The Ultimate Guide to Top Philly Cheesesteak Spots


Date Published: March 25th, 2025 | Last Updated: Sept 8th, 2025
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA

Since moving to Brooklyn 2 years ago, Toby and I have made numerous weekend trips to explore the city of Philadelphia. There’s so much rich history and interesting things to see there, but of course being a foodie, the highlight of every trip for me is the Philly Cheesesteak. Every time we think about making a trip, the first thing on my mind is which cheesesteak are we going to try this time? You could call it an unhealthy obsession. To tide me over between our Philly trips, I’ve come up with my own Philly Cheesesteak recipe that you can check out here.

I’ve made it my personal mission to try as many popular cheesesteak spots as I can find through online research, word of mouth, and local reviews. This post is my personal take on these popular spots. I know there will be a lot of differing opinions and I’ve seen heated debates on who has the best cheesesteak, and at the end of the day the answer will depend on individual preference. There’s no one right answer – it’s like asking a New Yorker who has the best pizza. Everyone will have their own favourite and this post highlights some of my favourites and thoughts on these popular joints.

My go-to order: Whiz Wit with extra onions (cheesesteak with Cheez Whiz and extra onions). I keep my order consistent every time (where I can help it) so I have a standard of comparison between cheesesteak shops.

To skip this long detailed post, here’s a summary of my preferences:

Keep checking back, I’ll be updating this post as we continue to eat our way through this great city!

Contents:

  1. What is a Philly Cheesesteak? What makes it so special?
  2. Dissecting the Philly Cheesesteak:
    1. Bread
    2. Steak
    3. Cheese: Provolone, Cheez Whiz, American Cheese, or Cooper Sharp?
    4. Optional Toppings
  3. Philly Cheesesteak Spots
    1. #1: Jim’s South St.
    2. #2: Dalessandro’s Steaks
    3. #3: Del Rossi’s Cheesesteak & Pizza CO.
    4. #4: Donkey’s Place (across the river in Camden, NJ)
    5. #5: Miller’s Twist – a pretzel cheesesteak
    6. #6: Angelo’s Pizzeria
    7. #7: John’s Roast Pork
    8. #8: Joe’s Steaks + Soda Shop
    9. #9: Sonny’s Famous Steaks
    10. #10: Woodrow’s Sandwich Shop
    11. #11: Campo’s Philly Cheesesteaks
    12. Pat’s and Geno’s – #12 & 13
    13. A note on Fedoroff’s Roast Pork (Williamsburg, NYC)

What is a Philly Cheesesteak? What makes it so special?

A Philly Cheesesteak is a sandwich that is essentially bread, cooked steak, and cheese. The combination of these 3 ingredients don’t sound like much, but it’s the quality of the bread, the tenderness and juiciness of the beef, and the cheesy goodness all combined together that makes this sandwich magical. There’s no fancy truffle aioli, or a complex combination of marinades and spices. It’s just simple ingredients made well. Also be prepared – a good cheesesteak tends to be pretty greasy so pack your wet wipes!

Dissecting the Philly Cheesesteak:

Bread:

The traditional sandwich bread for a cheesesteak is a long Italian roll. It should be soft and chewy on the inside but with a light crust on the outside. The bread roll should have enough structure to hold up your sandwich while absorbing the delicious dripping juices without it being too soggy. It also shouldn’t be too tough that it becomes difficult to bite through.

Steak:

Rib eye is usually the go-to meat for a cheesesteak. It’s tender, somewhat fatty, and flavourful all at the same time. It’s sliced super thin before cooking on a flat top grill and comes out looking almost like ground beef (depending on how thin they slice it) with little folds that hold in all the juices. The first sounds you hear when walking into a cheesesteak shop is usually the clanging and banging of the metal spatulas on the flat top grill as they cook up the steak.

Cheese: Provolone, Cheez Whiz, American Cheese, or Cooper Sharp?

For the readers that are unfamiliar to the cheesesteak life, when you order a cheesesteak, you have to choose what kind of cheese you want. The 3 options are usually Provolone, Cheez Whiz, or American Cheese. Of these 3, provolone is the only “real” non-processed cheese, but I find it to be the most subtle in flavour compared to the others. American Cheese is processed cheddar slices (ie. Kraft singles), and Cheez Whiz is a processed liquid “cheese” sauce that tastes like a melty version of American cheese to me. In more recent years, Cooper Sharp has entered the cheesesteak game which is also another type of processed cheese but has a sharp bold flavour and melts well. Of all these options, Provolone and Cheez Whiz seem to be the two most popular choices. I’m team Cheez Whiz all the way (with Cooper Sharp coming in at a close second), but lately Toby has been leaning towards the provolone. If you’ve never had a cheesesteak before, I’d recommend getting one of each and trying it out for yourself!

Fun fact: The local Philly slang for a cheesesteak with cheez whiz and onions is called a “whiz wit”.

My first cheesesteak side story: When Toby and I went to order our first ever Philly Cheesesteak, we had no idea that there were cheese options! The guy at Jim’s didn’t specifically ask us what cheese we wanted. He instead asked “Provolone?”. In a moment of panic, we just said “yes”. Surely provolone is the most popular option, otherwise he would’ve led with a different cheese choice, right? Sad to report, I was disappointed by the provolone because I couldn’t really taste it and I expected a cheesesteak sandwich to be cheese-forward in flavour – after all, it’s in the name. Maybe we chose the wrong cheese? Maybe we should get extra cheese? After polishing off our sandwich, Toby went right back in line and ordered another one, this time with Cheez Whiz – the gooey orange cheese that you see in so many iconic photos of a cheesesteak. After taking the first bite, we were in love! This was it. The Cheez Whiz made all the difference. This gooey fake cheese product penetrated through the layers of the beef and onions and melded the flavours together into a mess of greasy cheesy delicious goodness. Ever since that visit, Cheez Whiz has been my go-to, although I was also quite impressed by Cooper Sharp at Del Rossi’s.

Optional Toppings:

Onions are optional, but essential in my opinion. They’re usually cooked to just browned and softened with a bit of a bite. I prefer the cheesesteak joints that take it a little further and slightly caramelize the onions to add a bit of sweetness to contrast the heavy sandwich. Some places will offer fried or even raw onions.

Sautéed bell peppers are another popular add-on, but I find it too distracting from the rest of my sandwich so I tend to skip it.

Sautéed mushrooms are not as popular of a topping and not always offered, but I just love mushrooms in general and I find that it adds a nice texture to the sandwich. Toby prefers it without.

Other common toppings: hot banana peppers, relish, ketchup, mayonnaise, and mustard. Some places will have a side stand of these extra toppings to add on yourself. I prefer my cheesesteak with just onions and mushrooms, but Toby will sometimes add relish for a bit of sweet vinegary kick.

Philly Cheesesteak Spots

Without further ado, here’s a list of popular cheesesteak spots around Philly that we’ve tried and my honest opinions about them. With such limited ingredients in a cheesesteak, a good cheesesteak needs to be on point with all 3 ingredients: bread, steak, and cheese.

I’ve ranked them from our favourite to least. Keep checking back, I’ll be updating this list and re-ranking as we continue to check out more cheesesteak spots! I’ve also made a handy-dandy map for an overall view of where all these spots are located. 😊

#1: Jim’s South St.

Address: 400 South St, Philadelphia, PA 19147
Website: https://jimssouthstreet.com/
Hours: 11am-12am most days (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak: $13.49 (before tax)

Pros:

  • Always consistent
  • Moist juicy cheesesteak
  • Good pricing
  • Good location for tourists, about a 15 minute walk from the Liberty Bell
  • Onions are lightly caramelized giving it extra flavour
  • Indoor seating available
  • Takes both cash and card

Cons:

  • Smaller size sandwich (however $2-3 cheaper than most places)

Jim’s South Street is an easy local favourite. Throughout my research of finding the best cheesesteak in Philly, Jim’s came up again and again. It’s easily accessible and is located on the busy South Street with plenty of other restaurants and bars on this strip. Jim’s first opened up in 1939 and has been serving quality cheesesteaks since.

This was mine and Toby’s very first cheesesteak experience. It was everything I expected and more! We arrived at 12:45pm on a Monday in mid November and there was thankfully no line. Even if there was a line, I’m sure it’d move quick since they made our sandwich in record time. As soon as you walk in, you’re hit with the amazing aroma of caramelized onions and beef and the sounds of the banging and clanging on the flat top. Even if you weren’t hungry, watching the meat sizzle in front of you would get you salivating. The shop itself has a retro vibe with some seating available.

We got 2 cheesesteaks here: first with provolone which I struggled to find the provolone flavour, then with Cheez Whiz which made allllll the difference. The onions were perfectly cooked the way I like it – slightly caramelized for a bit of sweetness but with a bite and the steak was so juicy that it was a bit of a dripping mess, but the bread held up well without getting soggy. Delicious!

Update April 1st, 2025: After a string of disappointing cheesesteaks around Philly, we came back to Jim’s again to make sure I wasn’t overhyping this place since it was our very first cheesesteak afterall. I’m glad to report it was just as delicious as I remember it! I was watching the man behind the stove and noticed a few things that makes Jim’s stand out from the rest:

  1. They double layer their cheese – on the bread, then add the beef and toppings, and finish it with more cheez on top so you get a good amount of cheez whiz in every bite.
  2. Their onions are perfectly caramelized which adds so much more flavour with a slight sweetness. Most places will have softened onions without caramelizing them.
  3. This man has a literal kettle of melted beef oil that he pours on the beef while he cooks it to keep it moist and extra juicy as he cooks it.

#2: Dalessandro’s Steaks

Address: 600 Wendover St, Philadelphia, PA 19128
Website: https://dalessandros.com/
Hours: 11am-9/10pm most days (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $16.00 (cash only, ATM on site)

Pros:

  • Great sandwich size
  • Good amount of steak and cooked really well, not dry at all
  • No extra charge for onions

Cons:

  • Out of the way from downtown and old town/tourist areas
  • Onions very bland and not enough of it
  • Limited seating – only 4 picnic tables outside, no indoor seating
  • Cash only (ATM on site)
  • Limited street parking

Dalessandro’s was actually one of the first cheesesteak spots recommended to us from a Philly local but due to its location all the way on the other side of the city, it took us a while to make it here since it never seemed to fit into our Philly itinerary.

We came on a Saturday lunch hour in the first week of June and although it was busy, the line went relatively quickly and it took about 10 minutes to get our sandwich. It’s a window-order and pick-up set up that takes cash only (ATM on site). Once you place your order, there’s an automated voice over a speaker and a large screen that calls you when your order is ready and you pay on pick up. There are only 4 picnic-style tables outside and no indoor seating, but luckily we were able to snag a tablet just as someone left.

At first glance, the cheesesteak was pretty hefty with a good amount of meat. The bread was soft but held up well. The steak was super juicy and cooked really well (similar to Jim’s) and there was a good amount of cheese. However, the onions were the let down for me. Even with extra onions, there wasn’t much of it and the onions themselves didn’t have much flavour – wasn’t browned, kind of just soft and bland, almost like steamed onions. Honestly, if the onions were on point, Dalessandro’s would be at the #1 spot for me purely because their cheesesteak is larger than Jim’s and everything else was great!

#3: Del Rossi’s Cheesesteak & Pizza CO.

Address: 538 N 4th St, Philadelphia, PA 19123
Website: https://delrossisrestaurant.com/
Hours: 11am-11pm most days (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $16.48 (before tax)

Pros:

  • Fantastic bread – unique sesame artisanal bun
  • Juicy meat cooked well
  • Indoor-seating and they bring the food to your table
  • Takes both cash and card

Cons:

  • No Cheez Whiz, they carry Cooper Sharp cheese only
  • Inconsistent cook with the meat between repeat visits
  • Out of the way from downtown and old town/tourist areas

We came here on our latest Philly trip in February on the recommendation of some Philly native internet strangers. It is a little out of the way from the main city centre and touristy things (~6 mins north of the Liberty Bell for reference) so you’d need to either drive or Uber to get here. Upon first glance, it looked like an ordinary pizza shop with a bunch of pizza boxes piled high near the front, no signs of the large flat top or smells of a cheesesteak.

We ordered our usual “whiz wit” (cheesesteak with cheez whiz and onions) but to our surprise they only do Cooper Sharp cheese! This was the first place we’ve been to that didn’t have Cheez Whiz. It was a little hard to understand the cashier, but I think he said they used to do Cheez Whiz but it got too busy so they stopped offering different cheese options? Either way, the cashier was confident that we’d love their cheesesteak so we ordered one to share. Y’all… this cheesesteak was PHENOMENAL. It instantly became our new favourite cheesesteak. The bread was flavourful with a fantastic golden brown crust speckled with white sesame seeds that reminded me of an artisanal sourdough. It was our first time trying Cooper Sharp cheese and it was so bold and flavourful that it knocked our socks off. It also perfectly melted between the layers of the meat, making it a top contender to my beloved Cheez Whiz. The steak was also cooked well and the combination of everything was perfection. *chef’s kiss*

July 29th update: Del Rossi’s was originally my #1 pick for best cheesesteak, however after a couple more visits, although still delicious, there was inconsistency with the cook of the steak, being a little dry at times, so it’s now my #3 after Jim’s and Dalessandro’s.

#4: Donkey’s Place (across the river in Camden, NJ)

Address: 1223 Haddon Ave, Camden, NJ 08103
Website: https://www.donkeysplacemenu.com
Hours: Mon-Fri 10am-6pm, closed Sat & Sun (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $15.50 (before tax)

Pros:

  • AMAZING flavourful onions! The best onions in any cheesesteak sandwich I’ve had so far.
  • Generous portion sizes
  • Good amount of indoor seating in a pub setting
  • Takes both cash and card

Cons:

  • Located in New Jersey, across the river in a slightly dodgy neighbourhood
  • Limited menu – cheesesteak, wings, fries, and onion rings (but there’s a full bar!)

Donkey’s Place was recommended by our Philly walking tour guide and claimed it to be just as good, if not better than the cheesesteaks in Philly. Although it’s not technically in Philadelphia, I’ve included it in this post anyway due to how close it is. Donkey’s Place is located in Camden, NJ, just across the river, a 10 minute drive from the Liberty Bell (the USS New Jersey is also nearby if you want to check out a battleship!). This little pub is located on a random street away from any main tourist areas in a bit of a run down neighbourhood. There’s a small parking area for 2-3 cars or street parking. There wasn’t any special advertisement or signs for their cheesesteak and just by looking at this place from the outside, you never would’ve guessed they served cheesesteaks. We hoped we were in the right place.

Upon walking in, it was a cozy bar with some friendly people. You can either grab a seat at the bar or at one of the dining tables for table service. Their little menu posted on the napkin dispenser mainly consists of pub food with the addition of a cheesesteak.

We ordered two cheesesteaks – one with American white cheddar and the other with cheez whiz (no provolone option). The cheesesteak came on an untraditional round poppy seed bun with a hefty amount of meat (I think the waitress said half a pound), and when we said ‘extra onions’, they REALLY piled on a side of caramelized onions which I’m so glad we did because it was the highlight. The sandwich was seriously SO GOOD. The bun was a bit soft for my liking, but the overall sandwich was incredible that I didn’t care. The onions were what made it for me. It had a robust rich flavour and held more moisture, not like your typical caramelized onions. My best guess is that they either cook it down with beef fat or beef stock for that flavour and moisture. I tried to ask the guy how they make their onions, but all he said was “seasoning” which seemed to be a secret. Maybe it’s beef bouillon powder 🤔.

They also had Birch beer – similar to root beer but made with birch sap and bark. A little lighter and less sweet than root beer which I appreciated.

Less traditional, but a good contender for top fave! It’s definitely worth making a trip over the bridge for this cheesesteak!

Update April 20th, 2025: I’ve recently learned that Donkey’s Place was Anthony Bourdain’s top cheesesteak pick!

#5: Miller’s Twist – a pretzel cheesesteak

Address: 51 N 12th St, Philadelphia, PA 19107 (located in Reading Terminal Market)
Website: https://www.millerstwist.com/
Hours: Mon-Wed 8am-3:30pm, Thurs-Sat 8am-5pm, closed Sundays (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $7.50 (before tax)

Pros:

  • Unique little snack-sized cheesesteak in a pretzel dough
  • Takes both cash and card

Cons:

  • Located inside Reading Market – paid street or garage parking only
  • Closes earlier than regular cheesesteak shops
  • Sells out depending on popularity

This place didn’t show up on my cheesesteak research, but it did come up during my Reading Terminal Market must-try places to eat. I’ve got a serious weakness for soft pretzels, so of course when I saw that they had a Cheese whiz and onion cheesesteak pretzel, I just had to have it. Although small, it packs a lot of flavour. It’s essentially Cheez Whiz, onions, and steak wrapped up and baked inside a soft buttery pretzel dough. It was honestly SO GOOD. Toby said it was his favourite cheesesteak that day! This place also makes pretty great regular pretzels as well – they’re soft, buttery, and everything right.

