Late April too early for Mount Desert Island?
 

Hey folks! My spouse & I are thinking about a week-long visit to Mount Desert Island for our 20th anniversary in late April 2015. We vacationed there maybe 8 years ago (in autumn) & just loved it. We'll rent a house on some kind of water & focus on lots of easy hiking, photography, exploring in general, mostly cooking for ourselves, and we don't mind cool weather. The only shopping I care about is fun food stores & antique stores (of the cheap collectibles variety). Is late April too early in the year this kind of plan? We have total flexibility with when to go; I just thought it would be nice to go as close to our actual anniversary as is reasonable.

I would have a look at the average weather - and double check with openings. I think a lot of places might still be closed then.

It's not just about average temp in my opinion. Depending on the severity of the winter and how late spring arrives, the trails and the carriage roads may still be very wet (and closed). Take a look at mountdessertisland.net and its archives to get a better sense of when things start to open. If it were me, I'd push the trip out by a couple of weeks just to be safe.

Thank you, I was concerned about the carriage roads & trails especially. And I wasnt sure how many places would still be closed down for the winter season. I'll do more research, but will start thinking about the end of May instead.

black flies and mosquitoes, depending on what kind of a winter Maine has .

I'm thinking many of the shops of the type you want to visit would not be open for the season yet.

Thanks all. Maybe we'll just keep pushing the time frame even farther back. Usually our northern vacations are in the fall, which has always worked out beautifully. We could always just take a mini trip near home for our actual anniversary.

I think the " too early" advice is true in most coastal New England towns that depend on tourists. Except for Daffodil Weekend, very little is open at that time of year here in Nantucket, and we are a couple of hundred miles south. Really, many shops and restaurants don't open until Memorial Day.

We last travelled to the area in September of 2013--just after the Labor Day rush. It was just lovely. Days were warm, but not hot and the mornings were crisp but not cold. Shops, restaruants and the park were open, but nothing felt overly crowded.

We stayed here: http://www.homeaway.com/vacation-rental/p119223

It's not on the water, but we just loved the house. It was very charming, clean and quiet. Diane, the owner, is great, and she's decorated and maintained the home very, very well. We brought our bikes and rode several days on the carriage roads; took a sea kayaking tour with National Park Kayak, which we just loved, and rented kayaks one morning at Long Pond, another fabulous day. Minus my/our trips to Europe, it was my favorite vacation.