Baxter adventure a rendezvous with nature Wildlife, scenery fill four-day hike

EDITOR’S NOTE: Hiker Brad Viles recently spent four days exploring the northern reaches of Baxter State Park chasing trout, black flies and adventure. The following is a diary of his trip.

Day One

I started hiking around 8:30 in the morning, down the Wadleigh Brook Trail at the north end of Baxter State Park on June 22, the first full day of summer. The actual solstice was the day before, Saturday, at 3 p.m., and this morning it was already getting warm.

I soon found that hiking to my destination at Hudson Pond, 8.4 miles away, meant I needed to move fast enough to beat the heat. About a mile into it, I learned I’d have to beat the bugs, too.

I planned this backpacking trip in February, when fighting biting insects was only a remote thought. I expected there would be mosquitoes and black flies, because I would be crossing an upland bog and be near lake country, both renowned for hordes of flies. The idea for the trek was simple. Go somewhere during bug season and, by extension, when the fishing was best, see some new places and maybe, just maybe, catch a few trout.

Actually, I hoped to catch and eat so many trout, they’d have to wheel me out of the woods. The bugs would just be an annoyance, I thought at the time.

I reserved four nights, each at a different site along the trails in Baxter. On the first day I’d hike the Wadleigh Brook Trail to Hudson Pond Lean-To, then over the Freezeout Trail to Little East Lean-To on Webster Stream for the next night. My third day would take me across the Perimeter Road to the Five Ponds area to the Billfish Pond campsite. On day four, I’d hike to the lean-to at Upper South Branch Pond. Each day would end at a prime fishing spot. My plan for this trip called for hiking about 35 miles.

Now, farther down the Wadleigh Brook Trail, I discovered just how bad the bugs could be. Swarms of mosquitoes surrounded my head net while I hiked toward the lean-to at Hudson Pond. The landscape was low ridges separated by even lower boggy areas. Almost the entire area had been cut over for trees several times, the most recent of which was just before Gov. Baxter donated it to the state in the late 1950s.

I made the seven miles to the picnic grounds at the Scientific Forestry Management Unit at Blunder Pond in three hours. The mosquitoes wouldn’t stop nor let me stop. I tried to lift my head net several times but just got attacked. It was like a scene from a bad “Off” commercial. I was the guy’s arm in the case, but the case surrounded me, with the bugs inside. After a short pack-off break, I got to the lean-to, 8.4 miles in, by 12:30.

Hudson Pond is a low break in the water table that probably has no fish. It didn’t matter, because I was there, with the inner wall of my tent set up in the lean-to as a bug screen so I could nap inside in peace. It looked like the first day would be fishless. I fished from shore, where the thick growth of alders would allow me water access around dusk. Even though I didn’t catch anything, I was glad to see the sleeping bag from inside the tent afterward, with the biting hordes of mosquitoes outside. That in itself was gratifying.

Day Two

Today was just like yesterday, no wind, chased by bugs, and it was getting hot. The air was absolutely still, with a thin overcast of clouds filtering the sun. Again I hiked in long pants, head net and bug mesh shirt. Like yesterday, the trail took me over miles of bog country until I got to Webster Stream. There, it followed the bank of the swift-flowing stream for six miles until I got to the lean-to at Little East.

It’s named for the East Branch of the Penobscot River, which flows into Webster Stream in front of the lean-to, and then Matagamon Lake just a short distance downstream. I started hiking by 6:30 this morning and four hours later I arrived at the lean-to. I only took one break, at Grand Pitch Falls, on the stream. It’s a 30-foot-high Niagara-type waterfall that poured water in a thunderous roar over the lip.

When I got to the site, there were two park rangers, Steve Allen and Loren Goode, digging a privy hole and erecting the stockade-type structure. We talked for a while, since they were the first people I had seen on the hike so far. Soon, with the pack off, I left for some more fishing upstream near a fishing ledge I saw on the way.

I made a few casts and hooked into a salmon. He took the fly, a Hornberg, snapped my three-pound tippet like it wasn’t there, then leaped clear of the water. It was as if the fish were showing me just how foolish I was to think I could catch him.

Last night, I was on a remote pond, accompanied by the sound of shore waves. Tonight it was the subtle, rolling sound of the stream that lulled me to an early sleep.

Day Three

I saw a doe this morning. She watched me as much as I watched her. This morning, I fished awhile before leaving the site, but still no takers. It was always a possibility, not catching fish, but I was sure I’d have a little better luck. After packing up, I started hiking the 5.9 miles to Trout Brook Farm Campground around 6:40.

Two hours later, I was there and walking down the Perimeter Road to retrieve the truck before I started the part of the hike on the south side of the road. I walked only a short ways when a pickup pulled over and gave me a ride. The driver, a young guy, was heading to South Branch Pond. He took me about a mile out of his way and I got the truck.

I left it at the start of the Five Ponds Trail and started hiking to the campsite at Billfish Pond. As I climbed up the trail, I sensed something didn’t seem right about this trail. It sure was steep for a gentle uphill hike to Billfish Pond. I finally figured out that I was climbing Trout Brook Mountain, elevation 1,767. About halfway up, I got a great view of the area I had circuited over the past three days. That night at the pond, a breeze came up that sent the flies packing, finally.

Day Four

After the past few days of more than eight miles each, today’s trek of only 4.6 miles down to Upper South Branch Pond would be a breeze. Speaking of which, the breeze came up strongly today, and it was the best day bug wise.

It was the first day I could hike in shorts and without a head net. Too bad it was my last day of the trip. I went swimming to celebrate. I spent the rest of the day at the pond reflecting about what a trip like this could mean. I saw no one else in the first 22 miles except the park rangers, so it was remote. I saw great wildlife, a bald eagle at Hudson Pond, a varying hare, a deer and loons, and I heard an owl.

There had to be more to gain from this hike than just catching trout. There had to be beauty, seen from the top of a mountain climbed by mistake. There was, as the view from Trout Brook Mountain took in the entire Five Ponds region, with water reflecting the hot summer sky, back-dropped by mountains.

Even learning how to deal with the mosquitoes, which chased me from one end of Matgamon Lake to the other, probably taught me something. Maybe it’s that for all the days that there were bugs, there’s a day like this last one, with a strong breeze to keep them off and keep me cool.

There also has to be the hiking itself, crossing a varied landscape that continually surprises, like stumbling along on a stream walk with the sound of the stream in your ears or hiking to a waterfall on a side trail on the way here. Right now it’s the sight of a beaver swimming around the pond while watching the sun go down over South Branch Mountain.