#6: Angelo’s Pizzeria

Address: 736 S 9th St, Philadelphia, PA 19147
Website: https://www.angelospizzeriasouthphiladelphia.com/
Hours: Wed – Sun 11am-7pm, closed Mon & Tues (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $16.04 for a cheesesteak (before tax, cash only, not sure if they charged for extra onions)

Pros:

  • Hefty sandwich
  • Nice sesame bun, baked fresh daily

Cons:

  • Cash only (unsure if there’s an ATM on site)
  • Long lines all the time, they can run out of bread during the day so come early
  • Long waiting time – it took an hour from ordering to pick up
  • No seating available
  • Average cheesesteak filling

Okay, unpopular opinion here, but I think Angelo’s cheesesteak is just okay. 🫣

Angelo’s Pizzeria opened in their current location in 2019. They’re known for their pizza, hoagies, and the cooper sharp cheesesteak. They are praised for their unique fresh-baked sesame bun that is used in their cheesesteaks and hoagies. They often run out of bread during the day and stop serving cheesesteaks altogether, so if you want to try Angelo’s, get there early! Angelo’s reached superstar status when Dave Portnoy (the one-bite pizza review guy and founder of Barstool Sports) gave them a glowing review on their pizza in 2019, calling it “the best pizza in Philly”. Since then they’ve had a line-up out the door from opening to close! They take phone orders, but that’s only if you can get through. Apart from their pizza, their cooper sharp cheesesteak is also highly recommended by so many people. In 2024, Bradley Cooper, a Philadelphia native, teamed up with the owner of Angelo’s, Danny DiGiampietro, and opened up a cheesesteak shop in NYC called ‘Danny and Coop’s Cheesesteaks’, bringing over that famous sesame bun (which we’ve yet to visit – I’m waiting for the lines to die down).

From all this hype and publicity around them, I was super excited to try Angelo’s. It took a while for us to make it here since they’re always closed Mondays and Tuesdays which are the only two days off we get off from work. We arrived here just before 4pm on a Saturday and there was already at least 20 people in front of us waiting to order. This is a takeaway shop only, which means there’s no seating anywhere. There is a park across the street with limited benches, but many people were sitting on a stoop, curb, or just standing to eat. Luckily we found a parking spot directly in front of the shop so we just ate in the car.

It was a 12 minute wait for us to get to the front of the line to put in our order (cash only, pay on pick up), and it was another 40 minutes until they texted us to pick up our order. This was definitely the longest we’ve ever waited for a cheesesteak! Good thing we weren’t starving. We went for a walk on the popular South Street until they texted us to let us know our order was ready – even then, it was another 8 minute wait in the food pick-up line.

Since it took us so long to finally get here and with such a long wait, we ordered 3 sandwiches to try it all: two cheesesteaks – my classic Cheez Whiz, but since people rave so much about the Cooper Sharp, we got that one too, and also an Italian hoagie since Toby was a little sick of cheesesteaks at this point (not me, I could eat it until my dying day!). Sadly, the cheesesteaks were not worth the hype in my opinion. Although the sesame bun was good and super jam packed with sesame seeds, it wasn’t life-changing (I actually prefer the bun at Del Rossi’s better, Toby disagrees). The meat was average – not dry but not overly juicy, there wasn’t enough cheez whiz, and even though I asked for extra onions, it wasn’t enough. The onions were also kinda bland and tasted steamed rather than fried or caramelized. It was a pretty hefty sandwich though. The hoagie was also okay. Overall it wasn’t a bad cheesesteak. I’d say it was average but their sesame bread brings them up a couple points. It definitely wasn’t worth the hour-long process from ordering to pick-up. Maybe their pizzas are more worthwhile 🤷🏻‍♀️.

#7: John’s Roast Pork

Address: 14 E Snyder Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19148
Website: http://www.johnsroastpork.com/
Hours: Tues-Sat 10am-5pm, closed Sun & Mon (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $15-16 (I can’t remember exactly, prices weren’t posted, but we paid $18 with a soda)

Pros:

  • Hefty sandwich – lots of meat
  • Indoor and outdoor seating available
  • Takes both cash and card

Cons:

  • No cheez whiz or cooper sharp, only provolone or american cheese
  • Out of the way location in an industrial area with warehouses and strip clubs around

John’s Roast Pork is another popular local spot for cheesesteaks. They won a James Beard Award for their roast pork sandwich in 2006. It’s an unassuming shop located in the middle of nowhere amongst industrial buildings and strip clubs, but despite its location and it being the middle of winter, it was still pretty busy when we arrived. There was only window service with some indoor and outdoor seating available. They call their cheesesteaks “ultimate cheesesteaks” with 12oz of meat in each sandwich (I’m not sure how much meat they normally put on a cheesesteak, but it did feel more hefty compared to the others). Disappointingly they only offer sharp provolone cheese or American cheese. No whiz or cooper sharp. 💔

Overall I thought their cheesesteak was just okay – perhaps it was the lack of Cheez Whiz or perhaps we were following it straight after Del Rossi’s cheesesteak which is tough to beat. I thought the meat was decent but the sandwich wasn’t very cheese-forward in flavour probably because the provolone gets goopy when melted rather than the melty oozy cheese from Whiz or Cooper Sharp – I just don’t think I’m a provolone fan. It’s not a bad sandwich, but I thought it was just average. Toby liked it more than I did.

#8: Joe’s Steaks + Soda Shop

Address: 1 W Girard Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19125
Website: https://www.joessteaks.com/
Hours: 11am-9pm most days, until 1am on Fri & Sat (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: Small $8.50 / Large $13.89 (before tax) (I can’t remember if they charged extra for onions)

Pros:

  • Offers both small and large cheesesteak sizes
  • Fantastic milkshakes
  • Table service
  • Good ambience, plenty of seating
  • Takes both cash and card

Cons:

  • Good average cheesesteak, wasn’t overly excited by it, not bad but not great
  • Farther out away from the city
  • Can be difficult to find street parking

Interestingly, I didn’t hear about this place from any internet reviews or recommendations. We collect souvenir magnets for all the places we visit and on our first trip to Philly, we came across a cool Philadelphia magnet at the Christmas market at JFK Plaza. At the time I hadn’t even had an official cheesesteak yet, but here in the middle of the magnet was “Joe’s Steaks”. A quick Google search revealed Joe’s to be a locally loved and OG cheesesteak joint that’s been open for more than 70 years, so of course I had to add it to my list of cheesesteaks to try.

Opened since 1949! Originally called ‘Chink’s Steaks’ due to the non-asian owner’s nickname for having “almond eyes”, the current owner took over in 1999 and after much debate, he renamed it ‘Joe’s Steaks’ in 2013 to get with the times and drop the racial slur. Keeping the same recipe over 70 years, this place has been a local staple.

This shop is located in the Northern suburbs in Fishtown. We thought it’d be in a random quiet location like many other cheesesteak shops away from the city, but it was actually right smack in the corner of a pretty busy street with plenty of cool shops and restaurants. We actually struggled to find parking and had to park a bit farther away. Joe’s is in the theme of a vintage diner with retro colours and booths. It’s table service or take away and there are plenty of cheesesteak, hotdogs, and burgers on the menu. This was the first cheesesteak place in Philadelphia that we saw offer a smaller or large size, which was nice considered we weren’t that hungry.

The cheesesteak came out quickly and overall was good, but not spectacular. The meat, cheese, bread, onions were all good – cooked well, decent flavours, but nothing to write home about. The real star of the show was the milkshakes. Toby was OBSESSED with the cookies and cream malted milk shake. Overall, the servers were lovely and the ambience was great, but I probably wouldn’t make an extra trip just for Joe’s (I’m sure Toby would say otherwise just for their milkshakes 😅).

#9: Sonny’s Famous Steaks

Address: 228 Market St, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Website: https://sonnyscheesesteaks.com/
Hours: 11am-10pm daily (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $13.77 (before tax)

Pros:

  • Great location for tourists, right in old town across the street from many sites
  • Good amount of cheese
  • Nice flavour on the steak with a slight char

Cons:

  • Good average cheesesteak, wasn’t overly excited by it, not bad but not great

Sonny’s is located on Market Street, which is conveniently close to old down and just down the block from the Benjamin Franklin Museum. GQ magazine named it their top pick for Philly Cheesesteaks, however looking at the 10 places they tried, neither Del Rossi’s nor Jim’s was on their list, so did they really sample the best? 😜

We came on a Tuesday afternoon and there was no line. We ordered our usual whiz wit. The bread was average, the steak was cooked well with a nice char (not the juiciest, but still good), and the cheez whiz shone through the layers. Overall it’s a good sandwich with a great location, but there’s better out there. If you’re a visiting tourist without much time to travel further, then Sonny’s is a good choice for a cheesesteak and within walking distance to the heart of Phildaelphia Old Town tourism.

#10: Woodrow’s Sandwich Shop

Address: 630 South St, Philadelphia, PA 19147
Website: http://www.woodrowsandwich.com/
Hours: 11am-8pm daily (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $15 (online QR code ordering already – careful it automatically adds 20% tip even if takeaway)

Pros:

  • Good location on the popular South Street
  • Unique truffle cheese with good truffle flavour

Cons:

  • Grainy texture of the truffle cheese
  • Only truffle cheese option – soz if you don’t like truffle
  • Steak was a little dry
  • QR code ordering only even if no one else is there and the staff are not doing anything
  • 20% tip default added on unless you change it

I’ve seen Woodrow’s occasionally mentioned here and there but not consistent enough to make it on the top 10 list, however I just HAD to try it when I heard that they have a truffle cheesesteak. I’m OBSESSED with truffle and I can never pass up anything truffle-related on a menu, so when you mention truffle and cheesesteak together, I’m there.

Located on South Street near Jim’s Steaks, we came on a Tuesday afternoon in April and there was no one else there at the time. Annoyingly, they only do QR code ordering. All 3 staff members there were standing around waiting for me to process my order before anything was started. Had I known, I would’ve just done this from my car instead of 3 people silently and awkwardly waiting for me. Be careful when checking out. My $15 sandwich suddenly jumped up to $19 as the total and I realized that they default add a 20% tip – I nearly missed it in my rush of checking out quickly. Even if you’re ordering for takeaway, 20% is added on (which is crazy because there’s literally zero service – they won’t even take your order at the counter 😂).

Ordering complaints aside, I was still excited to try my truffle cheesesteak. Interestingly they ONLY have a truffle cheese option, no regular cheese. The sandwich didn’t take long to make and we ate it in our car to save money on street parking, lol. Overall it was a tasty sandwich and the truffle flavour definitely comes through, BUT the cheese itself was grainy. They pride themselves on making their own truffle cheese in house and not from a can which I do commend and the flavour of the truffle cheese was actually quite nice, but the graininess was very distracting and kind of ruined it for me. It was kind of like the graininess you’d get from melting pre-shredded cheese that have added caking agents instead of using blocks of fresh cheese (pro-tip: you should never make mac & cheese with pre-shredded cheese for this exact reason). Apart from the grainy cheese, the meat was also a little dry. The bread and onions were average.

#11: Campo’s Philly Cheesesteaks

Address: 214 Market St, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Website: https://camposdeli.com/
Hours: 9am-10pm daily (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $14.85 (before tax, extra surcharge with card payment)

Pros:

  • Great location right near old town and all the touristy things

Cons:

  • Short and blunt counter service
  • Surcharge on credit card
  • Lack of cheese flavour – I can see it, but couldn’t really taste it
  • Average steak, cheese, and onions

Also located on Market Street just a few doors down from Sonny’s Famous Steaks, we visited on a Tuesday afternoon in April. There was no one else there at the time so our sandwich was made relatively quickly. The counter service was short and blunt and there was a surcharge if you’re paying with card.

I really wanted to like this place due to its great location next to old down, but unfortunately the sandwich let me down. We ordered our usual Whiz Wit. The bread was average, the onions were soft without much flavour, the beef was cooked well and juicy however there wasn’t much char or flavour on it, but the biggest disappointment was the lack of cheese flavour. I couldn’t taste it at all and actually thought maybe they forgot to put in the cheez whiz and was about to go back to the counter to check before Toby pointed out the opaque colour within the sandwich. Cheez Whiz has quite a strong flavour that’s hard to miss – perhaps they have a watered down version or a different brand or maybe they’re just skimping, but I couldn’t taste it at all and a cheesesteak is supposed to be cheese-forward in flavour – it’s in the name! If you’re looking for a convenient cheesesteak on Market Street, go to Sonny’s instead.

Pat’s and Geno’s – #12 & 13

Pat’s King of Steaks and Geno’s Steaks are two cheesesteak shops located across the street from each other at the south end of 9th Street in South Philly. Due to their location and how often they’re mentioned together, I’ve grouped them together here and compared them side by side. They both have impressive shop fronts with neon lights on the outside that make you think you’re in Vegas. When you research “Philly cheesesteaks”, undoubtedly these two shops will pop up again and again in travel guides, probably due to their close vicinity to the popular nearby Italian Market along 9th Street, but be warned, even though they both have 4+ stars on Google reviews with an impressive 10K+ reviews, they have a reputation of being tourist traps. I decided to try them both out to judge for myself – after all, a guide to Philly cheesesteaks wouldn’t be complete without at least mentioning these two places due to their popularity!

Pat’s King of Steaks and Geno’s Steaks in the background

Both shops have outdoor only seating with speedy window service and both are open 24 hours. In order to fit this into our packed Philly day, we ended up coming here at 8am. Although it wasn’t busy, we were surprised how many other people also got cheesesteaks for breakfast.

#12: Pat’s King of Steaks

Address: 1237 E Passyunk Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19147
Website: http://www.patskingofsteaks.com/
Hours: 24 hours (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak: $14.81 (before tax)

Pros:

  • Quick service
  • Lots of covered outdoor seating (no indoor seating)

Cons:

  • Slightly stale, tough, chewy bread

First up was Pat’s. The sandwich was made quickly and served hot. The flavours were actually decent and the meat was juicy and not overcooked. The big let down was the bread. It was a bit tough and chewy, almost a little stale. Overall it’s not bad a bad sandwich if you wanted a middle of the night cheesesteak, but if you’re looking for the best of Philly, this unfortunately doesn’t cut it. Next is Geno’s.

#13: Geno’s Steaks

Address: 1219 S 9th St, Philadelphia, PA 19147
Website: https://www.genosteaks.com/
Hours: 24 hours (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $13.89 (before tax) – cash only

Pros:

  • Quick service
  • Lots of covered outdoor seating

Cons:

  • Cash only
  • Meat very overcooked, dry, and tough

Geno’s is just across the street from Pat’s, also covered in neon lighting. It was a similar set up with window service and outdoor seating. The cheesesteak here is $1 less than at Pat’s, but they take cash only. Our sandwich was again made in record time, but sadly we did not like Geno’s at all. The meat was sliced thicker and was overcooked, making it dry and tough. The onions were not cooked enough for my taste with barely any browning. It was overall very disappointing and not worth the calories, making Geno’s last on my cheesesteak list.

Cheesesteak Spots on our list to try for our next Philly trip:

  • Shay’s Steaks
  • Cafe Carmela
  • Stella’s

I hope you enjoyed my rambling on cheesesteaks across Philly. Keep checking back for updates and let me know in the comments if there’s a cheesesteak spot you think we should try!

A note on Fedoroff’s Roast Pork (Williamsburg, NYC)

Address: 178 N 10th St, Brooklyn, NY 11211
Website: www.fedoroffs.com
Hours: Mon-Sun 10am-10:30pm (check the website for updated hours)
Cheesesteak with onions: $18.95 medium 6″; $21.95 large 8″ (before tax)

Although Philadelphia is only less than 2 hours away from NYC, I scoured online reviews to find a local fix between our trips and found Fedoroff’s Roast Pork in Williamsburg, NYC. Since this is a cheesesteak post, I figured that I should include it if not for other New Yorkers, but maybe more for myself to rant into the void of the internet. This is hands down THE unanimous go-to spot for cheesesteaks in NYC…according to everyone else.

I came with an open-mind, making the trek from Park Slope to Williamsburg (which is no easy feat considering how congested the BQE always is or how long the subway ride takes). I was craving a cheesesteak and I was excited. On first impressions, it’s a small shop with really old signage that made it seem like this place has been here for a long time (odd choice since they only opened in 2016).

This place is incredibly expensive. Cheesesteaks usually come in one size and often a 12 inch roll for about $13-16. At Ferdoroff’s you have a choice of “medium” (which is 6 inches) for $18.95, or “large” (which is 8 inches) for $21.95. First of all, it baffles me why a sandwich shop would even bother carrying two different sizes of bread that is only 2 inches in difference 🤨. Second of all, I get that NYC is expensive, but $19 for a sandwich that’s literally half the size as a regular cheesesteak in Philly that’s made of sliced meat, cheez whiz, and onions is beyond me. What’s even more annoying is that they don’t even post the prices on their try-too-hard-to-look-vintage sign. I had to ask the cashier when we went to order. Luckily we went on a Tuesday where they happened to have a cheesesteak special for $12.95 for a medium 6″ sandwich. The server bro asked us if we wanted to upgrade to a large 8″ for $21.95…An extra $9 for 2 inches of sandwich? – I’m good.

Despite this, I still kept an open mind and ordered my medium 6″ cheesesteak. Maybe this sandwich will be so incredible that it’ll be worth the money – after all, it’s so highly reviewed.

It definitely wasn’t worth the wait or the money. It sounds stupid, but I have seriously never been more annoyed eating a sandwich than at Fedoroff’s 😂. Their bread is so thin and soft, that it might as well not have been there. The filling was average, nothing special, but the bread was constantly falling apart and getting mushy. I couldn’t even hold onto it properly. With every bite I was dropping more and more food from my hands and by the end I felt like a child with cheese sauce all over my hands and face. It was a huge mess. It was ridiculous.

