The Map is Not the Territory: A Northern Maine Adventure

[epicxcrider]

The Old Man

Almost to Groveton we passed a man standing on the side of the road smoking a pipe. He had long hair and a long nicotine yellow-grey beard. All of his clothes were worn thin, the once red undershirt almost the same color as the blue jeans. Nick B - the photographer - stopped the convoy and sprinted back up the road to grab a portrait of this guy.

Nick sprinted back and we all crowded around his camera to get a closer look at the guy. One of his eyes was missing, his skin was the color of his clothes. Nick learned he had lived in the house by himself since 1955.

I'll have more on this from Nick B later

We jumped back in the trucks to get to Groveton to pick up some grub. I hadn’t prepared for the rest of the weekend so Nick B and I picked up some supplies while Josh’s crew prepared their exhaust manifold burrito cooker. Our beer supply had also mysteriously run low so we re-stocked the cooler.

[epicxcrider]

Back on the dirt we started up E. Nash Stream Rd in Nash Stream State Forest. By this time I was getting the hang of the overloaded handling of the FJ, though something would have to be done about the front wheels bouncing off the ground while climbing hills. We turned East off Nash Stream and began to climb. The road was steep and windy, a 2nd and sometimes 3rd gear climb up into the mountains. The road was fun and we made good time to our lunch spot on Little Bog Pond.

Lunch was pre-cooked chicken we made into sandwiches, reminding me of the Bill Cosby joke about an American being able to turn anything into a sandwich with two pieces of bread :P

Josh’s crew enjoyed (tolerated?) their manifold-warmed burritos.

Erek explains the workings of the universe to Nick and Chirp

There were a few camps on the pond but the place was utterly deserted while we were there. By the looks of the camps and the number of propane tanks outside, most of them are winter use only by snowmobiles.

Why not take a swim?

We explored a bit, I found an outhouse -and used it- and Josh found some old couch springs to try and tie up his busted exhaust. More on this later. (The exhaust not the outhouse)

Little Bog Pond

Now the route had called for us to backtrack to Nash Stream Rd and continue north to RT 26.....



Forget the route. Trio Pond Rd looked like the road less travelled so we went East...

[epicxcrider]

Trio Pond Road - Class unknown - led us up a steep and rough gravel road. I put the FJ in 4-Low to keep the bumping down, it bottomed out too easily with all the extra weight. Cresting the hill we reached Trio Ponds, on which there were a few more camps. We approached a 3 way split in the road with no clear marking. We were off the GPS now, and the trail was not on the atlas.

I hoped it was the usual two dead end roads must meet somewhere in the middle situation...

I jumped out to scout ahead a bit and Nick got out to shoot some photos. I decided to go straight and pass between the pond and the cottages - it looked someone's yard, but the road continued and wound North back into the woods.
On the Northwest side of the lake, grass grew tall in the road and the roadbed was covered in moss. Nobody had driven a wheeled vehicle here in a long time. I kept the FJ in 4-Low and moved forward up the slight incline until I started getting the sinking feeling - so I went for it....

[epicxcrider]

With a little throttle and some clever steering I made it through the 8” boggy surface uphill to a firmer area, warned Josh over the CB and ran back to guide him through. The road had looked great on the surface but there were two brown-black sunken tracks down the middle, it was clear that nobody had driven this way in quite some time.

Since the the tires on the LX were all terrains we decided Josh should follow inside my tracks to get through. He goosed it and with surprisingly little wheel-spin was quickly in line behind the FJ.

Things started to level out and firm up - but the challenge wasn’t over. Again the grass had grown up into the road enough to cover most of the obstacles so I crept along feeling my way though waiting for a tire to drop or rise.

The real challenge was determining if we were on the right trail, where it would end up, and if there would be a gate on the other end...

As we continued down Trio Pond Rd there was nothing out of the ordinary Class VI road - downed tree here, soft spot there, big rock to negotiate - until we came across another culvert that had washed out.

[epicxcrider]

Night owl update

Airing Down - I should stop here to mention something about airing down on an exploratory trip.
I’ve found that if you air down early, you’ll be thinking “why did I bother” at the end of the easy dirt road as you dig around in the back for the compressor.
If you wait, however, you’ll end up stuck between a rock and a log wondering why the ____ you didn’t air down earlier as you kneel in the mud to let some air out of your tires.

Josh, Erek, and I cleared away all the nail-filled boards that had been tossed in the newly formed ditch and proceeded. With some careful spotting and driving both vehicles made it through with a few too many scrapes and bangs. (remember about airing down?)



The trail here sort of disappeared into a bog, so I sent Jason and Nick out ahead to scout the trail. Jason returned in a matter of seconds (Nick seemed to be distracted by a photo opportunity) so I quickly re-dispatched Jason to run ahead until the trail intersected with another trail.

