The Best Lobster in Bar Harbor: Why Everyone Told Us to Drive to Thurston's

If you ask enough people where to eat lobster near Bar Harbor, one name comes up over and over again. Thurston's.

Everyone told us it was worth the 30-minute drive from Bar Harbor. They weren't exaggerating.

Sitting on the water in Bass Harbor, Thurston's has been family owned for five generations. The lobster comes straight from the working harbor you're looking out over while you eat. It doesn't get much fresher than that.

Of course, ordering the lobster was the easy part. The funny part came when Scott realized our boys had never really learned how to crack one open, so dinner quickly turned into Lobster 101. There were demonstrations, flying shell pieces, lobster juice squirting in every direction, and plenty of laughter. It ended up being one of those dinners we'll probably talk about for years.

After all that work, I think we agreed we're probably more of a lobster roll family. Less effort, more lobster in every bite. We're the same way with Maryland crabs. We lived in Maryland for more than 20 years, but I never became someone who wanted to spend an afternoon shelling crabs. Give me a really good crab cake instead.

That said, I do enjoy opening a lobster a little more. Maybe it's the nostalgia. It took me right back to my early 20s, visiting Kennebunkport, Ogunquit, and Perkins Cove, eating sweet little Maine lobsters at picnic tables on the side of the road before those towns became as busy as they are today.

Some meals do that. The food is almost beside the point, and what you're really sitting inside of is the place, the people, and the moment. If you're heading to Bar Harbor or Acadia, make the drive to Thurston's.