I really struggle to see why people like Fedoroff’s. They boast themselves on being the only cheesesteak shop in NYC owned by South Philadelphia natives, yet their website says they pay tribute and get inspiration to the great cheesesteaks in Philly including Pat’s and Geno’s…🤨. I’d rank Fedoroff’s even below Geno’s. At least with Geno’s you know what you’re getting at a fair price. Fedoroff’s make it seem like they’re the only legit spot for cheesesteaks in NYC, but the combination of the high prices, poor product, try-too-hard-to-look-old, and suspicious history makes this place just feel scammy. Highly do not recommend. /rant

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The Ultimate Guide to a Manhattan Chinatown Food Crawl – bring cash!


Manhattan Chinatown is full of amazing authentic Asian food but in a neighbourhood full of Chinese signage and shop keepers that barely speak English, it can be daunting to find the best food spots amongst the literal hundreds of restaurants in this neighbourhood. This food guide highlights some of my favourite places to eat in Chinatown…

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Discover Acadia National Park: Your Guide to Mount Desert Island


Date Published: Dec 2nd, 2024 | Last Updated: Dec 2nd, 2024
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA
Date of travel: Oct 13-14th, 2024

START HERE: This post has everything you need to know about visiting Acadia’s Mount Desert Island.

Acadia National Park is the “Crown Jewel” of the North Atlantic Coast providing breathtaking coastal views, mountainous hikes, scenic drives, beaches, and a town with no shortage of restaurants. This national park is a must-do in Maine!

Contents:

  1. Park Info
  2. An Overview
  3. When to travel
  4. How Many Days Do I Need?
  5. Where to Stay
  6. Getting Around Acadia – Driving vs the Bus
    1. Driving
    2. Island Explorer Bus
  7. Park Pass
  8. Travel Tips
    1. Start Early!
    2. Limited Cellphone Service Everywhere
    3. Bring good hiking gear
    4. Print your park pass before you go
  9. Best Things to Do:
  10. Overwhelmed? I got you. Here’s an ideal travel itinerary to hit all the highlights in 2 days

Park Info:

Location: Acadia National Park, Maine (Hulls Cove Visitor Center: 25 Visitor Center Road, Bar Harbor, ME 04609)
Park opening hours: Open 24 hours, year-round. There are road closures in the winter months (check the park website for updated info).
Park website: https://www.nps.gov/acad/index.htm
Park fees: $35 per car (+$6 for Cadillac Mountain vehicle reservation) – https://www.nps.gov/acad/planyourvisit/fees.htm

An Overview

Acadia National Park is made up of 3 areas: Isle au haut, Mount Desert Island, and Schoodic Peninsula. Of these three, Mount Desert Island is the most popular with the most amount of things to do and has the the iconic scenery in this national park. During our trip, we didn’t have time to make it to Schoodic nor Isle au Haut, so I will focus on Mount Desert Island only for this post. We do have plans to visit again next year, so keep a look out for updates!

There is a lot to do here, so if you’re feeling overwhelmed, I’ve done a quick 2-day itinerary to see all the main highlights here.

Although an island, Mount Desert Island is accessible by car via Bar Harbor Road. The most popular things to do are on the East side of the island, including exploring Bar Harbor downtown, Sand Beach, hiking the Beehive Trail, Thunder Hole, Ocean Path, Jordan Pond, the ‘Bubbles’, and Cadillac Mountain. I’ve made a quick map of these places below to give you a rough idea of the proximity of the main attractions. I’ll go into each place in more detail further down in this post.

Map of Mount Desert Island in Acadia National Park

When to travel:

The busy season is between Summer and Autumn. When I say busy, I mean BUSY. Plan wayyyy ahead and book your travel plans at least 3 months in advance if you can. I’d recommend visiting in Autumn for the beautiful orange and red colours of the fall foliage that adds to the already breath-taking landscape.

Photo from the South Bubble summit

If you want to time your trip to synchronize with the change in fall colours, here’s a foliage tracker/estimator that can be helpful when planning: https://www.explorefall.com/states/maine. The leaves will usually start changing colours between the end of September to middle of October, depending on the temperature that year. We went in the middle of October this year and while it was perfect for Acadia, it was too early for upstate New York, and just a touch late for New Hampshire 🤷🏻‍♀️.

Check the park website before you go, as some roads are closed during the winter months and some trails are closed during Peregrine Falcon nesting season in the spring to late summer.

How Many Days Do I Need?

To hit the highlights of Acadia in a flash, you’ll need 2-3 days, but if you want to explore more and take it easy, then I’d recommend staying here a week. Toby and I had limited vacation days and wanted to hit up New Hampshire and Vermont during the fall foliage season as well so we did the Acadia highlights in 2 days. We originally planned for 2.5 days, but we hit some bad weather on our last day and and shortened our stay, skipping a couple attractions. 😦

Check the weather ahead of time since many of the popular hiking trails are weather-dependent, so give yourself an extra day or two for wiggle room incase you need to post-pone any activities like us. Check our 2-day itinerary here.

Where to Stay

There are a TON of accommodation options around Acadia National Park. You pass by motel after motel the closer you get to Acadia but with that being said, ALL OF IT WILL GET BOOKED UP EARLY. We’ve never encountered such a busy place in our travels before. A month before planning our trip, every single (affordable) accommodation option was booked up around the national park and we snagged the only affordable one remaining all the way in Surry, a 45 mins drive from the park. Although it meant that we had to wake up earlier than planned to get to where we wanted to go, we were just grateful to get a place at all! We travelled at peak season in middle of October, so if you’re planning to do the same, BOOK EARLY. I’ve included a map of available accommodation options from booking.com for the middle of October next year as reference.

Accommodation options from booking.com

The best place (although more expensive) to stay will be in Bar Harbor town, inside Acadia National Park. Although a small town, it’s got everything you need at your fingertips, including restaurants, shops, grocery stores, bars…etc. It’s also close to the major attractions in the national park as well. I’ve included a screen cap below of available options in Bar Harbor from booking.com for reference. The downtown area is very walkable, so choose to stay closer to Main Street if you want to be in the hustle and bustle. Read more about Bar Harbor below.

Accommodation options in Bar Harbor from booking.com

If you can’t manage to get a place in Bar Harbor (like us), don’t fret. Anything nearby will be fine. You can always drive to Bar Harbour town and spend an afternoon to walk around (it’s not a big town, you can get through it in a couple hours).

Getting Around Acadia – Driving vs the Bus

You can get around Mount Desert Island by either driving or taking the free Island Explorer Bus.

Driving:

We prefer the freedom of driving our own car, however there are downfalls. Since Acadia gets extremely busy, parking can be an absolute nightmare. If you are visiting popular hikes and trailheads, make sure you arrive early (ideally before 8am) to get a parking spot, otherwise prepare to circle the lots and the side roads again and again until one frees up. We had to do this when we visited Jordan Pond and when we did eventually find a parking spot it was a 30 minute walk away from the trailhead 😭. It was the worst parking experience we’ve ever encountered. When parking lots are full, the rangers will barricade the entrance so you can’t just go in and circle around until one frees up. Therefore, if you only want to drive, start early and also consider that it will limit the number of places you go in a day and you’ll have to factor in the extra time to find a parking spot – for example, we woke up super early and got a great parking spot at Sand Beach parking, however in the afternoon when we wanted to to the Jordan Pond hikes, it was near impossible to find a spot and driving around took up a chunk of our schedule.

Also keep in mind that there is limited cellphone reception, so if you rely heavily on Google maps, maybe have a paper map with you just in case.

Island Explorer Bus:

This is a free bus service that operates only from Summer to Fall and runs roughly every 30 minutes. It takes you to the most popular places and will stop at most parking lots. Their website here has more information regarding the bus routes: https://www.exploreacadia.com/routefinder.html. The benefit of taking the bus is that it is easy and you don’t have to worry about parking, however the downfall is that you’ll have to take your whole day of hiking essentials with you and make sure you have places where you can fill up your water bottle throughout the day. The bus is also only every 30 minutes, so you’ll have to factor that in as well when you’re planning your day.

Island Explorer bus – a free bus service around Acadia National Park

What I recommend: a combination of both. Get up early and get parking at your desired lot. If you’re doing the Beehive Trail first thing (which I would recommend), park at the Sand Beach parking lot. If you’re doing the Jordan Pond trails first, then park at the lot there. When you’re ready to move on to the next location, just take the Island Explorer Bus instead of moving your car. It will save you the hassle of having to find parking for your next location. The bus will go to all the parking lots, so even if you can’t get a spot at your desired lot, just park at the next closest one and take the bus. There’s no cost for parking, so you can leave your car at the same place all day.

Park Pass

You will need to purchase a park pass to enter Acadia National Park. There’s no gated entry, but there are plenty of rangers around checking people’s cars for the pass. It’s $35 per car and must be displayed on your windshield. This park pass allows you to go anywhere within the park, however if you wish to drive up Cadillac Mountain (more on that below), you will have to purchase an additional timed vehicle reservation pass ($6 per car). The Cadillac Mountain sunrise tickets sell out quick so plan ahead of time!

The park pass and Cadillac Mountain vehicle pass can both be purchased online ahead of time on the government website: https://www.nps.gov/acad/planyourvisit/fees.htm. You can purchase the park pass in person at the visitor’s centre in town, but not the Cadillac Mountain pass. I’d highly recommend buying both online beforehand and have it printed and ready to go, so you have one less thing to worry about. In peak season, it can be incredibly busy and parking can be a huge hassle – don’t waste your trip waiting in line to look for parking just to buy a park pass!

Travel Tips

Start Early!

If there’s one piece of travel advice I can give you for visiting Acadia National Park, it’d be to start early! Ideally at sunrise. If you were looking for a relaxing getaway of sleeping in, I’m sorry to disappoint you. Because this place has so much to offer, it gets INCREDIBLY busy especially in the summer and fall season – I’m talking about having to park a half an hour away from your car busy – and everyone wants to hit up the same areas and the same iconic hikes. It gets so busy that not only will you struggle to find parking, but you’ll even have to wait in line to climb up mountains! It gets insane, trust me. Getting up early is the only way to ensure the best time away from the majority of the crowds and the frustrations of finding parking. You’ll appreciate the calmer and quieter surrounding in the early morning and take in nature without all the noise.

A benefit of starting early is that you get to see some wicked cool sunrises.
Limited Cellphone Service Everywhere

There is very limited cell reception in Acadia. You might get some pockets of good reception on top of mountains, but it’s spotty at best. There’s free wifi at Jordan Pond House and also decent wifi in Bar Harbor town, but apart from that be prepared for your service to jump in and out. I’d recommend picking up a map of the area or screenshot it on your phone before heading out and going on hikes just incase you lose reception and get lost.

Bring good hiking gear

There are plenty of rock-scrambling and cliff-side hikes to embark on in Acadia. If you plan on trekking through these popular hikes, a reliable pair of hiking shoes with good grip is a must! There’s also rock-climbing involved in some of the trails, so I’d also recommend a good pair of hiking pants that will hold up against abrasive surfaces. Hiking sticks can be useful, but depending on your hike, there are some trails that will require your hands to climb up and down rocks and hold on to iron rungs.

You need to display the Acadia park pass in your windshield when you park. Remember to have it printed and ready to go before you travel or hope that your hotel or accommodation will have a printer you can borrow.

Best Things to Do:

A summary of the best things to do:

Sand Beach

This is the largest sandy beach in Mount Desert Island and unsurprisingly is a very popular spot in the summertime. This open beach is a lovely place to relax and enjoy the views and sounds of crashing waves or to rest your legs after a long hike. We came here during the fall so the weather was a bit chilly for swimming, but there were still plenty of families here with children playing in the sand.

To access Sand Beach, park at the Sand Beach parking lot and it’s only a few steps away.

Ocean Path

Distance: 6.6km (3.3km each way)
Duration: 1.5 hours out and back, not counting time for photos
Trail type: out & back
Start: Sand Beach parking lot

Ocean Path is a lovely walking path along the coast of Maine. The path is narrow and follows along Park Loop Road, but there are multiple small paths to diverge off in the trail to get closer to the views and rocky terrain, best for that perfect Acadia photo. This path is flat and easy to walk on, popular for runners, hikers, photographers, and bird-watchers.

Getting to the start of the trailhead from the parking lot

This out and back path starts at Sand Beach parking lot and continues for 3.3km, ending at Otter Point Overlook. Apart from enjoying the views along the way, there are 4 main stopovers on this path: 1) Thunder Hole, 2) Otter Cliff Overlook, 3) Boulder Beach and 4) Otter Point Overlook (marked on the map).

Ocean Path, 6.6km, roughly 1.5 hours to walk to entirety

You can choose to walk as much or as little of this path as you like. If you don’t feel like walking, you can drive down Park Loop Road and you’ll see turn offs for small parking lots at each of the stops (but I’d recommend walking to see the views along the way). Note: Park Loop Road is a one-way road to accommodate for road-side parking, so you can only travel from North to South by car.

Some photos along Ocean Path on our way to and back from Thunder Hole:

Small paths along the trail to get closer to the coast
Small parking lots turn off at Thunder Hole
We drove to Otter Cliff Overlook (which wasn’t really worth the stopover in my opinion) – Otter Point Overlook not pictured

Thunder Hole

Thunder Hole is the most popular stop-off on Ocean Path where you can watch waves crash into the rocks, creating a burst splash of water high into the air. You have to come 2 hours before high tide to experience this. We didn’t manage to get our timing right, but it’s still neat to stop over here anyway. It’s roughly a 20 minute walk to Thunder Hole from Sand Beach via Ocean Path with beautiful views along the way.

Thunder Hole
The terrain around Thunder Hole
Thunder Hole not at high tide </3
Coast views at Thunder Hole
What it’s meant to look like if we came at the right time 😅

Beehive Trail

The Beehive Trail is one of Acadia National Park’s most popular hikes, offering breath-taking panoramic views. This hike has a reputation for being thrilling and difficult with iron rungs and vertical climbs but we personally didn’t find it bad at all, especially with good pacing. I recommend starting early, wearing good shoes, and dressing in layers. For safety, avoid this hike if it’s raining. Follow this in-depth guide about hiking the Beehive trail here.

Views on the Beehive Trail

Hiking Acadia’s Beehive Trail: A Complete Overview


The Beehive Trail in Acadia National Park is one of the most popular hiking trails known for its stunning panoramic views and challenging vertical climbs. This guide has all the information you need to tackle this trail.

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Jordan Pond Trails

There are numerous trails you can hike around the Jordan Pond, and many of them conveniently start at Jordan Pond House Restaurant. The 3 most popular hikes here are the Jordan Pond Path, Jordan Cliffs Trail, and Bubbles Trail. You can also combine all 3 hikes to get the best of all of them – which is what we did! Follow my complete guide to hiking these trails here.

View of the “Bubbles” from Jordan Path
View from Jordan Cliffs trail
View from the Bubbles Trail, at the top of South Bubble
View from Jordan Pond Path

Jordan Pond House Restaurant

Outside of Bar Harbor, there is a very limited selection of restaurants on Mount Desert Island in Acadia National Park. Jordan Pond House Restaurant is the most popular choice not only because of their good food, but also because of its convenient location where many trailheads are located. The back patio of this restaurant also offers views of Jordan Pond and the North and South “bubbles”.

They’re known for their popovers here, which is kind of like a hollow muffin made with a thin batter, served with butter and their local-made jam. It was okay, but for me the star of the meal was their meatloaf sandwich! Find out more about this restaurant here.

Cadillac Mountain at Sunrise

Cadillac Mountain is the highest point on the eastern seaboard and is famously known to be the best (and first) place to watch the sunrise in Acadia. You can get to the summit by either hiking or driving, but generally driving is the preferred option so you’re not hiking in the dark to get up the mountain by sunrise.

Due to its popularity, Cadillac Mountain is the only place in Acadia National Park where you need a vehicle reservation to drive to the top. You must pre-purchase your reservation ahead of time online on the government website: https://www.recreation.gov/timed-entry/400000. This ticket is in addition to the park pass – you must have both to drive up the mountain. You cannot buy these tickets in person unlike the park pass. 30% of the tickets are released 90 days in advance and the remaining 70% are released 2 days prior at 10am EST.

The government reservation website screenshot of the two ticket type reservations.

Tips to securing a ticket: When you get to the government website, there are 2 types of tickets to choose from: sunrise and day tickets. Not surprisingly, the sunrise tickets are the most highly sought after. Set your timer and get multiple people on multiple devices because as soon as it hits 10am (eastern time – make sure you’re in the right time zone), you must click immediately for your best chances. I tried this on two occasions and swore I clicked exactly on time and the tickets were already sold out within a SECOND. It was insane. Once you’re in, the system reserves the ticket for you for 15 minutes until you check out. Pro-tip: If you didn’t secure a ticket at 10am, keep refreshing and wait until 10:15am to see if tickets become available. All the people that didn’t check out their tickets within the 15 mins have their tickets timed out and gets put up for sale again. This was actually how I managed to snag our tickets 🤫. Once you check out, you’ll get sent a QR code that they will scan at the gate on the day.

The sunrise tickets are timed to enter between 5:30am – 7:30am, there’s no time limit on how long you can stay up there. It is recommended to arrive 1 hour prior to sunrise. It takes about 20 minutes to drive to the top and only a few minutes from the car park to walk to the views.

