BANGOR DAILY NEWS • June 28, 2025
Tourist season in Bar Harbor has resumed with the usual crowded sidewalks and hard-to-find parking spots, but there is one noticeable difference this summer. The town’s cruise ship visits are a shadow of what they have been the past three years. After seeing more than 100 ship visits between April and early November in each of the past three years — most of them from large ships — Bar Harbor this year at most will get 16 large ship visits, and so far hasn’t had any. Since 2022 local voters twice have supported referendums that effectively ban visits by ships that carry 1,000 or more passengers. None of those large ships have appeared in Bar Harbor this year, and the shops and restaurants that have been geared toward their passengers are feeling the pinch.