Hiking Maine: a guide to the state's greatest hiking adventures

337 Pages·2015·9.251 MB·English

by  Westrich, Greg

HHiikkiinngg
MMaaiinnee
A Guide to the State’s Greatest Hiking Adventures
Revised Edition
Greg Westrich
Introduction i
FALCONGGUUIIDDEESS®
An imprint of Rowman & Littlefield
Falcon, FalconGuides, and Outfit Your Mind are registered trademarks of Rowman & Littlefield.
Distributed by NATIONAL BOOK NETWORK
Copyright © 2015 by Rowman & Littlefield
Photos by Greg Westrich
Maps by Alena Joy Pearce © Rowman & Littlefield
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical
means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher,
except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Information available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available
ISBN 978-0-7627-9304-4 (paperback)
ISBN 978-1-4930-1484-2 (ebook)
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard
for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
The author and Rowman & Littlefield assume no liability for accidents happening to,
or injuries sustained by, readers who engage in the activities described in this book.
Contents
Acknowledgments ..........................................................................................vii
Introduction .....................................................................................................1
Wildlife ....................................................................................................3
Bugs .........................................................................................................4
Plant Life ..................................................................................................4
Weather and Seasons .................................................................................5
How to Use This Guide ....................................................................................8
Trail Finder .......................................................................................................9
Map Legend ...................................................................................................12
The Hikes
Southern Coast ............................................................................13
1 Carson Trail ............................................................................................15
2 Wolfe’s Neck Woods State Park ...............................................................19
3 Bradbury Mountain ................................................................................24
Honorable Mentions
A Kennebunk Plains ...................................................................................28
B Harpswell ...............................................................................................28
Mid- Coast ...................................................................................30
4 Mount Megunticook ..............................................................................32
5 Maiden Cliff ...........................................................................................36
6 Fernald’s Neck Preserve ..........................................................................40
7 Ragged Mountain ...................................................................................44
Honorable Mention
C Josephine Newman Sanctuary .................................................................48
Downeast.....................................................................................49
8 Blue Hill .................................................................................................52
9 John B Mountain ....................................................................................56
10 Holbrook Island Sanctuary State Park ......................................................60
11 Isle au Haut ............................................................................................65
12 Great Pond Mountain .............................................................................70
13 Black Mountain Bald ..............................................................................74
14 Tunk Mountain ......................................................................................78
15 Catherine Mountain ..............................................................................82
16 Petit Manan ............................................................................................85
17 Pigeon Hill .............................................................................................89
18 Great Wass Island .....................................................................................93
19 The Bold Coast ......................................................................................97
20 Shackford Head ....................................................................................103
Introduction iii
0 Kilometers 150
Map Overview
0 Miles 150
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THE NORTH COUNTRY 65
QQUUEEBBEECC Eagle
Lake 11
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63
BAXTER 57-58 62
STATE PARK
59 11
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MOOSEHEAD 48 MMiilllliinnoocckkeett 2
54 53 4546 LLaakkee
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27 Lake 41 CCEENNTTRRAALL 95 West
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iv Introduction
21 Quoddy Head .......................................................................................108
22 Bangor City Forest and Orono Bog Boardwalk .....................................112
Honorable Mentions
D Bog Brook Cove Preserve .....................................................................117
E Bald Bluff Mountain .............................................................................117
Mount Desert Island ...................................................................118
23 Cadillac Mountain ................................................................................120
24 Dorr Mountain .....................................................................................125
25 Great Head ..........................................................................................129
26 Pemetic Mountain–North Bubble Loop ................................................133
27 Norumbega Mountain ..........................................................................138
28 Beech Mountain ...................................................................................143
29 Acadia and St. Sauveur Mountains ........................................................148
30 Western Mountain ................................................................................153
31 Ship Harbor Nature Trail ......................................................................158
32 Hadlock Falls and Bald Peak .................................................................163
Honorable Mentions
F The Beehive .........................................................................................168
G Champlain Mountain ............................................................................168
Western Mountains .....................................................................169
33 Mount Blue ..........................................................................................171
34 Tumbledown Mountain ........................................................................175
35 The Bigelows ........................................................................................180
36 Puzzle Mountain ...................................................................................185
37 East Royce Mountain ...........................................................................190
38 Caribou Mountain ................................................................................194
39 Bald Mountain (Oquossoc) ..................................................................198
Honorable Mentions
H The Grafton Loop ................................................................................202
I Dunn Falls ............................................................................................202
Central Highlands .......................................................................203
40 Moxie Falls ...........................................................................................205