Map of Cadillac Mountain summit – smaller West lot on the left and East lot on the right

Sadly for us, we did everything right, but the weather was not in our favour. We woke up super early and got to the gate entry at 6:20am, about 20 mins before sunrise (a bit late). We knew visibility was going to be poor, but we had hopes of a small break in the clouds for the views so we drove up anyway – after all, we were already there and the $6 was spent. They scanned our QR code at the gate and it only took us 15 minutes to drive to the top (although I’ve heard it can take up to 30 mins due to slower people unfamiliar with driving up mountain roads and it’s single file all the way up). Once we got to the top, there are 2 parking lots. You’ll pass the smaller West lot first which is farther away (seems like the overflow lot), then you’ll reach the East lot, which is a semi-circle and is directly in front of the trail. You want to park in the East lot. When we visited, the weather was so bad that you could barely see 10 feet in front of you so we just got out to have a quick peak, then got back into our car and headed straight for a warm breakfast in Bar Harbor.

East lot with no visibility at sunrise
</3
What we shoud’ve been seeing
Toby pointing at where the view should be 😅

There’s a short and easy 500m trail around the Cadillac Summit that was supposed to be nice to see. I guess we’ll have to try again next time. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Bar Harbor

Bar Harbor is the only major town in Acadia National Park. Here you’ll find lots of cute shops, souvenirs, restaurants, hiking gear, and even a big grocery store for all your food needs. There are also tons of accommodation options in this small town that get booked out way in advance during the busy season.

Map of downtown Bar Harbor – Main Street will be the majority of the shops

You don’t need to spend a ton of time in Bar Harbor, an afternoon is enough to explore this small town. It only takes about 15 minutes to walk from one end to the other. Main Street is the street with the most shops. There are TONS of seafood restaurants around here and of course, lobster rolls – when in Maine!

Take a stroll down The Shore Path that starts at the North end of town from Agamont Park. From here, you can see a ton of lobster boats anchored in the water (we counted at least 26). Continue walking on the path that wraps around Bar Harbour Inn, a big beautiful inn with spa amenities (looked expensive). The path can go for a while but we stopped wen we reached the small beach at Balance Rock and took a right to head back onto the Main Street, weaving through the beautiful old houses in the quiet neighbourhood.

Agamont Park
View from the harbor
The many many lobster boats – we counted 26!
Bar Harbour Inn
Balancing Rock

If you need to stock up on supplies, there is a large corporate grocery store that sits at the edge of town called Hannafords.

We had breakfast at a highly rated local diner called Jordans Restaurant (conveniently located next to Hannfords). They open at 5am, which was perfect for us after our big disappointment with the gloomy weather on Cadillac Mountain. When we arrived at 7am, the diner was already half full. By the time we left an hour later, there was a line up out the door! They have a decent sized menu, boasting their wild blueberry muffin and wild blueberry pancakes – we got both (and Toby added chocolate chips to the pancake). We also got the lobster roll, clam chowder, and lobster cheese omelette – if you haven’t noticed, we often order too much food because I want to try it all 😅. Overall it was an okay meal. I liked the home fries and the lobster roll was great (soft fluffy toasted buttered bun). The pancakes with the wild blueberry sauce was good but the lobster omelette and blueberry muffin was just okay. The staff was real friendly and the place had a great buzz about it.

If you’re looking for great coffee, there’s a cool local shop called Vacationland Coffee Roasters where they roast their own beans onsite and will package it fresh for you. What actually drew me here was the super cool logo with the lobster claw pinching a coffee bean. I bought a bag of beans just for the logo 😅.

Overwhelmed? I got you. Here’s an ideal travel itinerary to hit all the highlights in 2 days:

I’ve put together an ideal sample itinerary to hit the highlights of Acadia National Park from our experience (our real itinerary was a bit more messy):

Before you go:

  • Check the tide times for Thunder Hole and estimate to arrive at Thunder Hole 2 hours before high tide. Depending on when you go, you will have to adjust your itinerary to either do Thunder Hole before or after the other activities to get there at the right time. There is a parking lot at Thunder Hole that gets pretty busy so plan accordingly. You can also walk from Sand Beach parking lot via Ocean Path – takes about 20 minutes. You really only need 10 mins at Thunder Hole to watch the waves crash.
  • Make a lunch reservation at Jordan Pond House, timing will depend on where you are able to fit Thunder Hole in.
  • *Book your Cadillac Mountain vehicle pass 2 days in advance.

Day 1: Beehive Trail, Ocean Path, Thunder Hole, Jordan Pond Trails

  • 7am (or earlier): Get to Sand Beach parking lot by 7am to secure a parking spot.
  • 7am – 9am: Hike the Beehive Trail when the sun rises to avoid the crowds. This hike takes roughly 1.5-2 hours, depending on your pace and crowds.
  • 9am-10:30am: Finish the Beehive Trail and head towards Sand Beach to take in the views of the ocean, then walk the Ocean Path (conveniently also starts from the Sand Beach parking lot). Ocean path does link up to Thunder Hole, so if the timing is right you can head there after hiking the Beehive Trail.
  • 11am – Noon: Arrive at Jordan Pond House for your lunch reservation, or if you didn’t secure a reservation, get there before 11am and line up to get seated. If you were able to make a late booking, you’ll have more freedom in your time.
  • 12-4pm: Hike the Jordan Pond Trails (takes about 3-4 hours, be mindful of the time of sunset that day).
  • 4pm onwards: The loop finishes back at the restaurant. Depending on how tired you are, you can have dinner here or head to Bar Harbor for more restaurant options. Have an early rest and wake up early the next day.
  • Note: you can also flip the hikes around and do Jordan Pond Trails first, then lunch at Jordan Pond House and Beehive Trail last, however the Beehive Trail is one of the busiest trails and it will get PACKED in the afternoon, whereas the Jordan Pond Trails are not as busy.

Day 2:

  • 5:30-7:30am: Arrive at the Cadillac Mountain summit before sunrise (make sure you have a vehicle reservation pass).
  • 7:30a – 9am: Enjoy the sunrise views and walk around the Summit Loop.
  • 9am – 10am: Breakfast in town at Bar Harbor – we went to Jordan’s Restaurant. Quick service, decent food, nice people.
  • 10am onwards: Spend the rest of the day exploring Bar Harbour
    • Browse the shops
    • Walk across the foot bridge to Bar Island at low tide to get some views of Bar Harbor from a distance (make sure you come back before the water level rises again!)
    • Book a lobster boat tour with LuLu Lobster Boat Tour (tour times are usually 9am, 11:30am, 2:30pm) – https://lululobsterboat.com/
    • Have lunch or dinner in one of the many restaurants in town
  • Sunset at Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse
    • This is optional and a VERY busy place at sunset. We did not end up doing this due to timing and weather, but other visitors have recommended coming 3 hours before sunset just to get a parking spot due to the very small lot that’s there. It’s roughly a 30 minute drive from Bar Harbor.

Less popular places that came up in my research for this trip but we didn’t get to go due time constraints, so I’ll make a list here for reference on our next trip to Acadia. You’d need at least another day to fit the rest of this into the itinerary:

  • Beech Cliff Ladder Trail – we didn’t get to go due to weather, but this hike (strenuous, roughly 2 hours) provides beautiful views over Echo Lake. It’s not as exhilarating as the Beehive Trail or Precipice Trail but there are still iron rings, ladders, and cliff-side walks. Park at the Echo Lake Beach Entrance for the trailhead.
  • Precipice Trail – I didn’t put this in my original itinerary because of the multiple warnings and thrilling things about this hike, but after doing the Beehive Trail which was also meant to be scary but wasn’t bad at all, I think we’ll give this hike a go next time. It’s the most dangerous hike in Acadia and will take you anywhere between 1-3 hours. Arrive early for a parking spot (what else is new?).
  • Walk across the foot bridge to Bar Island at low tide from Bar Harbor to get views of Bar Harbor.
  • Drive around to the other little towns (ie. Southwest Harbor and Northeast Harbor)
  • Watch the sunset at Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse
  • Visit Echo Lake
  • Visit the other two Acadia regions: Schoodic Point and a day in Isle au Haut
  • LuLu Lobster Boat Tour (9am, 11:30am, 2:30pm) – https://lululobsterboat.com/

Discover Acadia National Park: Your Guide to Mount Desert Island


Acadia National Park is the “Crown Jewel” of the North Atlantic Coast providing breathtaking coastal views, mountainous hikes, scenic drives, beaches, and a town with no shortage of restaurants. This national park is a must-do in Maine!

Exploring Cape Elizabeth: Iconic Lighthouses and Lobster Rolls


Cape Elizabeth, Maine, is a serene coastal town featuring iconic lighthouses, including the famous Portland Head Light and the nearby smaller Bug Light. Visitors can explore both lighthouses and enjoy renowned lobster rolls at local spots like Bite Into Maine and the Lobster Shack at Two Lights, all in half a day.

Top Things to Do in Portland, Maine: Eat, Shop, Explore


Portland, Maine, is a charming coastal city known for its vibrant shops and seafood, particularly lobster rolls. Visitors can enjoy its historic streets, numerous dining options, and attractions, including the iconic Portland Head Light. A few hours is sufficient for a quick visit, but extending to a few days allows for deeper exploration.

Mount Battie and Megunticook: Your Camden Hiking Guide


Camden Hills State Park sits just outside the small coastal town of Camden, Maine. This park has a number of hiking trails with the most popular ones being Mount Battie and Mount Megunticook. Both of these trails offer panoramic views of the ocean coast and sweeping colourful fall foliage trees below. If you’re driving through the…

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Explore Acadia’s Jordan Pond: Most Popular Trails & Jordan Pond House Restaurant


Date Published: Nov 12th, 2024 | Last Updated: Nov 12th, 2024
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA
Date of travel: October 13th, 2024

If you haven’t checked it out yet, here’s a post of an overview of Acadia National Park if you need more info about where to stay, where to eat, getting around, and other travel recommendations.

Contents:

  1. Where to Start?
  2. Hiking the Jordan Pond Trails
    1. Jordan Pond Path (yellow)
    2. Jordan Cliffs Trail (green)
    3. South Bubble Loop/Bubble Trail (blue)
    4. All 3 hikes combined: Jordan Cliffs Trail + Bubbles Trail + Jordan Pond Path
      1. A Detailed Hiking Guide
  3. Jordan Pond House Restaurant – make reservations!
  4. Some Final Thoughts

Besides climbing the Beehive Trail, Jordan Pond is one of the most popular places to visit in Acadia National Park due to its numerous trails, beautiful views, and the ever so popular ‘pop overs’ served at the Jordan Pond House Restaurant. Jordan Pond is situated in the centre of Mount Desert Island in Acadia National Park (see map below for reference).

It gets extremely busy here, so I’d recommend coming here super early to get a good parking spot near Jordan Pond House Restaurant, spend your morning hiking (keep scrolling for a list of suggested hikes), then finish your hike at Jordan Pond House Restaurant for some lunch (make sure you have a reservation, or arrive before they open – see more tips below).

Note: The cellphone service here is very spotty and limited. There is free wifi at Jordan Pond House if you need to last minute download maps or send a message before embarking on hikes in this area.

Map of Acadia’s Mount Desert Island and location of Jordan Pond

Where to Start?

Start at Jordan Pond House Restaurant (2928 Park Loop Rd, Seal Harbor, ME 04675). This is one of the very few restaurants in Mount Desert Island (apart from Bar Harbor) and is also the start to many trails. There is very limited parking here and once lots are full, park rangers will block it off so you can’t just sit and circle waiting for a spot to open up. Most people park along side Park Loop Road once the parking lots fill up.

If you don’t get here early enough, try to find parking at a lot farther away and take the free Island Explorer Bus to Jordan Pond House (runs every 30 minutes). We didn’t realize we could’ve taken the free bus and ended up walking an extra 30mins to our car after our 4 hour hike 😭 – learn from our mistake!

Hiking the Jordan Pond Trails

There are numerous trails you can hike around the Jordan Pond, and many of them conveniently start at Jordan Pond House Restaurant. I’ve highlighted the 3 most popular hikes in the map below (Jordan Pond Path, Jordan Cliffs Trail, and Bubbles Trail), but you can also combine all 3 hikes to get the best of all of them (highlighted further down in red) – which is what we did!

(South Bubble Loop doesn’t technically start at Jordan Pond, but many people will start at the restaurant and walk the Jordan Path then join up with the Bubbles Trail to go up the South Bubble).

Here’s a topographical map of the Jordan Pond area for reference:

Map from Acadia National Park: https://www.nps.gov/acad/planyourvisit/maps.htm

Jordan Pond Path (yellow)

Distance: 5.3km
Elevation: 19m
Difficulty: Easy
Estimated time: 1 hour
More info: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/jordan-pond-path

This easy around-the-pond path is one of the most popular hikes in the Jordan Pond area. It takes roughly 1 hour to complete and the path is relatively flat and easy to walk on. You start at the Jordan Pond House Restaurant with iconic views of the Bubbles, then follow the trail around the water the entire way.

Jordan Pond Path

Jordan Cliffs Trail (green)

Distance: 4.8km
Elevation: 316m
Difficulty: Hard
More info: https://www.alltrails.com/explore/trail/us/maine/jordan-cliffs-trail-to-penobscot-mountain

This is an exhilarating loop trail that takes you via the exposed cliffs along Jordan Pond for gorgeous views. It starts off at Jordan Pond House then through Amphitheatre Road where it joins the Jordan Cliffs Trail. Continue on the Jordan Cliffs Trail for the views, then turn left onto the Penobscot Trail to the Penobscot Mountain Summit, then back via the Penosbscot Mountain Trail to Jordan Pond House. This is considered a very difficult hike with rock scrambling and iron rungs. You can then loop back via the summit of Penobscot Mountain and the Penobscot Mountain Trail.

Jordan Cliffs Trail

South Bubble Loop/Bubble Trail (blue)

Distance: 2.3km
Elevation: 150m
Difficulty: Moderate, steep
More info: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/south-bubble-mountain-and-jordan-pond-loop

The South Bubble Summit is another place for iconic views of Jordan Pond. There’s also “Bubble Rock” here which is a large boulder that sits on the edge of the cliff, brought here by a glacier thousands of years ago. You can either reach the summit via the ‘Bubble Rock Parking Lot’ as pictured in the map above, or you can combine it with the Jordan Pond Path and make it an out-and-back hike to the summit then back down, skipping the rest of the Bubble Loop. The path up to the South Bubble summit is very steep with lots of rock scrambling, so be prepared with a good pair of hiking shoes!

If you’re short on time, this is the hike with the best views around Jordan Pond (in my opinion, anyway).

Bubbles Trail/South Bubble

All 3 hikes combined: Jordan Cliffs Trail + Bubbles Trail + Jordan Pond Path

So many trails around Jordan Pond intersect each other so you can mix and match and make up your own trail as you like. The most popular mix of trails is the Jordan Cliffs + South Bubble + Jordan Path trail. You get the best elevated views of the Jordan Pond from the Jordan Cliffs Trail, with the iconic panoramic scenery of the Bubbles Trail/South Bubble Summit, and the serene easy flat water-side trail of the Jordan Pond Path. This combination of paths is the hike that we chose to do and is what I’ll focus on in detail for this post. 😊

Length: 7.2km
Elevation Gain: 358m
Trail type: Loop
Difficulty/Terrain: Moderate to Hard with exposed cliffs, iron rungs to climb, rock scrambling, and steep ascents
Estimated duration: 2.5 – 4 hours, depending on your level of fitness (we took 4 hours due to a road closure and also multiple stops for photos 🙃)
Starting point: Jordan Pond House Restaurant
Things to bring: water bottle, sunscreen & hat, good hiking shoes, tick/insect repellent depending on season, screenshot of the trail map
More Trail info: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/jordan-cliffs-trail-to-bubbles-trail-to-jordan-pond-path

A Detailed Hiking Guide:

You’ll want to start this hike clockwise to make it easiest on yourself. Some of the rock scrambling on the Jordan Cliffs Trail can be a bit dangerous if you do it counter-clockwise.

Red is the combined path of all 3 trails. We had an unexpected road closure and had to do slight detour (outlined in pink dots)

A) Start at Jordan Pond House Restaurant. From the back of the restaurant, walk towards Jordan Pond and start by enjoying the calm of the Jordan Pond waters with views of the North & South Bubbles in the distance (aka the geological boobs – you were thinking it too).

Path from the back of the restaurant towards Jordan Pond
The geologic boobs

B) Continue briefly left onto Jordan Pond Path and walk over the mini bridge then make a right onto ‘Carriage Road’.

C) Carriage Road will then split – take the left uphill (Amphitheater East Carriage Road) and continue on.

Take a left when Carriage Road splits

D) You will eventually see a small sign that points to the start of Jordan Cliffs Trail on the right side (pay attention, the sign is small and easy to miss).

Follow the Jordan Cliffs Trails through the trees. The path will become more and more rocky until you eventually emerge from the trees and onto the cliff-side views of Jordan Pond.

Rocky terrain

Continue on the cliff-side trail with iron rungs and rock scrambling while enjoying the views for the next 2km. This was the most difficult part for us and involved getting on our hands in some parts to get down a large step or climb up a big boulder. It’s tiring, but take your breaks and drink plenty of water. We actually ran into a few people doing this trail backwards and while doable, many were struggling to get down the iron rungs. I wouldn’t recommend it. Also, keep your eyes peeled – some hikers reported seeing a porcupine in this section!