This is a trail? Sweet.

Josh and I continued through the undulating rocky and boggy swamp overgrown with prickers until we both got hung up good on rocks. We could not move forward or backwards. (That airing down thing again)

I should take an aside here - there are a lack of photos.. This trail was NOT easy, grass covered all obstacles entirely and you would fall into holes walking down it. We had not gone so far we couldn't turn around... but there was at least 1.5 hours invested in this trail so far.

So.... while we were both kneeling in the (smelly) mud airing down Jason returned with the good news - there was an intersection about ¼ mile ahead. Nick B was nowhere to be seen but nevertheless we saddled up and moved forward with our newly found traction. Of course because we had just aired down, we came back out on to a mild dirt logging road - the challenging sections behind us - for now..

[achampagne]

I love this pic of the Franconia Notch, I bet its taken from the last bridge crossing over Rte 3 right before you enter the notch.

[epicxcrider]

another good one

[epicxcrider]

The Wind Farm
Back out on the logging roads, there was another challenge ahead of us - where do we go? Nothing was marked and the GPS & Atlas were both wrong. Roads change so fast in logging country - what was a road on the map is now a skidder trail strewn with CV boot and brake line ripping sticks. .

Dirt paths led in unknown directions. We tried heading North but the road ended in another skidder trail, Southeast it would have to be. Continuing down the “road” with the most recent traffic we seemed to be heading in the right direction - East. The new goal was to intersect with Phillips Brook Road which would wind us through the mountains to RT 26 - back on track.

The logging road began winding left and right and gradually getting steeper downhill until we came around a sharp left hand corner... all we could say was WOW.

Josh and I skidded to a stop to get out and take in the amazing view of the mountains in front of us. The logging road stretched out and down into the valley below, a small ribbon winding into the forest.

My photos do not do justice to this view

The view really was incredible and we all took the opportunity to snap a few photos before descending off the mountain.

Picking up a considerable amount of speed, Josh and I wound our way down the nicely graded logging road - slowing only for the blind corners and unknown intersections.

Eventually we found ourselves at an intersection with a heavily travelled construction road and were greeted with a confused look from a dump truck driver. A quick check of the Map and the GPS told us we were on the right road, so North we went. We weren’t following the dump truck for long when the giant structures on trailers clued us into the fact that we were in the middle of the new Coos wind farm project. There were signs instructing drivers to tune to CB 19, but only heard a few French Canadian truckers conversing.

It wasn’t long before we were greeted with another confused look from a truck driver. I asked this one if we could continue North... he explained (still confused as to how we got there) that the road was closed up North and had we come in from the south (not over the mountain to the East) that we would have seen the detour signs. We would have to head South and find another way around. We cruised south on the construction road checking out the staging area for the wind turbine pieces and the huge national guard trucks they were hauling them with - it was a pretty cool sight.

[epicxcrider]

We ended up on Rt 16 and headed North. Because of the unexpected re-route our new goal was to get to Colebrook NH, refuel and reassess our route there. I quickly tired of being on pavement and started looking for a new dirt route - and found that Millsfield Pond Rd would take us through the hills to Rt 26, skipping Errol altogether.

We had just started up the road and I got word over the CB that there was trouble in the LX - Josh smelled burning rubber.I backed up to where he had pulled off and got out to help assess the situation. Josh quickly determined two things:

A) His busted exhaust was making his bumper extremely hot, possibly causing the smell
B) A piece of the aforementioned couch spring was rubbing the inside of the tire - also possibly contributing to the smell.
We removed part of the couch spring and pressed on and I reassured Josh that “they make new bumpers every day”.

After about 30 minutes on the dirt, we were back on the pavement again heading West on Rt 26 towards Colebrook through Dixville Notch. I’ve driven through the Notch a few times and been greeted with the amazing view of The Balsams, but had never taken the time to stop in the state park. We pulled off on the North side just as the road started to climb. Right off the highway we were rewarded with a view of the falls.

After the requisite photos and exploration of the falls, it was back on the road to Colebrook. We arrived at the gas station around 5:00, aired up and filled up. Erek had also made a call to his in-laws - it looked like we would be able to spend the night under a roof in Pittsburg NH. That suited all of us fine since rain was in the forecast. I went back to the atlas and GPS to find a route that would bring us there on dirt

[epicxcrider]

I planned a route taking us North through Coleman State Park, around the South side of Diamond Pond and into unknown territory. Driving North we were treated with some nice sunset views of Northern New Hampshire and the mountains to the south.

As we drove around Diamond Pond we were greeted with a familiar sight to most ENH’ers: Private road signs posted on a public way. Cautiously ignoring the signs we continued on as the road turned to a washed out dirt road, crossed a bridge and dove South into the woods. There was nothing particularly challenging about this trail, but everyone seemed excited. It was new territory far from home and the light was fading quickly...