END OF MONTH TWO, TRIP #4: As of Day 61, yesterday 8/12/18, we’ve been gone for two months on Trip #4. Granted, we had to stop and return home in July so that Rob could fly to CA, but just counting days on the road, we’ve completed two months of this trip. We got back on the road once he returned & we’d packed up again. We’d left off at Aroostook State Park in northern Maine near Presque Isle. When we returned to camping, we first headed to the old standby in Massachssetts, Traveler’s Wood’s Campground, then drove up to northern NH near the Maine border near Umbagog Lake National Wildlife Refuge. We stayed for over a week at Coleman State Park, an excellent campground, with Loons calling. Bald Eagles, Moose & great kayaking. From there we drove to Rangeley Lake State Park in western Maine, stayed there for almost a week, then moved on to Peaks-Kenny State Park near Dover-Foxcroft in central Maine. Beautiful country, but we really want to see the top of Maine, near the Canadian border. Not many roads there, almost no towns, river kayaking galore, Moose, Bears, Eagles, oh my……and we’ve just obtained reservations at Moosehead Lake and also at Baxter State Park, moving ever onward to the north. Stay tuned for more about the wilder side of Maine!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LIN! WE HOPE IT WAS WONDERFUL!
Day 62 – I neglected to do a campground review after Rangeley Lake State Park, so that will follow along with a review of Peaks-Kenny State Park because, guess what?, we have left this Park and moved on to another one! Crazy.
48 miles (1:20), 30965-31013
Rangeley Lake State Park: off South Shore Drive between routes 4 & 17, Rangeley, Maine, (207) 864-3858, www.maine.gov/rangeleylake. Check-in 1 p.m.; check-out 11 a.m. The use of generators was allowed from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Rangeley Lake is very large. Near the Lake are other large lakes, so this is a crowded, touristy area with lots of boating opportunities and lots of homes surrounding the Lakes. The area is heavily tree’d and lovely. Not too far from the New Hampshire border, it’s located in a fairly remote area in western Maine. There are Moose & Bears; we didn’t see any, but the signs say there are a lot of Moose/car crashes so to pay attention to the road. The highways go all the way around Rangeley Lake; there are two towns with adventure outfitters, restaurants, stores, etc., Rangeley & Oquossoc. The Parkside & Main restaurant in Rangeley was excellent. Rangeley Lake State Park had 50 campsites, and many of the sites were angled nicely & had trees so that even though you were close to a neighboring site, you did have some privacy. We arrived without a reservation. The campground was fully booked for the upcoming weekend. We were lucky enough to get a non-reservable site that worked well for us, #33M. Another campsite that was already occupied (to consider in the future) would be the non-reservable site #42U. Another site to consider if reserving in advance might be #15M. (Their “M” sites are not really “medium”; they are larger.) There are no hook-ups, but there is a dump station with potable water available there. The Lake is quite large and winds do keep the water a bit rough for kayaking; lots of motor boats, too. Again, this is a very popular area; something to consider in the summer season. Off-season camping would probably be quieter. We would camp at this Park again.
Peaks-Kenny State Park: State Park Road, Dover-Foxcroft, Maine, (207) 564-2003, www.main.gov/peaks-kenny. Check-in 1 p.m.; check-out 11 a.m. The usage of generators was allowed from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. We’d never been to this campground but had heard good things about it. It’s located north of Dover-Foxcroft near Sebec Lake. None of the campsites are on the water but there are trails leading to the beach. The closest boat launch is outside the Park via a short drive to Greeley’s Landing, a very crowded area with lots of bigger motor boats. We drove quite a distance to the town of Sebec to find a good kayak launching site. So this State Park is really better for motor boating. Nevertheless, it’s a very nice campground with 55 sites, six of which offer electrical hook-ups. The rest of the campsites have no hook-ups. There is a dump station & water is available there. Most of the campsites are large and some have good privacy. We had reserved site #12X for 3 nights, sight unseen, hoping to get our feet in the door to obtain something for the upcoming weekend which was fully booked. The site was fine & we could’ve easily camped there for the 3 nights while searching for a non-reservable site to extend into the weekend. The Ranger was incredibly nice in helping us to secure site #36U, by suggesting we go look at several open, non-reservable sites right then, before setting up on our reserved campsite. We changed to 36U and set up there. It was a very large campsite with more privacy than most sites offered. When driving through the campground, we also marked many others that were good: 4U, 12X, 14L, 15X, 21X, 20M, 32X, 33X, 36U, 37S, 40X, 41U, 43U, 44U, 45U, 46X & 54U. But because it was August, almost all sites were occupied. Although when driving around the area, we found that the kayaking opportunities weren’t great, it’s still a good campground & we’d come back again.
So, what happened? We moved campgrounds again? We were up & out, headed for Lily Bay State Park at Moosehead Lake near Greenville, Maine at 10 a.m. When Rob got up at 6:15, it was partly cloudy and 62 degrees, quite comfortable. We drove in the tow car, the Honda CRV, from the Dover-Foxcroft area to the Greenville area, following directions on the GPS, This route took us on some very rough roads, some of them dirt roads, but was the quickest route offered. It took us an hour and 15 minutes to reach Lily Bay State Park.
Gorgeous scenery, and two Moose sightings later, we had obtained the last available non-reservable campsight in the campground. It was a tough decision because the site at Lily Bay was not nearly as nice as the site at Peaks-Kenny which we’d also reserved. The deciding factor, however, was that we heard back from Big Eddy Campground near Baxter State Park, and we were successful in reserving a campsite there beginning August 20. That left us with one week in this area. Which place had more things of interest for us to do in the upcoming week? Lily Bay State Park, hands down.
Young buck Moose, Lily Bay State Park, Greenville, ME
Young buck Moose, Lily Bay State Park, Greenville, ME
Young buck Moose, Lily Bay State Park, Greenville, ME
So we drove back to Peaks-Kenny, another hour and 15 minutes, had lunch, packed up the RV and the cats (much to their chagrin) and drove back to Lily Bay. It was a long day. We left site #36U at Peaks-Kenny at 2:45 p.m., a wonderful campsite – we will return another time – 78 degrees, partly cloudy, and arrived at Lily Bay State Park, site #22M, at 4:05 p.m., 81 degrees, partly cloudy, and humid. Barring some unforeseen change, we will be here until Monday, August 20, when we’ll leave for the wild country of Class V rapids, Moose & Bears, below Mount Katahdin, near Baxter State Park.
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