First views of Jordan Pond from above
Lots of rock scrambling along the cliff
Uphill rocks
More rocky terrain
Tree roots
Big step down
Iron rungs
More uphill
More iron rungs

E) The path will eventually lead you back into the trees where the cliff-side views stop for now. You’ll see a sign – continue to follow the Jordan Cliffs trail downwards where you’ll meet up with Deer Brook Trail. This part is a sharp descent, so make sure you’re wearing shoes with good grip.

F) Turn right and continue downwards on Deer Brook Trail.

G) You’ll cross over ‘Carriage Road’ again briefly then continue the rocky scramble down where you’ll pass by Deer Brook Bridge, a cool double arch historic bridge built for carriages in 1925. Continue the rocky descent towards the beach at the North end of Jordan Pond.

Continue downwards past Carriage Road
Deer Brook Bridge
Continuing down
Finally reached the beach

H) Once you’re at the beach, take a breather and appreciate the flat easy-walking terrain along the beach.

Follow the beach and you’ll reach a sign on the left that points to the Bubbles Divide Trail where you’ll make your way up again. Note: this trail was under construction when we went, so we continued on the Jordan Pond Path along the water until we reached the Bubbles Trail, where we did an out-and-back to the South Bubble summit (our detour is shown in pink dots on the map).

The Bubbles Divide Trail was under construction at the time so we had to detour
We had an unexpected road closure and had to do slight detour (outlined in pink dots)

I) Turn right onto the Bubbles Trail towards South Bubble.

J) This where ‘Bubble Rock’ sits – the iconic glacial boulder that rests on the edge of the cliff.

K) Due to the road closure, we ascended the Bubbles Trail from this point. The climb up to the South Bubble summit was no easy feat. It’s a steep ascent with lots of rocks to climb and uneven footing, and it gets more difficult the closer you are to the top.

Lots and lots of rocks to climb over

I’ll admit, our legs were getting pretty tired at this point that we almost didn’t want to climb back up a mountain that we just came down on, but I’m glad we pushed ourselves and did it. It was a tiring climb up boulders the whole way, with some tricky areas where long legs were helpful, but after all the climbing over scraggly rocks, the view at the top was 100% worth it. Second to the Beehive Trail, it’s another iconic picturesque view that everyone seeks. It was too bad that the clouds started rolling in so there wasn’t much sun when we got to the top, but it was still so beautiful that we spent some time just sitting and taking it in.

Pointing to Jordan House in the distance, where we started this hike!

Take a break here and enjoy the panoramic views and be in awe at how far Jordan Pond House is in the distance, where you started this journey.

Scramble back down the steep rocks on Bubbles Trail to Jordan Pond Path. For reference, it took us 1 hour to get up and down the Bubbles Trail from the Jordan Pond Path including resting and photo time at the top. So although it is a difficult climb, it’s not very long!

Scrambling back down the Bubbles Trail the same way we came up due to the detour

Continue following Jordan Pond Path and enjoy the flat even ground all the way back to Jordan Pond House (roughly another 30-40 minutes).

Jordan Pond Path

Overall it took us 4 hours to do the whole thing (including the detour from the road closure) at a slow-med pace and stopping for photos and taking intermittent rest breaks.

Jordan Pond House Restaurant – make reservations!

Address: 2928 Park Loop Rd, Seal Harbor, ME 04675
Website: www.jordanpondhouse.com
This restaurant has seasonal hours – refer to their website for updated information.

Outside of Bar Harbor, there is a very limited selection of restaurants on Mount Desert Island in Acadia National Park. Jordan Pond House Restaurant is the most popular choice not only because of their good food, but also because of its convenient location where many trailheads are located – most notably Jordan Pond Loop, South Bubble Trail, and Jordan Cliffs. The back patio of this restaurant also offers views of Jordan Pond and the North and South “bubbles”.

It gets EXTREMELY busy here and finding parking is no easy feat. Toby dropped me off while he went to look for parking and he had a LOT of trouble finding parking. Every single lot was full but luckily he eventually snagged a spot in a small lot…a 30 minutes walk away! It was INSANE. Next time, I’d recommend coming here super early and do some hikes, then make it back in time for lunch.

Note: there’s very limited cellphone reception in this whole area, but the restaurant does have free guest wifi so keep this in mind if you’re planning on communicating with each other when waiting for seating or coordinating with parking.

I would highly recommend making a reservation at Jordan Pond House as early as possible. Their reservation book is usually booked out a couple of MONTHS in advance. You may have some luck calling in person to check for cancellations, but their online reservations were completely full everyday. If you haven’t planned ahead, then I would recommend showing up a little before they open to try and get a spot. We didn’t have reservations and I arrived 3 mins before opening time and there were already at least 30 people standing in line! When 11am hit and the doors opened, the line started moving as they slowly filled up the large restaurant. I got to the front of the line 20 minutes later and they put me on the waiting list, where I only had to wait 10 minutes before I was seated. If you had a reservation, you could skip right to the front of the line where there was a separate check-in counter for reservations. When we finished eating, it was about 12:30pm and on our way out Toby had overheard that there was going to be a 1.5 hour wait to be seated!

The lobby of the restaurant. If you had a reservation, you could walk right up to the front.
Main dining room
Side dining room – this is a pretty big restaurant!

For the only restaurant in the area, the food was actually surprisingly good! A little pricey, but hey, they’re the only place around.

They’re known for their popovers, which is kind of like a hollow muffin made with a thin batter, served with butter and their local-made jam. It was good, but not mind-blowing.

Their famous pop overs served with butter and local blueberry jam

We also had a meatloaf sandwich which was delicious and a $40 lobster roll (when in Maine…) which was average but they were VERY generous with the amount of lobster meat. I also couldn’t help but also order the lobster stew which was also pretty decent and Toby had a flourless chocolate cake for desert (which was average, but he liked it).

The meatloaf sandwich – our favourite!
Lobster roll
Lobster stew

If you didn’t have a reservation and don’t have time to wait in line for walk-in seating, there’s an upstairs “grab and go” area for takeaway food. The menu here is a little more limited and I don’t believe you’ll be able to get popovers for takeaway, but there’s outdoor seating upstairs and also plenty of picnic tables on the grass to enjoy the view of Jordan Pond and the Bubbles without having to wait in line.

Back of the restaurant with a ‘Grab and Go’ upstairs
View of Jordan Pond from the back of the restaurant

Some Final Thoughts:

  • Start your day early!
  • Finding parking is a bitch here – start early!
  • Make reservations ahead of time if you can, or show up before they open
  • Try the meatloaf sandwich – you won’t regret it.
  • Bring a pair of good hiking shoes for all the rock scrambling

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Hiking Acadia’s Beehive Trail: A Complete Overview


Date Published: Nov 3rd, 2024 | Last Updated: Nov 3rd, 2024
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA
Date of travel: Oct 13th, 2024

If you haven’t checked it out yet, here’s a post of an overview of Acadia National Park if you need more info about where to stay, where to eat, getting around, and other travel recommendations.

The Beehive Trail is one of Acadia National Park’s most popular hikes, offering breath-taking panoramic views. This hike has a reputation for being thrilling and difficult with iron rungs and vertical climbs but we personally didn’t find it bad at all, especially with good pacing. I recommend starting early, wearing good shoes, and dressing in layers. For safety, avoid this hike if it’s raining.

I highly recommend coming during peak autumn foliage season for the gorgeous colourful red and orange leaves.

Contents:

  1. Hike Stats
  2. Is it really that difficult to climb the Beehive Trail?
  3. Map of the Trail/Trail Overview
  4. Ready to hike? Let’s Go! – a more detailed guide to hiking the Beehive Trail with way too many photos
    1. Park at Sands Beach – START EARLY!
    2. Cross the road to the start of the trail
    3. Reach a crossroad and turn right to the Beehive Trail to do the trail clockwise
    4. Continue the climb up, cross a metal grate, and climb iron rungs while enjoying the view
    5. Reach the summit and take in the views
    6. Make your way down the mountain
    7. Reach another crossroad: Continue on to The Bowl or take the shortcut
    8. Get back to the parking lot and be glad you started early
  5. Some final thoughts
  6. When you get back to the parking lot, there are a few things you can do:

Hike Stats:

Length: 2.4km
Elevation Gain: 155m
Trail type: loop
Difficulty/Terrain: difficult-ish with uphill climbs and rocky terrain
Estimated duration: 1-3 hours, depending on the number of people and waiting times (it took us 2 hours starting at 8:15am – 1 hour to get up and 1 hour down, including waiting in line)
Starting point: park at Sand Beach parking lot, then cross the road to the trailhead
Things to bring: water bottle, sunscreen & hat, good hiking shoes, snacks, dress in layers in case it gets cold as you wait
Driving option?: no
More Trail info: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/the-beehive-loop-trail

Is it really that difficult to climb the Beehive Trail?

Not really!

I was a little nervous for the Beehive Trail because I kept reading about how hard it was and there was a lot of climbing. For a person that was not the most fit and with minimal upper body strength, I was anxious to get this hike over and done with. While doing the hike, I kept expecting it to get harder and harder, but it actually wasn’t bad at all. Yes, there are short bursts of vertical climbs and you’re exposed on the side of the cliffs, but there were enough handles to grab on to and good footing to stabilize yourself. It also helps that there was always someone to lend a hand hopping over the trickier bits or climbing up a big rock. At no point did we feel unsafe. We were also moving at a glacial pace near the top where the trickier parts are, so we barely broke a sweat getting to the summit.

If you have a mild fear of heights or if you’re generally a slow hiker, just take it slow and let people pass. The path eventually becomes single-file and the hike may naturally slow down or come to a standstill anyway if it’s busy, due to people taking their time crossing or climbing certain parts. We didn’t mind the slow ascent because the view along the way to the top is AMAZING and gave me ample time to snap (too many) photos. The view gets better the higher you go!

*If you are really terrified of heights, you can try to climb to the first view then decide if you want to turn around. The views at this spot is the same view as you would get at the top, but at a lower viewpoint (see the photos below). I’ve marked this spot on the map here –>

You can also take the Bowl Trail instead where the hike is covered amongst trees until you reach the very top (more on that below). As you can see on the map, it’s not far to backtrack if you decide to take the Bowl Trail instead.

Here’s a comparison of the view from the first view point vs the summit view:

View from the first lookout at the bottom
View from the summit

Map of the Trail/Trail Overview

A Brief Overview of the Trail:

A) The Beehive Loop trail starts just off of Park Loop Road (a 5 min walk from the parking lot).

B) The trail starts covered amongst trees and you’ll come to a fork in the road. The right is the Beehive Trail and the left is the Bowl Trail (circled in white and grey in the map above). Although technically a loop, the Beehive Trail is single-file going up the mountain due to the sheer amount of people and it also gets dangerous if you’re coming down the mountain on the side of a cliff. Therefore, if you want to take the easier Bowl Trail, you’ll have to do an out-and-back hike when you reach the summit.

⭐️ Green star on the map marks the point where you’ll see the first ocean views (more pictures below). The path gets more narrow here and will become single-file, so if you want to turn around, do it here.

C) After some vertical climbs and taking way too many photos on the way up, you’ll reach the Beehive Summit. Take a breather and soak in the views, take more photos, then start to make your way down the mountain.

D) You’ll reach another fork in the road. You can either continue on Beehive Trail to reach The Bowl, or take the shortcut and get back to the parking lot via the Bowl Trail.

Ready to hike? Let’s Go! – a more detailed guide to hiking the Beehive Trail with way too many photos

1. Park at Sands Beach – START EARLY!

If there is one crucial piece of advice I can give you to hike the beehive trail, is to start as early as possible to avoid the crowds and get a parking spot. The Beehive Trail is one of THE most popular trails in Acadia National Park due to its amazing views and adrenaline-pumping hike. As a result, it gets INCREDIBLY busy, especially in peak season (which is when we went).

The closest parking lot is at Sands Beach, which is only a short 5 minute walk to the start of the trail. There’s roughly enough spaces for about 100 cars, which sounds like a lot, but by the time we arrived at 7am, the lot was already 70% full. We started the hike at 8:15am (after visiting Thunder Hole) and by the time we finished around 10am, the parking lot was completely full and there was an incredibly long line of cars parked along Park Loop Road and many people were walking 20 mins+ from their car just to get to the start of the trail. There were also park rangers standing at the entrance to stop people from going in, so you can’t even circle the lot to wait for a spot to open up. Therefore, try to get to Sands Beach before 7am if you’re visiting in peak season like us and driving a car.

The parking lot by 8am with the Beehive Summit ahead
Tons of cars along the side of the road when the lot is full
Sands Beach Parking Lot

If you don’t get here early, be prepared to park far away or consider parking at a different parking lot along Park Loop Road and take the free Island Explorer Bus to Sands Beach parking lot. The bus will drop you off near the public restroom in the parking lot (see map above) and runs every 30 minutes.

Apart from trying to get a parking spot, you want to start the hike as early as possible to avoid the crowds and the line. If you do the trail clockwise via the Beehive Trail (which I recommend for the best views), it becomes single file up the rocks as you scale the mountain. Some people stop to take photos, others who aren’t as confident with climbing or have a fear of heights take it slow, and as a result, you could be looking at a long wait just to get up the mountain when it’s busy. We started the hike at 8:15am and two-thirds up the mountain, we already had to wait in line, taking a few steps at a time until we eventually reached the top (which although was annoying, wasn’t the worst in the world because you’re constantly exposed to the amazing views all the way up and gave me plenty of time to take photos). By the time we finished the hike a couple hours later, the line was much much longer and we were glad we started as early as we did. You can actually see the line from the parking lot. Therefore, I’d recommend starting the hike as soon as the sun comes up or be prepared to wait. Wear layers and pack a snack.

2. Cross the road to the start of the trail

Once you’ve parked at Sands Beach parking lot, make your way across the road to the start of the trail head (there is a public restroom at the parking lot if needed).

Start of the trail

The path starts covered amongst trees and gradually increases in elevation with a rocky terrain – make sure you wear good hiking shoes for this hike.

3. Reach a crossroad and turn right to the Beehive Trail to do the trail clockwise

As you make your way to the base of the mountain, you’ll reach an intersection. When it gets busy, there’s a park ranger there that can provide more information. This is the split between the Beehive Trail and the Bowl Trail (see the map above to see the difference). Although more difficult, I would recommend continuing the hike via the Beehive Trail and doing this loop clockwise for the best views. The Beehive Trail is steep and will lead you to vertical climbs (that aren’t bad at all in my opinion) along the side of the mountain, but you’re faced with the beautiful views the entire time, constantly getting better the higher you climb. There are also rock ledges along the way for some great photo spots.

Park ranger at the crossroads helping people decide which way to go

If you choose to do the trail counterclockwise via the Bowl Trail, the trail is not as steep (although there are still large rocks to climb), but the majority of the trail will be covered amongst trees and you will only get the iconic views of Sands Beach and the surrounding views when you reach the top. This may be a better option if you have a fear of heights. Note: You will not be able to go down the Beehive Trail due to the sheer amount of single-file hikers trying to get up the mountain so prepare for an out-and-back hike once you reach the summit.

4. Continue the climb up, cross a metal grate, and climb iron rungs while enjoying the view

As we continued on, it becomes more steep with more boulders to climb over, and we mentally prepared ourselves for vertical climbs and clinging onto the side of the mountain. This was where the line started for us. It was moving along at a decent pace at first, but it got slower closer to the top. Yes this hike is steep and yes there are vertical climbs, however because we had to wait in line and only moving a few steps at a time and taking a few thrusts up big rocks at a time, this hike actually became a breeze. We barely even broke a sweat! There was always something to hold onto and there were flat parts to stand as you wait. You’re constantly exposed to the amazing views beside you and the waiting gives you more than enough time to get some nice photos on rocky ledges. We didn’t mind waiting at all. It was actually a more enjoyable and fun hike compared to constantly walking uphill.

Here are a bunch of photos of our ascent up the mountain (the view gets a bit repetitive, but when you’re there in person, it never gets old):

Our first views of Sand Beach inlet as we emerge from the trees and up the first set of rocks:

Our first views on the Beehive Trail
As we continue to climb higher, the views open up a little more with fewer trees obstructing the view

*This is the first view of the ocean that you’ll see after emerging from the trees. If you’re scared of heights, there’s still time to turn around at this point before it becomes too difficult to turn back. The views at the top is similar but at a higher vantage point (see the photos below).

As we continue to climb higher, the views open up a little more with fewer trees obstructing the view:

Then the path gets a little more tricky with metal gates and iron rungs. The photos make it seem scarier in photos than it actually was. At no point did I feel like I was going to fall off the side of the mountain or feel like I couldn’t make the climb up. This is where the line started for us as people take they time with the obstacles, but no matter, we’re still loving the views:

Our first metal grate. It did not feel dangerous at all.
Still loving the views

Encountered the iron rungs, which were a lot easier than I expected. There’s never more than 3-4 at a time:

This is probably the most common photo I’ve seen that shows how close to the edge you are, however…

…when taken at a different angle you can see that you’ve got the tree beside you with branches so smooth where thousands have people have grabbed onto for support. It didn’t feel scary at all.

