8/25/06 (Friday): Today was a hiking day. We hiked part of the Georges Highland Path, which is run by the Georges River Land Trust. They have over 35 miles of trails that cross private land. The land owners have put the land that the trail traverses in a trust.The land owner gets a tax break and the public gets access to land they might not ever get to explore. The area we hiked was four miles on East Peak and the flank of Spruce Mountain. The views were spectacular and the hiking was pretty strenuous for us lowlanders. We were quite content to laze around the campground when we got back!

The trailhead was on Rt. 17 just west of the campground. To the east it was in Camden and Rockport and was billed as steep and strenuous, so we opted for the trail to the west of 17, which was four miles of moderate hiking with several excellent viewpoints as the trail traversed the wooded slopes of East Peak, Spruce, Pleasant and Meadow Mountains in Rockport, Warren and Union. We only hiked as far as Spruce Mountain (a little more than 4 miles round trip). We did not see many animals, although we heard lots of songbirds and a woodpecker and saw a couple of slate colored juncos. The vegetation was very diverse. The lower slopes were deciduous forest with lots of wild flowers and mushrooms.

There was a very old stone wall along portions of the trail and the forest looked young in spots. It was easy to imagine that the slopes had been farmed and grazed 100 years ago.

The trail had a couple of steep climbs and even a scramble or two. It was fun--reminded me of my Appalachian Trail days! The blazes were painted on rocks at these points. The trail was very well marked and maintained. We were impressed.

The trail didn't go all the way to the summit, but we were quite happy with the view of Penobscot Bay from the highest point. We met a couple hiking back out just as we reached this point, and they took this picture for us.










It's been many years since I took such a strenuous hike, and I was pleased that I still had it in me. We stopped about 2/3 of the way back on this overlook (that's Mirror Lake in the background) and had a nice rest. Wiley did quite well, too. It took us about 4-1/2 hours to hike a little over 4 miles, including rest stops and a lunch break.


Next Wednesday (our next day off), we plan to hike the Oyster River Bog trail. It's also part of the Georges River system. The brochure says we might even see a moose!