Me and my wife did an East Coast trip last summer where we stopped through Boston, Acadia, and Mount Washington. During the trip we decided to go a little out of the way on a 1 night backpacking trip in Maine's Bold Coast near Cutler Maine.
If you want views similar or even better than Acadia without the crowds and don't mind getting muddy or getting a few mosquito bites, this is a great short backpacking trip or even day hike. We started on the inland trail which was only around a half mile and then continued on the inland trail towards the campsites at Fairy Head. The first portion of the trail was fine although very muddy due to a huge rainstorm the few days before. After a little ways we came across a bog where wooden beams had been laid across to cross dryly. Unfortunately they were under about a foot of water and sank even lower when you walked across them.
They say chivalry is dead but I had to move the beams in place so it was at least possible to walk across and only get ankle deep. In some areas the boards were impossible to walk on and the water/mud was about knee deep. I thought it was awesome, but wanted to make sure my wife wasn't cold and wet the whole trip so she would actually come back so I had to just carry her backpack across all the water. It was clear that these trails weren't hiked that much and weren't maintained by the NPS.
After we got across the bog area the elevation went up slightly so it dried out a bit. We walked a ways further and actually stumbled across a porcupine mother and baby. I had never seen one backpacking before so it was a cool sight to see.
Shortly after we came across the first two campsites at Fairy Head and chose the third one to stay at for the night. I think it was around 4.5 miles from the trailhead to the site. The fog was very thick so we couldn't see any of the views for a while. Luckily for us it cleared off in the evening so we were able to enjoy the views. The bugs around this entire area were some of the worst mosquitoes I have ever seen. The only other time where I have actually seen clouds of mosquitoes this bad was in the boundary waters on a canoe backpacking trip in norther Minnesota. Fortunately the campsite was so awesome that we could just sit in the tent and still enjoy the great views of the coast. The view from this campsite was one of the best views I have had at a backpacking site. The only downfall was there was a ton of debris/trash that was washed up from the ocean like buoys and thinks like that. It was a bit of an eyesore but we just faced the ocean the entire time to enjoy the views of the coast.
The next morning we woke up and enjoyed the sunrise from our campsite. The bugs were still horrible but the view of the sunrise on the east coast was awesome.
We packed up camp and started hiking the 5.3 miles back to our car. The trail was along the coast almost the entire way so the view was great; but the trail was not very well kept and was very muddy. So it required a lot of walking through thick weeds, brush and mud and the bugs were still horrible. There were several places where the cliffs descended to rocky beaches which would be a good area to cool off on a hot summer day.
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Overall, the views were probably better than Acadia and