The smoothest tree branch from multiple people grabbing onto it over the years

Still slowly waiting in line to make our way up, but still enjoying the views every step of the way:

As we got closer to the top it became more steep:

5. Reach the summit and take in the views

The final push to the top was just climbing over rocks but the view at the top was absolutely worth it. I can see how it is one of the most popular hikes in this park!

Take a breather and soak in the view. It’s the same view as what you see on the way up, but higher and more grand with sweeping views of the forest and ocean around you.

Plenty of space at the top for a snack or a packed lunch
Summit views

But the views don’t stop here. Continue following the blue trail markers to the other side of the mountain. Here you’ll see a sign that marks the actual summit of the mountain and you’ll get more ocean views with the small islands in the distance.

6. Make your way down the mountain

Continue following the blue markers to make your way down the mountain. You’ll get panoramic views of the beautiful trees below before you reach the trail path again.

As you make your way down, you’ll eventually be amongst trees again and climbing down big boulders, but then it gets easier as the ground plateaus and the path is much smoother.

7. Reach another crossroad: Continue on to The Bowl or take the shortcut

You’ll reach another intersection with trail signs that point to The Bowl. Continue on this path to reach views of The Bowl, or take the shortcut and continue the path back to the parking lot. We didn’t have time to make it to The Bowl so we took the shortcut back.

As you make your way back, you’ll eventually meet up with the original trail again and climb down the large rocks back to the parking lot.

By the time we met up with the starting trail, there were SO MANY more people and the line was MUCH longer. The ranger was telling people to do the loop backwards via the Bowl Trail avoid the line going up the Beehive Trail.

8. Get back to the parking lot and be glad you started early

By the time we got back to the parking lot, the lot was completely full with a very long line of cars parked along the road. You can see the top of the Beehive Trail from the parking lot with the many many single-file people slowly making their way up the mountain. Although we had to wait in line ourselves, we were SO happy that our line was no where as long as the one that was forming when we finished!

Some final thoughts

  • Get here early.
  • Get here early.
  • Get here early.
  • The views are amazing and worth the time and effort.
  • Wear good hiking shoes for good traction getting up rocks.
  • Consider skipping this hike if it’s raining.

When you get back to the parking lot, there are a few things you can do:

  • Check out Sand Beach, a short walk to this beautiful inlet beach
  • Walk Ocean Path – a flat easy path along the coast with beautiful views along the way
  • Thunder Hole – a 10-15 min walk along Ocean Path to this narrow inlet where rushing water creates loud thundering sounds and big high splashes of water into the air (come 1-2 hours prior to high tide for the experience)

Abby4 Comments

Exploring Cape Elizabeth: Iconic Lighthouses and Lobster Rolls


Date Published: Oct 29th, 2024 | Last Updated: Oct 29th, 2024
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA
Date of travel: Oct 12th, 2024

Cape Elizabeth is a quiet coastal town located just south of Portland, Maine. It’s home to a few lighthouses, including the most iconic and famous lighthouse in Maine: Portland Head Light. Between Portland and Cape Elizabeth sits Bug Light, a uniquely small lighthouse that’s also worthwhile a visit. But apart from lighthouses, there are a couple of popular places to get lobster rolls along the coast. I’d recommend spending half a day exploring both of these lighthouses and snacking on some lobster!

Contents:

  1. How much time will I need?
  2. Portland Breakwater Light aka “Bug Light”
  3. Portland Head Light – the iconic lighthouse
  4. Bite Into Maine 🍴 (food truck within Fort Williams)
  5. Lobster Shack at Two Lights 🍴
  6. Some Final Thoughts
  7. Need more travel recommendations for Maine? Check out these other places!

I’ve made a map below to outline the main places to see in this area to get your bearings:

An overview of the most popular places in Cape Elizabeth

How much time will I need?

You can visit both lighthouses and lobster roll places in half a day. The lobster roll places don’t open until 10:30/11am, so if you’re coming from Portland, I’d recommend starting at Bug Light first then work your way down the coast. You only need 5-10 minutes at Bug Light since there’s not much else to do here other than snapping some photos of the lighthouse. From there, it’s a 15 minute drive to Fort Williams Park where the Bite Into Maine food truck is and Portland Head Light. Try to get to Bite Into Maine right as they open at 10:30am, before the lines start, then afterwards head over to Portland Head Light and check out the museum and do the Cliff Walk. Lastly, drive another 15 minutes south to Lobster Shack at Two Lights Park and enjoy a second lunch (or dinner, depending on how long you’ve taken at Fort Williams) to finish off the trip.

Portland Breakwater Light aka “Bug Light”

Located in South Portland, outside of Cape Elizabeth, “Bug Light” is a small lighthouse that sits within Bug Light Park. There’s not much else here other than the lighthouse but this uniquely small tower was worth a stopover. Parking here is free and is only a few minutes walk to the lighthouse. Like Portland Head Light, the lighthouse tower is only open once a year on Maine Open Lighthouse Day. You can see views of the Portland in the distance and there’s a Liberty Ship Memorial here as well, commemorating the 274 Liberty Ships that were built in South Portland during WWII that carried important supplies across the Atlantic. You can read more about its history here.

Path from the parking lot to the lighthouse
Views of Portland from beside the lighthouse
Views of Portland in the distance
Bug light
🙆🏼‍♂️
View from the lightouse

Portland Head Light – the iconic lighthouse

Located in Fort Williams Park, Cape Elizabeth, Portland Head Light is the oldest, most popular and iconic lighthouse of Maine. It’s the lighthouse you see in all the ads of Maine. This lighthouse was commissioned by George Washington in the 1770s to warn citizens of incoming British attacks.

Portland Head Light attracts a lot of visitors daily, but thankfully the Fort Williams grounds are large with multiple parking lots available (see map). Parking is $5 for 2 hours, paid through a machine. From the parking lot, it’s a short 2-3 minute walk to the lighthouse. You can also book a trolley tour from Portland to get here instead of driving yourself.

Short walk to the lighthouse from the parking lot

Here’s an overview map that shows where the parking lots are, the cliff walk (highlighted in orange), the view points, Portland Head Light, and the popular Bite Into Maine food truck.

Map edited from: https://www.mainetrailfinder.com/trails/trail/fort-williams-park-cliff-walk

When you reach the lighthouse, you’ll see that it’s made up of the lighthouse tower itself, the keeper’s house beside the tower, and another small building beside it that’s the gift shop. The lighthouse tower is only open one day a year, on Maine Open Lighthouse Day where lighthouse towers across the state are open to the public. More information here: https://lighthousefoundation.org/maine-open-lighthouse-day/. The keeper’s house is a museum with more information of this historic landmark. Entry into the museum is $2.

Just before you reach the lighthouse, you’ll see some signs that point towards a Cliff Walk where you can follow the coast and enjoy views of the lighthouse and the rocky coast from different view points (see map).

We only had time to do the start of the Cliff Walk to snap some photos of the lighthouse from the side.

It was a SUPER windy day!

As you can see from the map below, there are multiple walks you can around Fort Williams Park, but the most popular is the Cliff Walk.

The walking paths at Fort Williams Park – the Cliff Walk is the most popular. Flip this map 90˚ to match the satellite map above.

Bite Into Maine 🍴 (food truck within Fort Williams)

Address: 1000 Shore Rd, Cape Elizabeth, ME 04107

Bite Into Maine is a VERY popular food truck that is parked near Portland Head Light, beside one of the parking lots (I’ve circled it on the map above). This place was featured on an episode of ‘Somebody Feed Phil’ where he highlighted the curry lobster roll and the picnic style lobster roll (drenched in butter 🤤). When we drove past it looking for parking, there was a HUGE line of people around the truck. Unfortunately due to our tight schedule and the fact that I had no idea the line would be so long, we didn’t have time to wait.🙁 The menu looked pretty good. 💔

Lobster Shack at Two Lights 🍴

Address: 225 Two Lights Rd, Cape Elizabeth, ME 04107

At the Southern end of Cape Elizabeth lies Two Lights State Park. This coastal park offers views of the ocean with a rocky waterfront terrain. The most popular part of the park is the Lobster Shack, which is a seafood restaurant located right beside the waters with views of the rocky beach from their abundant red picnic tables.

There’s free parking available here and plenty of seating, but it definitely gets busy. We arrived around 12:40pm and luckily we caught a gap in the lunch rush and only had 1 person in line ahead of us. By the time we finished ordering, there were at least 15 people lining up out the door.

The Lobster Shack is known for their lobster roll, fried clams, and clam chowder – of course we ordered all 3. The lobster roll was fresh and generous with the lobster meat, but at the end of the day it was still just lobster and mayonnaise – good, but nothing too special from other lobster rolls. The clam chowder was average, but the fried clams were great (get the medium size, they really pack it on). It was our first time trying fried clams and we surprisingly liked it way more than we expected!

Apart from the food, the main attraction of this place is the location with a view of the beautiful calm coast right beside you. The seafood is just a bonus!

Some Final Thoughts:

  • Prepare to wait in line if you want to dine at Bite Into Maine food truck.
  • Start your day hungry so you have space to try out both lobster places.
  • Bug light is super cute.

AbbyLeave a comment

Top Things to Do in Portland, Maine: Eat, Shop, Explore


Date Published: Oct 22nd, 2024 | Last Updated: April 22nd, 2025
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA
Date of travel: Aug 5th, 2025

Portland is the largest city in Maine, full of cool shops and endless lobster rolls. Spend an afternoon here walking through the old streets, sample the abundant seafood, and take a tour around town.

Fun fact: Although Portland is the largest city in Maine, the capitol is actually Augusta!

Contents:

  1. How long do I need in Portland, Maine?
  2. Where do I park?
  3. What to do in Portland: Shop, Eat, and Explore!
    1. 1) Shop
      1. Commercial Street
      2. Exchange Street
    2. 2) Eat
      1. Portland Lobster Co.
      2. Luke’s Lobster
      3. Highroller Lobster Co.
      4. Duckfat
      5. The Holy Donut 🙅🏻‍♀️🙅🏻‍♀️🙅🏻‍♀️
    3. 3) Explore
  4. Some final thoughts
  5. Need more travel recommendations for Maine? Check out these other places!

We originally did this trip in August 2024 on our way up from New York to Rockland for the lobster festival (you can read about the lobster festival here). We stopped by Portland on our way home and spent the afternoon here walking through the streets and perusing through the variety shops ranging from cool hipster vibes to fancy boutiques. There’s a LOT of restaurants here, not just seafood. Sadly, due to our short time here and limited stomach capacity, we were only able to hit up a few places, but the next time we come back I’ll definitely be crossing more off my list!

Below is a map of downtown Portland divided into 4 regions: the arts district, government district, old port district, and waterfront district. The majority of the shops and restaurants are in the old port district (in red).

https://www.portlandmaine.com (image edited)

How long do I need in Portland, Maine?

You really only need a few hours to explore downtown Portland. Even though it’s Maine’s largest city, it’s not actually that big. It’ll take you about 20-30 minutes to walk up and down the main street of Old Port (Commercial Street) and Exchange Street, then add in a couple extra hours for shopping and eating. There are a couple of museums and points of interest you can hit up as well to fill out the day and some microbreweries to check out in the evening. We didn’t have time to do these, but I’ll include it below.

There are also harbour cruises and island-hopping ferries you can take as well to explore more outside of Portland. Therefore, if you want to just do the city itself, an afternoon will be enough (or stay longer so you can fit in more meals in a day 😜) but you can easily stretch it out to 3-4 days if you want to take it slow. Portland is a nice place to be.

Also, Cape Elizabeth is 15 minutes south of Portland and is home to Maine’s oldest and most iconic lighthouse: Portland Head Light. I’d recommend spending a couple hours here as well to check it out, do the cliff walk, and also have a look at Bug Light (the cutest smallest lighthouse I’ve ever seen). There’s also more seafood options here in case you haven’t gotten your fill of lobster rolls yet.

Where do I park?

Your best bet is to park in a city-operated parking garage in Portland. The rates are reasonable and some of them are very central and within short walking-distance to the centre of downtown Portland.

Here is a list of city-operated parking garages with the parking rates: https://www.portlandmaine.gov/296/Parking. I’ve made a map of the most central city-run parking garages below along with the most popular eateries and walking streets to give you an idea of the best location to be.

We parked in the Elm Street garage, which was $28 max per day and $4 per hour. It was easy to get to and pretty central, only a short walk to Exchange street which leads right to the harbour. We found this rate pretty reasonable (especially coming from NYC), but there are cheaper lots further away that have $15 all day parking (check the website).

Some people also say there’s free unrestricted parking on Somerset Street by the Whole Foods but we didn’t investigate this because it was too far for us to want to walk (it was also a really hot day).

I’d avoid parking in private lots since it can get crazy expensive (some up to $40-50 per day). You can also do street parking which is about $2.50-$3.00/hour, but it fills up quick and most streets have 2 hour restrictions.

Map of downtown Portland highlighting the closest parking garages and the most popular eateries. The highlighted yellow streets are the most popular for shopping.

What to do in Portland: Shop, Eat, and Explore!

We only had an afternoon here and from my research on Portland, we’ve hit up the most popular places. We do plan to come back again in the near future and explore some more, so I’ll be updating this post when we do – keep watching this space!

Some sights around downtown Portland

1) Shop

Commercial Street

Walk along Commercial Street and you’ll find many cute boutique and souvenir/gift shops lined up one after another. This street is right by the harbour and is one of the busiest touristy streets for shopping. It’s highlighted in the map above.

Exchange Street

Exchange Street is another street full of shops. This street is more tucked away compared to Commercial Street but I found the shops here to be a lot more interesting with a cool hipster vibe. There’s restaurants along this street as well with some nice coffee shops. I found this street to have more character compared to the more tourist-y Commercial Street. This street is also highlighted in the map above.

2) Eat

When in Maine…eat Lobster Rolls! There is no doubt an abundance of seafood in Maine and we had nothing but seafood on our brains so that’s what we focused on, but there were tons of other non-seafood restaurants that looked amazing as we walked by. In my research, the consensus for the top 3 places for lobster rolls were: Luke’s Lobster, Highroller, and Portland Lobster Company.

Portland Lobster Co.

Address: 180 Commercial St, Portland, ME 04101

Portland Seafood Co is a small shop on the harbour with limited seating inside the restaurant, but there’s a huge open back patio by the water where you can easily grab a seat. We went right when they opened and there were already a few people there. They have a decent sized menu and the prices were fair. They’re well known for their lobster rolls, but Toby really wanted to try the Lobster BLT since we had never seen it before – it was REALLY good and they were generous with the lobster meat. I had a classic steamed lobster. Unfortunately I had a bad time with gastro from an earlier donut shop (more on that later) so I couldn’t fully enjoy the extent of the meal, but from the bites I had, it was delicious. Toby was more than happy to help me finish my lobster.

Luke’s Lobster

Address: 60 Portland Pier, Portland, ME 04101

Everyone was going to Luke’s or talking about Luke’s. It’s probably the most popular lobster roll spot in Portland and it’s also situated right on the water. We didn’t end up coming here because we’ve had Luke’s in NYC (it is indeed damn good) and wanted to try something new. If you’ve never had Luke’s before, I’d highly recommend coming here.

Highroller Lobster Co.

Address: 104 Exchange St, Portland, ME 04101

Highroller Lobster Co. had really cool vibes and it was super busy. We needed to get on the road and we were still full from Portland Lobster Co. so we decided to grab takeout instead of sitting down in the restaurant. The takeout menu was much smaller, but we were mainly here to try out their lobster roll anyway so we didn’t mind (although there were some amazing looking dishes on the full menu – I’ve included photos of both the dine-in and the takeaway menu). We ordered two 2oz lobster rolls that was $17 each. Super pricy and it was also SUPER TINY 💔. The bread was good and it was a decent lobster roll, but for the long time we had to wait and the small portion, it wasn’t THAT good. Next time maybe we’ll go for dine-in and get more variety.

Duckfat

Address: 43 Middle St, Portland, ME 04101

Not seafood, but I thought I’d include it due to the sheer popularity of this place and how every single travel blog mentions it. This place was even featured on an episode of ‘Somebody Feed Phil’. Duckfat is known for their Belgian-style french fries that are cooked in, you guessed it, duck fat! Their poutine is the go-to most popular item. Unfortunately we did not get to try this place because when we arrived, the line was super long and it would’ve been at least an hour wait. We were still full from all the lobster rolls anyway and we also still had a 7 hour drive ahead of us, so we didn’t wait. They don’t take reservations, it’s walk-in only, but you can pre-order and have it as takeaway – something we didn’t realize until we got there.

They do have a second location that only does takeaway called Duckfat Frites Shack (43 Washington Ave, Portland, ME 04101) that may have faster service. It’s another 10 min walk that we didn’t take because by then we would’ve been too far from our car. Womp womp.

Duckfat
The Holy Donut 🙅🏻‍♀️🙅🏻‍♀️🙅🏻‍♀️

Address: 177 Commercial St, Portland, ME 04101 (there are 3 locations in Portland, but this is the most central)

I don’t get it. I honestly don’t.

The Holy Donut is a donut shop that specializes in potato-based doughnuts. Their google reviews are off the charts. Every single travel blog says to come here and they say to come here first thing in the morning before they run out and have these doughnuts for breakfast. So we did. They open at 7am and we arrived just after 9am and there was a line of about 10 people in front of us, but the line went quick. We ordered 3 donuts (at $4.50 – $5 each): the blueberry glaze (most highly recommended), the blueberry lemon, and maple bacon. There was nowhere to sit so we ate it outside.

