worth the trip all by itself…