Allagash Lake: "Jewel of the Allagash"
Four o’clock on a late August afternoon and it’s pouring down rain deep in the Maine North Woods. We (husband Hy and friends Dawn and Lee) are in a muddy parking lot where we’d planned to strap our canoes onto carts, complete a one-mile portage to the south edge of Allagash Lake, canoe four miles, and set up camp. But no one’s feeling inspired.
Even on the brightest of days, Allagash Lake is not your mainstream North Woods destination. From Bangor, drive to Millinocket and head northwest on the logging industry’s Golden Road, a bone-jarring, tire-shredding highway of fractured asphalt and cratered gravel. Skirt the southern border of Baxter State Park before scrabbling your way north by twists and turns, via more logging roads: Telos, Umbazooksus, TransCanada, Edmond Roy, and Ledges.
Yet even though Allagash Lake is remote, it’s worth the trip. Aside from the ranger’s outboard, there are no motorized vehicles on or around the lake; that’s because it’s protected as part of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway. Allagash Lake is, simply, a treasure. Fishing can be lights-out with brookies and lake trout; travelers are few; the water is deep, at an average 35 feet with the deepest at 89 feet.
In the parking lot, dampened by dreary prospects, we decided to stop back at Loon Lodge, a hunting and fishing operation we passed a couple miles earlier. Maybe, just maybe, they’d have room. Sure enough, Ray and Leslie Cooley welcomed us in on the spot, and we spent a dry night in one of their cabins on the edge of Round Pond.
Cheery and rested the next morning, with a sunny day ahead, we tied down our (overloaded) canoes and hauled and pushed and pulled the mile toward the put-in. No surprise, atop one last hill from the end, a wheel on Dawn and Lee’s cart crimpled. We used our cart to take each canoe the several hundred yards down, past the ranger station, to the water’s edge.
Arranged before us was a flat sheet of water reflecting blue sky crowded with gray-bottomed cumulus clouds. To lessen the effects of an increasing wind, we decided to hug the west shore and paddled some four miles to the Ice Cave campsite. The site is lovely, atop a small point, with beach enough on one side to pull up the canoes and a wider sand beach on the west, which made for the perfect place to pop a beer in the setting sun.
You can learn a lot about Allagash Lake by reading Through Woods and Waters, Laurie Chandler’s excellent account of her solo canoe and hiking trek through the Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument. [Check out laurieachandler.com for more info or order the book at Amazon or maineauthorspublishing.com.] Lucky for us, after setting up camp, Dawn pulled out her copy of Through Woods and Waters and opened, purely by chance, to Chapter 4, “Jewel of the Allagash,” discovering that Laurie stayed over at the Ice Cave site on her trip. In that chapter, she taught us all about Allagash Lake and the Cooleys at Loon Lodge and the fire tower just beyond the ranger’s cabin and the endangered bats that hibernate in the Ice Cave from October through April. She describes the Allagash Ice Cave as “the longest talus or fissure cave in New England.” We did not venture as far into the caves as Laurie did; she is much more intrepid. Is there really ice down in that cave? We wouldn’t know, but there have been stories…
By her account, Laurie eventually headed off to suss out the start of Allagash Stream on the northeast corner of the lake and continue on to Chamberlain Lake. As for us, we saddled up the next morning and paddled back down the lake.
It took a while to extricate ourselves from the North Maine Woods. On the return portage, the wheel on Dawn and Lee’s cart became increasingly gimpy. At the final half mile, we unloaded the canoe to reduce weight and Lee ferried gear to the parking lot. The ride out was no picnic either. Our canoe rack came apart four times over the ragged roads. Duct tape was the final solution.
A short trip, numerous snafus, and poor fishing (spring/early summer is much better) didn’t offset the incredible beauty of Allagash Lake. Thanks to Laurie, we now know some of the secrets that make Allagash Lake so special. We were happy and honored to follow in her footsteps (paddle strokes?), if only for a day.
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