I was so excited to try these. After having a bite of each one… I was disappointed. I don’t get the hype. The potato-based doughnut made it really dense like a heavy cake and I felt like there was too much cake to the topping ratio so you get a small amount of flavour, then the rest of the time you have a mouthful of dry dense cake. Toby liked it, but he likes dense cake.

The aftermath was what made me curse this place. We hadn’t eaten anything apart from these donuts that morning (and I only ate a total of 2/3 of a donut to save room for lunch) but I started to have the worst acid reflux I’ve ever had (and I’m not a person that gets reflux issues!). Maybe it’s the empty stomach or the dense carbs in the donut, but after 40 mins of walking, I was sweating up a storm and vomited up acidic fluid multiple times (so glad I was able to find a restroom in time). Not appetizing, I know, but this messed up my stomach for the rest of the day which was quite upsetting because I was ramped up for more lobster meals in Portland. Never again shall I come here.

But, as much as I dislike this place, there are many more that love this place so I’ve included it in this post so you can make the judgement yourself. If you do go, I’d recommend not being on an empty stomach and bring some Tums or Pepto just in case. We struggled to find a pharmacy within walking distance.

3) Explore

We pretty much just ate and walked around town looking into the shops during our afternoon in Portland. Due to the donut incident, my stomach bothered me for the rest of the day so we didn’t do much else, but here’s a list of things I found that seemed cool for our trip next time:

Some final thoughts

  • I don’t get the hype with Holy Donuts.
  • Portland is a cute town with tons of boutiques and cool shops.
  • You only need a day to explore the city, but if you want to add on island-hopping, boat cruises, and museums, you can easily spend at least 2-3 days here.
  • Try all the lobster rolls!

If you’ve been to Portland before, I’d love to hear about your favourite places or other places you’d recommend!

Abby2 Comments

Mount Battie and Megunticook: Your Camden Hiking Guide


Date Published: Oct 21st, 2024 | Last Updated: Oct 21st, 2024
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA
Date of travel: Oct 12th, 2024

Camden Hills State Park sits just outside the small coastal town of Camden, Maine. This park has a number of hiking trails with the most popular ones being Mount Battie and Mount Megunticook. Both of these trails offer panoramic views of the ocean coast and sweeping colourful fall foliage trees below. If you’re driving through the area, these hikes are definitely worth making a stop for!

Contents:

  1. Camden, Maine
  2. Camden Hills State Park
  3. Mount Battie Trail
    1. Driving to the summit
    2. Hiking to the summit
  4. Mount Megunticook/Ocean Lookout (via Tablelands Trail)
  5. Some final thoughts
  6. Need more travel recommendations for Maine? Check out these other places!

Location: Camden Hills State Park, Camden, Maine
Park opening hours: Open daily, 9am until sunset (some roads may be closed due to weather conditions, check the park website for more information.
Park website: https://www.maine.gov/dacf/parks/trail_activities/camden_trail_conditions.shtml
Park fees: $6.00 per adult ($4 for Maine residents), collected at the park entrance toll booth

Camden, Maine

Camden is a cute small coastal town roughly 1 hour 45mins north of Portland, ME. I came across Camden Hills State Park while doing my research for the best hikes in Maine, and the town of Camden sits just outside of the park. Exploring this town wasn’t on my itinerary at all and we were on a bit of a time crunch due to driving 7 hours from Brooklyn that morning. However, we had forgotten to stock up on water before we left home so we stopped in a local grocery store to pick up a couple jugs before hitting the trails. Once we drove into town, we realized how quaint this place is and instantly regretted not allowing more time for us to explore this town. If you’ve got the time, I’d definitely recommending setting aside a few hours (or stay overnight) to explore Camden.

Downtown Camden (it looks cooler in person but we didn’t have time to explore the town properly so this was a quick snap from our parking spot)

Camden Hills State Park

Located just outside of the town of Camden, there are multiple trails to follow at Camden Hills State Park. The two most popular are Mount Battie and Mount Megunticook for the their panoramic views of the town below. I’ve also included the Maiden Cliffs Trail on the map as well since it came up frequently in my research, but it didn’t look as scenic as the other two trails and we wouldn’t have had time to complete the trail before sun down anyway. Perhaps next time. More info on the Maiden Cliffs Trail: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/maiden-cliff-trail.

One thing about the park that I did find disappointing is their lack of signage at the start of the trails. For a park that collects a fee, I was expecting it to be more organized. I’d recommending downloading or screenshotting a park map before you go.

You can find the full park map on the park website here. I’ve highlighted the three trails in this image below to make it a little more clear on the path of these hikes since there are a few intersecting trails. Each hike starts at their own parking lot.

Highlighted map of the 3 most popular trails

You can also connect all 3 hikes together in a loop and start at the Camden Hills State Park Campground, but it will take about 5 hours to complete, covering 13.8km (8.5mi). I’ve hightlighted that trail in green below. Here’s more info on this hike if you’re game: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/mount-megunticook-maiden-cliff-and-mount-battie-loop

Mount Battie Trail

Mount Battie summit is the most popular summit in Camden Hills State Park because you can drive right up to the summit and enjoy the views without any effort, which is exactly what we did to save time in our packed schedule.

Length: 1.8km
Elevation Gain: 180m
Trail type: Out & back
Difficulty/Terrain: Moderate, rock scrambling and can be slippery
Estimated duration: 2 hours total
Starting point: Trail head is in downtown Camden on Megunticook Street (57 Megunticook St, Camden, ME 04843)
Things to bring: water bottle, sunscreen & hat (most of the trail is shaded with exposure at the top), good hiking shoes, tick/insect repellent depending on season, screenshot of the trail map
More Trail info: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/mount-battie-trail
Driving option?: Yes! Set the maps to “Camden Hills State Park” (280 Belfast Rd, Camden, ME 04843) and there will be an entry with a manned toll booth. Hours are 9am until sunset, daily.

Driving to the summit:

To drive to the summit, set the maps to Camden Hills State Park (280 Belfast Rd, Camden, ME 04843). Do not set it to Mount Battie like we did because it will take you to a closed entrance with a sign that redirects you to the correct place. Once you reach the state park entrance, there will be a small manned toll booth to get on the auto toll road (Mount Battie Road). It’s $6 per person ($4 if you’re a Maine resident). Pay attention to the gate closure time on the way in. They close the gate at sunset every day, so make sure you’re back down the mountain before then!

It was about a 10 minute drive to the top of Mount Battie with enough parking for about 30-ish cars. We arrived around 4pm and didn’t have any trouble finding parking. There’s no sign that says you’ve arrived, so when you’re at the top where the road ends and there are a bunch of other cars, you know you’re in the right spot. The views are only a few steps from the parking lot and you’re instantly rewarded with a beautiful panoramic view of the trees and the town of Camden below. There’s also a small tower that’s a WWII memorial that you can go inside, but when we were there it was under construction.

The drive up the toll road to the top of Mount Battie
Parking at Mount Battie

You really only need a couple minutes here, but it’s so lovely that you may want to spend longer just sitting and enjoying the views.

WWII memorial tower under construction
View of Camden town from Mount Battie Summit
Coastal views of Maine from Mount Battie Summit
Mount Battie Summit

Hiking to the summit:

If you want to hike to the summit of Mount Battie, the trailhead starts in downtown Camden on Megunticook Street (maps to 57 Megunticook St, Camden, ME 04843). Although it’s only 1.8km, it’s a pretty steep ascent with scrambling rocks. If it has rained recently, it can get pretty slippery especially if there are leaves on the ground. Make sure you have a pair of decent hiking shoes with good traction! We drove and didn’t do the hike ourselves, but there are plenty of information and reviews on this trail on Alltrails.

Also an added bonus of doing the hike: because you’ll be parking in downtown Camden rather than driving up the auto toll road, you can avoid the park fees (however I’m not sure if there’s a fee to park in downtown Camden).

There is also an alternate route of hiking from the Camden Hills State Park Campground (where the toll road starts), however it will be a longer hike compared to starting in downtown, but less steep.

Mount Megunticook/Ocean Lookout (via Tablelands Trail)

Mount Megunticook is the highest peak in Camden Hills State Park. The hike is just over 4km and the average estimated time to complete this out and back loop is 1 hour 38mins. We arrived at Camden much later than expected and although we were lucky enough to unintentionally catch the sunset at the lookout point, we sadly had to hike back down in the dark scrambling through rocks and sliding on leaves which made it a 2 hour round trip hike for us. If you plan to catch the sunset here, make sure you bring a headlamp and definitely have a decent pair of hiking shoes with good traction to prepare for hiking back down in the dark. Hiking sticks won’t hurt either to help with balance getting back down the mountain over the uneven rocks.

Length: 4.3km
Elevation Gain: 250m
Trail type: Out & back
Difficulty/Terrain: moderate, lots of annoying rock scrambling and tree roots, can be slippery esp if wet
Estimated duration: 1 hour 38mins (we took a full 2 hours due to hiking back in the dark)
Starting point: Tablelands parking lot (the one right before the Mount Battie parking lot)
Things to bring: water bottle, sunscreen & hat (most of the trail is shaded with exposure at the top), good hiking shoes, tick/insect repellent depending on season, screenshot of the trail map
Could my mom do this?: with difficulty, lots of rocks to scramble and can be slippery
Driving option?: No
More Trail info: https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/maine/tablelands-trail

Note: Although we are hiking Mount Megunticook, the views are at Ocean Lookout, not the actual summit. Therefore you can end your hike once you reach the views, but if you want to get to the summit, it’s an extra 500m (0.3mi) walk and you will be met by a pile of rocks with a sign that indicates you’re at the summit. There are no views here, you’re amongst the trees – wasn’t worth the extra walk to us. I’ve marked the summit walk on the map in purple to give you an idea of where the summit is.

Yellow: Mount Battie drive from the park entrance; Red: Tablelands Trail to Mount Megunticook; Purple: small trail to the summit

There are multiple trails you can take that will lead you to Ocean Lookout, but the fastest and most direct one is via the Tablelands Track (highlighted in red on the map). You will start at the Tablelands parking lot (there’s not much signage here so it’s easy to miss – it’s the next parking lot from the Mount Battie lot). There’s enough parking for about 10 cars, we arrived at 4:30pm and there were only 2 other cars here.

Parking lot at the Tablelands Trail head

At the trail head, you’ll see a small wooden sign that says Tablelands Trail along with a small laminated inkjet printed paper map that has seen better days stuck to the post of the trail. It was disappointing that there wasn’t a larger map available and there were also no signs that pointed towards Mount Megunticook. At the time I didn’t know that the trail to Mount Megunticook was called Tablelands Trail, so we spent a good couple minutes squinting at the tiny paper map to figure out that we were on the right path. If you’re doing this hike, I highly suggest you either bring a map or a screenshot of the map and remember the trail names so you don’t get lost. You want to start at the Tablelands Trail –> Ridge Trail to Ocean Lookout. There is still wooden signage along the way, but the printed maps seemed to get more worn and illegible as the trail continues. There are blue and red trail markers along the way to follow.

The entire hike is mainly shaded amongst the trees and opens up when you reach the views at Ocean Lookout. It starts off relatively flat for the first 10 minutes, then gets increasingly more steep with large rocks and boulders to hop/climb over. The ascent isn’t sharp but it is constant uphill near the second half of the hike.

Relatively flat at the start

I’ll be honest and say that the hike itself wasn’t too enjoyable for me because most of it was on uneven ground with rocks and tree roots everywhere that were also partially buried by fallen leaves so we really had to watch our step. Rather than enjoying the hike, I was constantly watching the ground so I don’t trip or step on an uneven rock. I would highly recommend wearing a good pair of hiking shoes with ankle stability for this hike.

Stepping over rocks and half buried tree roots
Some red marker signs along the way as you ascend
There are also blue markers as well (which made it a little confusing, but just keep following red)
Never ending rocks to climb
Lots and lots of tree roots – gets a little slippery on the way down

However, as annoying as the terrain was, the view was definitely worth it. We finally reached Ocean Lookout after about an hour of hiking. It was beautiful! The views of the orange and red fall foliage below us and the extending coastline in front of us in the distance. The pictures just don’t do it justice. We would’ve stayed here longer to take in the views if we had more time, but the sun was starting to set and we were frantically trying to not hike down the mountain in the dark.

Nearly there
The view at Ocean Lookout!
We did it!
We did it!

We took a few photos and continued to follow signs to the summit, hoping for even better views (although they’d be hard to beat). The summit was another 0.3 miles away. It took us 15 minutes and disappointingly, it was just a pile rocks that marks the summit. No views, nothing. Buried amongst trees. Bah! This was extra time we could’ve used to get down the mountain before dark. </3

The sign to the summit
Mt Megunticook Summit – no views here

As we hiked back down towards the car, the sun was setting. When we reached Oceans Lookout again, we had unintentionally arrived exactly at sunset. The orangey/pink colours of the sky over the coastline was mesmerizing. I wanted to stay longer, but it was getting increasingly dark.

Sunset at Ocean Lookout

We tried as best as we could to get back to the car before the dark but we failed. It was a really annoying hike back. All the steep steps and boulders with slippery dry leaves that we dodged going up became hidden in the dark and we had to take our time being careful with our foot placement over the downhill descent of uneven rocks. It took us another hour to get back to the car even though we were going down hill. If you’re going to do this, bring a headlamp and maybe some hiking sticks for stability. It was 6:30pm by the time we reached the car and got down the mountain before the gate closed at 7pm. After this strenuous hike, we went to Claws in Rockland for dinner (our favourite lobster restaurant) then headed to our BnB for the night near Acadia.

Some final thoughts:

  • I’d recommend driving up to Mount Battie and paying the toll rather than hiking up.
  • Save your energy to hike Mount Megunticook for the views at Ocean Lookout.
  • Don’t bother hiking the extra bit to the summit of Mount Megunticook – it’s a bunch of rocks.
  • The signage at this park sucks. Bring a map or screenshot one on your phone.
  • Have good shoes with ankle support.
  • There’s always time for a lobster dinner.

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Maine Lobster Festival & Rockland, ME


Lobster Festival

Date Published: Oct 7th, 2024 | Last Updated: April 22nd, 2025
Author: Abby | Category: Travel, USA
Date of travel: Aug 3rd – 5th, 2024

Contents:

  1. Lobster Festival
  2. How many days do I need?
  3. Where to stay
  4. Where to park
  5. Rockland
  6. Final Thoughts on the Maine Lobster Festival & Rockland:
  7. Need more travel recommendations for Maine? Check out these other places!

How many days do I need?

One. The lobster festival was a lot smaller than we had expected. It only took us about half an hour to walk through everything + an extra half hour to eat. The town of Rockland is also quite small with a few cute boutique shops. It takes about 15 minutes to walk from one end of the main street to the other. You could do both the festival and walk through the town all in one morning.

If you’re planning a weekend getaway, I’d recommend spending a day in Portland, the largest city in Maine and it’s only 1.5 hours away.

Lobster Festival info: https://mainelobsterfestival.com/

Cost: Free admission

I’m a BIG seafood lover and of course 99% of the time you hear about American lobsters, they’re from Maine. So of course when I found out that there is a lobster festival held in Maine once a year, we just had to go! This will also be our first time in the state of Maine.

Side note: Since moving to NYC, we’ve noticed that the most popular way to eat lobster meat (and most easily available) is in a lobster roll. Served either warm doused in butter or cold mixed with mayonnaise, you can’t go wrong with either option. During our travels around the Australian coast, we’ve had our fair share of lobsters (they have the ‘rock lobster’ species there) but lobster rolls are not a common food item you’d find anywhere in seafood restaurants. They’re usually served either steamed with a side of butter or ‘lobster mornay’, covered in a cream sauce and baked with a layer of cheese on top. My best guess of why lobster rolls aren’t common in Australia is because rock lobsters in Australia don’t have the big claws that American lobsters do and the claw meat is most often used in a lobster roll. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Whatever the reason, we’re so happy to have lobster rolls so accessible in this part of the country and one of our hopes for this trip to eat delicious, fresh, (and hopefully cheaper lobster meals) – what better place than Maine, the lobster capital!

The lobster festival is held annually in Rockland, Maine, a small town 1.5 hours North of Portland (the largest city in Maine). I was actually surprised it wasn’t held in Portland, considering Maine is the lobster capital of the country.

We left Brooklyn on a Saturday morning and drove 7.5 hours to reach Rockland. As we drove up the coast towards Maine, we passed by plenty of restaurants advertising their lobster rolls, some with huge lines out the door – there is definitely no shortage of lobster in this part of the country!

We drove past this place that claims to have the record for the longest lobster roll!

We arrived in Rockland around 4pm and after checking in to our hotel, we headed straight to the festival for some long-awaited seafood.

Where to stay:

Rockland is a small town so hotel options can be limited, so I’d recommend booking early. I had originally booked a room 6 months early at a hotel right in front of the lobster festival, but a few weeks before the festival they messaged us to say that they were still undergoing renovations and had to cancel our booking. It was annoying, but luckily managed to get a room at Glen Cove Inn & Suites Rockport, 7 minutes drive away from Rockland. It wasn’t anything fancy and it was a bit weird that our room was right beside the swimming pool, but apart from that our stay was fine.

