Across the water from Bar Harbor on Mount Desert Island, Maine, a forested hump of pine and birch rises and falls with the tide: Bar Island. Uninhabited and mostly forested in pine and birch, the island is now part of Acadia National Park and offers walking trails that invite exploration. At low tide a sand-and-gravel bar, exposed only a couple of hours, connects Bar Island to Bridge Street in Bar Harbor; visitors often walk across that bar or even park cars on the exposed sand.
Be cautious: on the island side, in front of a locked gate, only a small area fringed with dense sea rose bushes is elevated enough for safe parking, and visitors have returned from a hike to find their cars submerging and themselves stranded until the tide recedes. The town of Bar Harbor has repeatedly attempted to obtain jurisdiction over this island connected by the eponymous bar, but a 1903 court decision confirmed that the distant town of Gouldsboro retains jurisdiction under its 1798 articles of incorporation. Listen for the hush of pine and birch, the creak of sea roses in the wind, while the exposed bar and Bridge Street wait across the water.