41 Moxie Bald ...........................................................................................208
42 Borestone Mountain .............................................................................212
43 Little Wilson Falls ..................................................................................216
44 Gulf Hagas ............................................................................................220
45 Nesuntabunt Mountain .........................................................................225
46 Debsconeag Backcountry ......................................................................229
47 Turtle Ridge .........................................................................................236
48 Debsconeag Ice Caves ...........................................................................241
Contents v
Honorable Mentions
J Whitecap Mountain ..............................................................................245
K Tumbledown Dick Falls ........................................................................245
The Moosehead Region ..............................................................246
49 Laurie’s Ledge .......................................................................................248
50 Big Moose Mountain ............................................................................253
51 Little Moose Mountain .........................................................................257
52 Mount Kineo ........................................................................................261
53 Little Spencer Mountain .......................................................................265
54 Boundary Bald ......................................................................................269
55 Coburn Mountain ................................................................................273
Honorable Mention
L Number Four Mountain .......................................................................277
Baxter State Park .......................................................................278
56 Katahdin ..............................................................................................280
57 The Traveler ..........................................................................................285
58 Howe Brook Falls .................................................................................290
59 Doubletop Mountain ............................................................................294
60 South Turner Mountain ........................................................................298
61 Niagara Falls .........................................................................................302
Honorable Mentions
M Barrell Ridge ........................................................................................306
N The Sentinel .........................................................................................306
The North Country ....................................................................307
62 Mount Chase ........................................................................................309
63 Shin Brook Falls ....................................................................................312
64 Deboullie Mountain .............................................................................315
65 Quaggy Joe Mountain...........................................................................320
Honorable Mention
O Mattawamkeag Wilderness Park .............................................................324
Appendix A: Clubs and Organizations ...........................................................325
Appendix B: Maine Land Trusts ....................................................................325
Hike Index ...................................................................................................326
About the Author .........................................................................................327
vi Contents
Acknowledgments
This guide would not be possible without the hard work and dedication of the
people who work to protect Maine’s natural places and build the trails we all love
and use. Whether they are individuals like Chris Keene bushwhacking all around
the Moosehead region looking for new trails to construct or organizations like the
Downeast Coastal Conservancy, we owe them all our gratitude. I own more than a
dozen Maine hiking guides and piles of maps. Those guides and maps have helped
shape and inform my exploration of Maine; without them this guide would not be
as good as it is.
Brian Swartz, and especially David Fitzpatrick, at the Bangor Daily News have been
a great resource and help. Brian continues to buy and print my stories; David is a great
friend and mentor. Thanks, guys.
I owe a special thanks to my wife, Ann, and my two children, Henry and Emma.
Without their support and help, this guide would have never happened. They have
supported me through all the ups and downs of this project, and my freelancing
career in general. Their only payment has been a few hikes with me and getting their
pictures in Hiking Maine.
Lady Slipper Orchid.
vii
Looking toward Frenchman Bay from Dorr Mountain (hike 24).
Introduction
Maine is best known for its rockbound coast, granite peaks, and endless forest dotted
with ponds large and small. The hikes in this guide include plenty of those, but there
is much more to Maine. The state comprises half of New England and is the most
forested state in the country. Maine is also the least densely populated state east of the
Mississippi. That’s a lot of wildlands to explore.
Maine’s 230-mile coastline is so convoluted and irregular that if you pulled it out
straight it would stretch more than 3,500 miles—more than the rest of the Atlantic
coast in the United States. And except for extreme southern Maine, there are virtually
no sand beaches. The longest stretch of undeveloped coastline in the East is between
Cutler, Maine, and the Canadian border.
Mount Katahdin, Maine’s highest peak, and Mount Desert Island are glacier-
scoured granite plutons, leading many folks to believe the entire state is underlain by
granite. Yet granite is the bedrock in less than a third of the state. The center of the
state, for example, is a swath of black slate that is still commercially mined around
Monson and creates numerous waterfalls and gorges. Granite and slate are both meta-
morphic rock. Except in the far north, most of Maine’s bedrock is metamorphic.
Maine’s geologic history is tied to Europe’s as much as North America’s. When the
supercontinent Laurasia broke up 180 million years ago, a piece of northern Europe
was left behind, attached to North America. That chunk is Maine and Atlantic Can-
ada. For our purposes, however, it was the last ice age that shaped Maine’s famous
landscape more than the bedrock beneath it.
The glaciers retreated about 12,000 years ago, leaving behind scarred bedrock
covered with varying layers of debris. Where the debris was pushed into snake-l ike
piles alongside the glaciers we now have eskers, often called whalesbacks. These nar-
row ridges tend to run north and south through the southern half of the state, often
rising above low, wet areas. Where the debris dropped to the ground as the ice melted,
we find erratics, ranging in size from small stones to house-s ized boulders. In general
the soils in Maine are poor and thin—12,000 years in a cool climate isn’t long to
build and lay down soil. Many trails have worn right through the soil down to the
bedrock. The ice melted irregularly throughout the state; where large islands of ice
melted more slowly, they created depressions in the landscape that formed the beds of
many of the state’s lakes and ponds.
One of the joys of hiking in Maine is reading the natural history of the woods
and mountains as you walk along. There is also a human history that can be read in
the landscape. Native Americans moved into what is now Maine almost as soon as
the ice retreated. Their place names and trails are as much a part of Maine’s mystique
as its famous coast and granite mountains. Europeans began exploring and settling in
Maine in the sixteenth century. The first attempt at a permanent British settlement
in the New World wasn’t in Virginia or Massachusetts; it was at Popham in southern
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