Where to park:

The lobster festival offered free parking at a school parking lot with shuttle busses every 20mins, but since it was later in the day, we tried our luck and found a spot on the street for free right across from the festival. We did this again the next morning when it was much busier and again got lucky with free street parking. Therefore, if you’ve got the time, I’d recommend driving around before heading straight to the school lot.

Rockland is a very small but cute town with lovely boutique shops and cafes on their Main Street that were unfortunately all closed when we arrived on a Saturday night, but no matter, our eyes were targeted for the Lobster Festival that was held at the waterfront!

I expected a HUGE festival with tons of lobster area in a bustling town, but it wasn’t quite that. The size of the Maine Lobster Festival was a lot smaller than expected, with maybe about 30-40 vendors.

First views of the festival from the entrance

There are various events throughout the day including lobster trap racing, live music, and tours of a real Navy destroyer – see the schedule of events on their website for more info.

Everyone gathering around to watch the lobster trap race
It’s crazy how well some of these kids do!
Big turn out to watch the race

Our main goal for this trip was to eat some good lobster, but sadly there wasn’t nearly as much lobster as I was hoping for. I was expecting food vendors everywhere with all kinds of different ways to showcase lobster, but I was disappointed to find that the only place to get fresh lobster at the festival was at the main food tent run by the festival. It was a cafeteria/Ikea-style set up where you go to different stations and pick up what you want onto your tray then check out at the cashier. It wasn’t anything fancy, but I’ll admit it was a pretty efficient system and the people serving were so lovely.

The path leading up to the food tent
The menu available
Cafeteria-style service. Everyone was really lovely!
So many cooked lobsters!
The food tent

The main seafood items on offer in the food tent were a full steamed lobster, mussels, native clams/steamers, chowders, lobster bisque, lobster mac & cheese, and some desserts.

We got a bit of everything! Native clams/steamers, clam chowder, lobster bisque, mussels, and lobsters x 2!
Suited up and ready!

Seeing as how this was the only place to get food in the festival, we ordered a bit of everything: 2 steamed whole lobsters, native clams, mussels, lobster bisque, and clam chowder ($111, tax included). I’m going to be super honest here: apart from the steamed lobster and the sweet corn on the cob that came with it, everything else was a let down. The flavour of the mussels weren’t bad (white wine broth with some veg), but the mussels itself were sandy as hell and the actual mussels were quite small. Neither of us have had native clams before and unfortunately we couldn’t even get past 2 of them, and I hate wasting food. The lobster bisque tasted like it came from a can but the clam chowder was actually good – however, as we walked past the stand, we saw them open up multiple plastic bags of the soup into the warming pot so it also wasn’t made fresh. 😦

Toby also got a $30 lobster roll and it was the tiniest thing. It lacked seasoning and he finished in 3 bites. It was sad to say that we came all this way for our first lobster roll at the Maine Lobster Festival but the ones in NYC are cheaper, larger, and tastier 💔.

$30
The tiniest lobster roll!

However, the highlight for me was the steamed lobster. It was so fresh and sweet but also on the salty side – perhaps they over salted the water when cooking or didn’t replace the water in between batches so the salty sea water made it salty? Not sure. Either way, despite the salt, I thought it was still good and there was tons of butter available for dipping. The placemat had instructions how to break down a lobster and by the end of the weekend, Toby was a pro 😎. The corn on the cob that came with it was also great – but then again, I really like corn. 😬

The food tent was right next to the water for some beautiful views while you eat.

After eating, we walked through the rest of the festival grounds which was mainly tents of local-made goods and a handful of food trucks that sadly didn’t really serve lobster-related things.

Although it was a small festival, there was no shortage of fantastic live music – there were performers in the food tent, beer tent and also on the main stage. Julia Gagnon (an American idol contestant) performed on the main stage the next morning and blew everyone away – what a voice!

The entire festival took us about half an hour to walk through everything + an extra half hour of eating time, then we then sat and listened to the live music while enjoying our giant lemonade and delicious fried dough from a food truck for dessert.

Overall it was a cute little festival with good lobster, however I’m not sure it was worth the 7.5 hour drive just for this festival. If we lived closer to the area, I’d come by again just to check out the live music scene and a walk-around.

Rockland

When we arrived in the evening the day before, everything in the little town was closed so there wasn’t much to see. The next morning we took another stroll through town and sadly about 1/3 of the stores were still closed, including some really cute cafes and bakeries that I was eyeing the day before – perhaps because it was a Sunday, but I had hoped that they’d have adjusted hours due to the increased tourism from the festival 🤷🏻‍♀️. It took us about 15 minutes to walk from one end of the main street to the other, with some extra added time for stopping in cute little boutique shops.

Due to the disappointment of the seafood at the festival the day before, we decided to find a nice restaurant for lunch in hopes of a better seafood meal in Maine. After a little Googling and reading through online reviews, we decided on Hillside Seafood Company. This restaurant was right in front of the Lobster Festival with views of the waters and the reviews were good. It was decently busy when we arrived so I was excited for a good meal. Sadly when we sat down outside to enjoy the views, a big ass tour bus parked right in front of the restaurant and blocked the entire waterfront view for everyone. This was a prelude to what was to come. We ordered a mix of items people raved about in the reviews as well as what the waitress had recommended: lobster stew, lobster pie, crab cakes, and broiled haddock with crab topping. I wish I could tell you that this was a redemption meal for Rockland seafood, but it was really bad, y’all. The $30 lobster “stew” was essentially warmed milk with lobster meat (although they were quite generous with the lobster meat portion), the $42 lobster “pie” was lobster meat and breadcrumbs with old bay seasoning on top (again, very generous with the lobster portion), the flavour of the crab cake wasn’t bad but it wasn’t crispy like a traditional crab cake – the texture was more like a dense pancake with old bay seasoning, and finally the most disappointing and the most recommended by reviews and the waitress was the $24 broiled haddock with crab topping. The crab topping was an extra $3 and it tasted just like the breadcrumbs in the lobster pie (but somehow worse) and the haddock was super dry. Overall it was about $130 for the meal and it was pure disappointment. I wish we had just went back to the festival for the steamed lobster instead. 💔💔💔 /rant

Lobster stew
Lots of lobster though
Crab cake
Lobster pie
Which was just lobster + breadcrumbs
Broiled haddock (they forgot the crab topping and added it on later)
The tour bus that blocked the waterfront views </3

Claws – so good that it deserves its own heading!

Claws is a Rockland restaurant that we drove past multiple times between the Lobster Festival and our hotel. Each time we drove past there was a huge line. We decided to give it a go for our final meal in this town, and I’m so glad we did! This was the redemption meal.

We came at 4pm and luckily there was barely anyone in line!

Claws was exactly what we were looking for and wish we had all of our meals here from day one. They get all their seafood fresh from the boats daily and they’re served with unique flavours, tons of options, and also very reasonably priced!

For reference, a 1 1/4 lb lobster at the festival was $32 and $41 in Portland, but only $28 here. For 2+ lbs, it’s only $38 and some of these big boys that came out of the kitchen were HUGE!

We got there around 4pm and luckily there was only 1 person in line (by the time we left, the line was super long again). We ordered at the counter then took a seat on their beautiful patio that opens up to the waters. If it weren’t for how busy they get, it’d actually be quite a peaceful place to be with views of the open still waters.

We ordered the lobster donut (essentially lobster with a cheese sauce inside a sweet bun and topped with syrup – a savoury sweet combination – it was SO GOOD), the famous award-winning clam chowder (can confirm, probably the best we’ve ever had!), and a lobster roll with old bay honey butter sauce (I thought the sauce was amazing, but Toby thought it was overpowering and preferred a plain lobster roll instead). I wish we were hungrier so we could’ve ordered more, but we were sadly still so full from the disappointing lunch at Hillside because I hate wasting food 🙁.

Lobster donut
Award-winning clam chowder
Lobster roll with old bay honey butter sauce

We had a great time here and moved from our table to the water-side seats when they were free and just drank our blueberry lemonade and chatted the evening away. As it got closer to dinner time, it got REALLY busy with tons of people standing around waiting for a seat to open up. I’d recommend going early or grabbing a table first before ordering because it gets packed – and for good reason!

You can’t tell, but there are about 20 people lining up by the time we left

Edit: We came back here again Oct 2024 and it was still as amazing as ever. This time we saved room to get the lobster. *chef kiss*. It was a lot more chilly this time. There were some heaters going, but it was still pretty cold, so rug up if you’re coming here later in the season!

Final Thoughts on the Maine Lobster Festival & Rockland:

1) The Lobster Festival was smaller than expected but had great live music. The food was subpar and for the size of the festival, we didn’t feel like it was worth the 7.5 hour drive to come here, but if you live nearby, it’s definitely a neat and lively festival to check out.

2) I have no idea why Hillside Seafood Company restaurant is so popular.

3) You MUST go to Claws. I’d come back to Rockland just for Claws. I’d make a detour just for Claws. I’d come here everyday if I lived in the area.

4) You can do everything in 1 day. Even half a day. We originally planned to stay 3 nights here, but checked out early because there wasn’t much else to do, so we headed to Portland.

* One thing we didn’t get to try was ‘Wasses Hotdog’ because we didn’t have the stomach space and this weekend was focused on seafood, however this palce had great reviews and there were often many people lining out the door for it. Maybe next time!

Abby1 Comment

Our Time Working in Central Victoria: Kilmore, Wallan, Woodend (the start of our working journey through the pandemic)


It was the end of August 2020, smack deep in the pandemic. The state of Victoria had the highest number of COVID cases and everyone was stressed and in lockdown. 8 months prior when there were only whispers of an emerging COVID virus overseas, Toby and I both gave in our notices with big plans ahead, not expecting everything soon to be derailed. We had planned to move out of our apartment in Balwyn in April 2020, live 1 month on Toby’s parents’ farm to prepare for our wedding, then be wed on the farm on Saturday, May 9th, 2020. After the wedding we were going to locum in the UK and travel Europe.

In March of 2020, we were working the final months of our contract. The news got scarier and scarier to watch, with COVID cases climbing higher and higher. Everyone felt a sense of unease and paranoia. Our work started with face shields and masks with social distancing then turned into curb-side/over-the-phone consulting. There was a shortage of masks and hand sanitizer and I was so glad we still plenty of our Costco bulk toilet paper left from simpler times. When they closed international borders, it was clear that our wedding would not go ahead as planned and our overseas plans were in danger. How the near future would play out was uncertain and no one knew how long the pandemic would last. We decided to continue with our plan of leaving our jobs anyway and move on to the farm to wait out the pandemic since neither of us have had a proper break since starting work as new grad veterinarians so this would be a nice extended break. We sold all of our furniture and held a couple Camberwell stalls to get rid of unwanted items, then moved the rest to the farm. We were hopeful the virus would be contained within a few months so we only postponed our wedding to November of 2020.

When we first implemented face shields in March 2020

Moving to the farm was a breath of fresh air. We had 50 acres of land to roam and open-air with cattle, chickens, and the three family dogs. Toby put together a little TV room for us so we can have our own little space and watch our evening Masterchef on TV while his dad watched the evening news. His parents did the weekly grocery shop at Dandenong Market while Toby and I cooked daily with inspiration from Masterchef. Our day-to-day was waking up, cooking, doing the dishes, then going about our own activities until the evening where sometimes I’d be baking something or Toby would be trying out a soufflé recipe (he was really into egg recipes at point to use up the abundance of eggs from the chickens) and we’d eat it together until 7-8pm when Masterchef/the evening news would come on. Rinse and repeat.

After 4 months of this, the end of the pandemic was nowhere in sight and the lack of income and working purpose was gnawing at us. One day I received a random phone call from a corporate company that asked me if I was looking for a job. During the pandemic everyone was home, paying more attention to their animals or people were rescuing animals from shelters and as a result the need for veterinarians were at an all time high. I had never actually worked for this company before, but I did apply for one of their clinics almost a year prior but I never accepted the job – they must’ve kept my information in their file and in desperate times, calling every lead they possibly had. The call came at a good time, when we were getting a little tired of the monotony and yearning for a greater purpose again. We didn’t want to commit to another full time contract job since we still had plans to leave the country when the pandemic blew over (whenever that would be), so we accepted a temporary locum job for 2 months. Within 48 hours we were packed and ready to start a new adventure. Toby stayed at the Kilmore clinic full time and I travelled between Kilmore, Wallan and Woodend.

Map of our travels and work locations
Within 48 hours of the phone call, we were packed and ready to go
Toby was pretty good at packing my little car
Kilmore is only about an hour north from the city and its surrounded by beautiful farm lands
The small town of Kilmore – our first views driving in
They had a furnished room at the back of the clinic all ready for us. There was even a really nice bathroom! This was a lot more modern than we were expecting in this small town.

The communal break room had a full kitchen for us to use. As you can see, the bulk of our things were my cooking tools and we were also loaded up with farm fresh veggies from Toby’s mom before we left <3. Toby is trying to reorganize and figure out how everything is going to fit.

We arrived at the Kilmore clinic while the clinic was closed and the practice manager showed us to our accommodation at the back of the clinic. We were expecting the worst but it was actually a very nicely renovated room with a roomy bathroom. We unpacked and settled into our new home relatively quickly.

A few days later it was Toby’s birthday. He picked out a mini cake at the local bakery.
We also tried out the local pizza, Toby’s favourite food.
I was FINALLY able to get a haircut since being in lockdown
Someone donated adult diapers to the clinic so we were using then instead of urine pads for surgeries 😂
Looks silly but it definitely worked well

After a month the landlord decided that he suddenly needed to replace the flooring of the back of the clinic so they moved us to the trailer park across the street. Looked dodgy, but it was actually quite nice! We got two small bedrooms and a full kitchen. I continued to work between the 3 clinics and Toby crossed the street everyday and continued on at Kilmore.

We had a great time over the next couple months with interesting cases and fantastic coworkers. We were only meant to stay 2 months, but decided to extend our contract another 2 months. Here’s a collection of our day-to-day and some crazy things we’ve seen along the way.

Out and about to local farmers markets on the weekends: They’ve all been small community markets but after so many months of lockdown, it was so nice to be back out in the sun again, supporting the locals.

Tallarook Farmer’s Market
Tallarook Farmer’s Market
Romsey Farmer’s Market
Romsey Farmer’s Market
Lancefield Farmer’s Market

We had some pretty good food during out stay here:

Papa Jim’s quickly became our local favourite. They had a unique salted crust. Sadly they closed down in Aug 2023. </3
We tried to get through everything on the menu before we left. The BBQ and Meat Lovers was our favourite.
Bourkies Bakehouse in Woodend was famously known for their vanilla slice
Bourkies baked goods (Vanilla slice not pictured)
Torng Bai Thai Restaurant, Wallan – AMAZING Thai red curry in this small country town! It was my go-to weekend treat ❤
Checked out Holgate Brewhouse in Woodend
Rose Garden Cafe, Kilmore
Rose Garden Cafe, Kilmore – peaceful setting with great food
The restaurant at Macedon Ranges Hotel & Spa (currently closed) – great views, average food

During our time here we took a few road trips to nearby towns:

Daylesford, VIC


Travel date: October 4th, 2020 Daylesford is known as a spa town in regional Victoria. We made a day trip here after working for 6 days straight for some relaxation. The bathhouses and spas on offer were quite pricey and we didn’t quite feel like having a spa day and bringing a change of clothes so…

Kilmore, VIC and Mount Piper


During our time in Kilmore, we did a couple of day hikes around the area. Mount Piper Situated in Broadford, Mount Piper was only about a 10 min drive from where we were staying Kilmore. There’s no entry fee and you can drive up right to the start. There are two hiking options: either the summit…

Malmsbury & Blackhill Nature Reserve, VIC


Travel Dates: October 2020 Malmsbury and Edgecombe are small towns in Central Victoria. They’re about a 12 minute drive away from each other. It’s the perfect outing to start with an early morning farmer’s market run then finish off with a hike through the Blackhill Nature Reserve in Edgecombe. Malmsbury, VIC Malmsbury Farmer’s Market This was…

Bendigo, VIC


Travel Date: November 5th, 2020 After living in a small country town for a couple months, I was craving a nice ramen or any sort of decent Japanese food, so the next biggest town near us was Bendigo. There were 2 Japanese restaurants in town and sadly the ramen at both places were both disappointing </3.…

We left at the end of December 2020. We had such a great time and met so many amazing people and would have loved to stay longer, however we told ourselves that we wanted to keep travelling Australia and made the difficult decision to say goodbye. 💔 Kilmore will always have a special place in our heart as our first locum experience and it solidified our decision to continue travelling around Australia to have more new experiences and meet more people as we wait out the rest of the pandemic.

Taco, the clinic cat

Since our departure, the company struggled to find a vet to fill the vacant position at Kilmore and last we heard they sold the practice to an independent buyer.

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Bendigo, VIC


Travel Date: November 5th, 2020

After living in a small country town for a couple months, I was craving a nice ramen or any sort of decent Japanese food, so the next biggest town near us was Bendigo. There were 2 Japanese restaurants in town and sadly the ramen at both places were both disappointing </3. However, the town of Bendigo was still nice to walk around and explore. There was even an observation tower (Poppet Head Lookout) and Rosalind Park was nice to walk through, with a mini bamboo “forest”.

Bendigo town
First disappointing ramen
Poppet Head Lookout
Top of Poppet Head Lookout
Views from Poppet Head Lookout
Rosalind Park
Chancery Lane – a cool street with cool shops
Awaiting our second disappointing ramen

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