Acadia National Park

Acadia National Park protects about 50,000 acres of granite mountains, lakes and rocky shore on the coast of Maine. That figure counts the private land it holds under conservation easements. Most of it lies on Mount Desert Island, with the Schoodic Peninsula on the mainland and half of Isle au Haut offshore.

Acadia was the first national park in the East, designated in 1919 and named Acadia in 1929. It was also the first made from private land given to the public.

In 2025 it had 4,079,318 recreation visits, the seventh most of any national park, although the Park Service counts it among the smallest. We checked every figure below on 27 October 2026 on the park's own pages, Recreation.gov, the Island Explorer's site and NOAA's normals.

Do you need a reservation to drive up Cadillac Mountain?

Cadillac Mountain is the one place in Acadia that needs a booking. From 20 May to 25 October 2026, every car on the Cadillac Summit Road needed a $6 vehicle reservation from Recreation.gov. The reservations are not sold in the park, and the entrance pass is still needed on top.

Sunrise slots give a 90-minute window to enter and daytime slots 30 minutes. There is no set time to leave before the road closes to cars at 9 p.m. Thirty percent go on sale at 10 a.m. Eastern 90 days ahead and the other 70% two days ahead. A sunrise slot is limited to one per car every seven days.

Vehicles over 21 feet, bike racks included, and all RVs and trailers are banned on the summit road even with a booking. The Island Explorer bus does not go up. No other road or trail in the park needs a reservation, and walkers and cyclists need none for Cadillac either. The park's alert, read on 5 November 2026, closes the Cadillac Summit Road to everyone, walkers and cyclists included, from 9 to 25 November and 1 to 18 December.

Is Cadillac Mountain really the first place to see the sunrise?

Cadillac Mountain is the first place in the United States to see the sunrise only part of the year. In the Park Service's own wording, Cadillac is the first place in the country where you can see the sun rise from 7 October to 6 March. The rest of the year, it is not.

At 1,530 feet, Cadillac is the highest point on the eastern seaboard of the United States. Sunrise there comes between 4:45 a.m. in mid-June and 6:15 a.m. in mid-October. The park advises arriving about an hour before. The summit is windy and cold even in summer, and fog is common from June to August. For a quieter sunrise, the Park Service suggests Ocean Path on the shore.

How much is Acadia, and does it take cash?

Acadia charges $35 per car for seven days, $30 per motorcycle and $20 per person on foot or bicycle. Those rates hold all year, with no winter rate. Children under 16 enter free, and cyclists on the Loop Road and the carriage roads need a pass too.

Acadia is one of the eleven parks with a $100 surcharge in 2026 for every non-resident aged 16 or over. Two adults from abroad in one car pay $235. The $250 non-resident America the Beautiful pass covers it, though not the $6 Cadillac reservation.

The park has been cashless since 15 April 2025. Visitors paying cash buy passes from outside sellers such as the Bar Harbor Chamber of Commerce. Our guide to national park fees for international visitors explains how to buy a pass in advance.

What is on the Park Loop Road?

The Park Loop Road is a 27-mile road built between 1921 and 1958 that strings together most of Acadia's famous stops. It starts at the Hulls Cove Visitor Center and runs past Sand Beach, Thunder Hole, Otter Cliff, Jordan Pond and the turn for Cadillac Mountain. A long section along the shore is one way.

The Park Service suggests three to four hours for the loop with stops. Thunder Hole, a sea cave that booms when waves surge in, is loudest about two hours before high tide. Sand Beach's water stays around 50 to 60°F, and its car park can fill by 9 a.m. in summer. Swimming is banned in Jordan Pond, a public water supply, where the Jordan Pond House has served popovers since 1893.

The Loop Road and the park's other paved roads are open from 15 April to 1 December. In winter only a short stretch along the shore stays open to cars. On 27 October 2026 the park had closed the southern section of Ocean Path, near Otter Point, for repairs.

How do you ride the carriage roads?

The carriage roads are 45 miles of broken-stone roads closed to cars, built between 1913 and 1940 as the gift of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and his family. They loop around the lakes and mountains in the middle of Mount Desert Island. Granite coping stones line the edges, and stone bridges cross streams and the motor roads.

Walkers, cyclists and horse-drawn carriages share them, and everyone yields to horses. Class 1 e-bikes are allowed, Class 2 and 3 are not, and the speed limit is 20 mph. The roads usually close for mud in March and April. In summer the Island Explorer's Bicycle Express carries cyclists from Bar Harbor to the Eagle Lake entrance.

How does the Island Explorer bus work?

The Island Explorer is a free bus network that covers the park and the towns of Mount Desert Island in summer. Entrance fees pay for most of it. In 2026 its spring routes ran from 20 May. The full network of twelve routes ran from 23 June to 12 October, seven days a week.

The hub is the Village Green in Bar Harbor, and drivers stop anywhere safe when waved down. Each bus carries six bicycles. The Acadia Gateway Center in Trenton, on the way onto the island, offers free all-day parking for the bus. Riders still need an entrance pass, and the bus does not go up Cadillac or between Schoodic and the island.

Which Acadia hikes suit a first visit?

Acadia's hikes are short by western standards, but several climb cliffs on iron rungs and ladders. The distances below are the Park Service's, round trip.

The Precipice, Jordan Cliffs and Valley Cove trails close each spring to protect nesting peregrine falcons and reopen only when the park judges it safe. The Park Service does not recommend hiking the mountain trails in winter.

When can you walk to Bar Island?

Walkers can reach Bar Island, off Bar Harbor, for an hour and a half either side of low tide. A gravel bar half a mile long then comes out of the sea. The tide rises and falls 8 to 12 feet twice a day.

The Park Service warns that a walker who loses track of time faces nine hours before the bar emerges again. The walk starts at Bridge Street, off West Street, and parking on the bar or on Bridge Street is not allowed. The round trip, bar and island trail together, is 1.9 miles. Check a tide table before setting out.

Why is Bar Harbor the base for Acadia?

Acadia has no hotels or lodges inside the park, so most visitors stay in Bar Harbor. The town is three miles from the Hulls Cove Visitor Center and is the hub of the Island Explorer. The park's own beds are four campgrounds, all booked on Recreation.gov.

There is no backcountry or winter camping and no overnight parking anywhere in the park. Downtown Bar Harbor parking is paid from 15 May to 31 October. Schoodic, the quieter mainland part of the park, is about an hour's drive from Hulls Cove, with a six-mile one-way loop road.

When do the leaves turn in Acadia?

Acadia's autumn colour usually peaks in mid-October, anywhere from the first to the third week, according to the Park Service. In 2026 the Maine Forest Service's final report, for the week of 14 October, rated the Bar Harbor area at peak.

The table gives NOAA's 1991 to 2020 normals for the Acadia National Park station, at park headquarters. Rain falls in every month, about 60 inches of snow fall in an average winter, and blackflies are worst from mid-May to mid-June. August is the busiest month, but October brings almost as many visitors as September.

How do you get to Acadia from Boston?

Acadia is about 265 miles from Boston by road; the Park Service gives 264 miles. Our own routing puts Boston Logan to Bar Harbor at a little under six hours without traffic. Cape Air flies from Boston to Hancock County–Bar Harbor Airport all year, about 10 miles from the park.

The distances are our own routing; summer traffic on Route 3 onto the island is slower. Acadia is on Eastern Time, and it is the main park in our guide to Maine.