Allagash Wilderness Waterway canoe trip

 
My wife and I love to backpack and camp in wilderness areas.  Now that we have retired to Maine we decided to try something new for us - an eight-day canoe trip on the Allagash Wilderness Waterway in the North Woods of Maine in late August 2019.  It is one of the classic canoe trips and since I missed my Boy Scout troop's canoe trip in Minnesota back in the 1960s, I thought I should find out what it is all about.
First, we did some research.  The most helpful book was "The Allagash Guide" by Gil Gilpatrick (July 2010).  After some internet research, I then ordered the "National Geographic - Allagash Waterway" trail maps, both North and South, for around $15 each.  These topographic maps show where (most of) the campsites and points of interest are.
One of my neighbors canoed the Allagash with a guide, which is a time-honored tradition.  I am too cheap for that (and we didn't have any trouble doing it on our own with good maps and a Garmin hiker GPS unit - cell phones are only good as cameras up there).  However, I did contact a guide who offers vehicle transfer and parking.  Norm L'Italien is a long-time guide and was super-helpful to us.  He gave us the vehicle options and then spent an hour giving us advice.  One piece we took to heart - don't use a fiberglass canoe.  We had intended to do just that but Norm said they tend to pop holes when they hit rocks and there are a lot of rocks in the Allagash.  He recommended a "Tupperware" canoe, i.e., one made of plastic/vinyl/Royalex.  We just happened to own one and it also had seat backs which made long days canoeing much easier.  The canoe was on the heavier side but it worked well for us.
On August 21 we got up at 4:30 a.m. with our canoe on the top of our Ford F-150 and drove from Boothbay to Millinocket.  From Millinocket we took the road to Baxter State Park and almost missed the turn off to Old State Road.  Bear in mind that cell service is spotty in this part of the county and non-existent along the Allagash.  We were now on the infamous logging roads.  They actually weren't that bad and we gave the logging trucks a wide berth.  Old State hooks up with Golden Road until you turn right on Telos Road.  Not far from Chamberlain Bridge we registered at the North Maine Woods checkpoint where we paid our road and campsite fees.
North Maine Woods road use and 7 nights camping for 2: $114
Transfer of our vehicle to Allagash Village (top of river): $225
Fee to park vehicle at White Church landing:   $23
Total expenses for a week of canoeing (cheap food extra): $362

We put in at Chamberlain Bridge at 11:15 a.m.  Norm's vehicle crew arrived minutes later and took our truck.  We were not extravagant but it still felt like we had packed too much.  Everything was in plastic bags "just in case."  Our goal was Ellis Brook campsite on Chamberlain Lake.  It was tucked away inside an inlet and one of the few campsites we had to share.  The other canoers were French Canadian 20-somethings who left us in the dust in the morning.

Each campsite has a common layout - picnic table with ridge pole to put a tarp over, fire ring, grassy areas to put up your tent, and an outhouse.  Some sites are for one group and others can take multiple groups.

During the busy season, campsites can fill up fast and you may have to paddle another hour or two to find an open one.  By going in late August we had zero competition.

These pit toilets are BYOTP (bring your own toilet paper); a few luxurious models have deodorizer tablets screwed to the walls.

Water is also do-it-yourself.  We have always filtered our water no matter where we hike.
All the campsites were well-maintained.  They even seemed to be mowed.  One downside is that this cherished Wilderness Waterway is heavily used and the woods are picked clean of decent firewood.

In Boy Scouts we called the dry lower branches of trees "Squaw Wood."  I am not sure what they call it now, but there is not much of it along the Allagash.  What you do find is twigs that have fallen from the tops of the trees.  We were always able to gather up enough of these to start a small fire and boil our water for oatmeal and hot chocolate.

Some campers left larger wood for us but it tended to be green, or way too big.
On August 22 we paddled across Chamberlain Lake to the lock dam and portaged it.  The lakes seemed to take forever to cross and any wind was in our faces, of course.  We were surprised the long hours of paddling each day didn't seem to bother us even though we are both in our 60s, probably because we kayak almost daily in the tidal waters of our home in Boothbay.

 
This day we saw our first moose and bald eagle.  By this time in the season most of the large mammals have moved deeper into the woods so we only saw a total of three moose while those who do the trip in July may see dozens of them.
We arrived at the Pump Handle campsite at 4:00 p.m., went to bed at 7:30 and slept 12 hours.  This was a typical routine for us.  Our elderly neighbor at the campsite said he had done the Allagash 62 times, almost every year of his adult life.  He and several others we met told us of their love for the Allagash and how unspoiled it was. I was not quite as awestruck, knowing that the wilderness is only a few hundred yards wide and surrounded by heavily managed forest (indeed, this describes the top half of Maine as you can see from satellite view in Google Maps). Our sense of wilderness is shaped by the Rockies and deep backcountry of Yellowstone, but parts of the upper Allagash Waterway certainly reminded us of Montana and Wyoming.  And I was glad that you cannot see any clear-cutting from the waterway, even on the hills in the distance.
Most of the trees along the Allagash are not the massive ancient trunks that you might expect from a wilderness.  This probably reflects the long history of logging in this part of Maine and the relatively recent designation as a protected area.  A strip about twenty feet wide along the shore is very stunted - I suspect this is bulldozed by ice floes every winter.  The dams are also a clue that this waterway has been engineered.  They were originally put in to ease the transport of logs to the mills.  Some interesting remnants of the logging railroads can be found near this dam but we did not think we had time to see them.
August 23.  We stop for lunch at a campsite and I use a latrine.  A woman opens the door, sees me, and screams.  I had not thought I needed to lock the latrine door out here.  She and her husband had done the Allagash twice and capsized both times in Chase Rapids, which Celeste took to heart.  We paddle through high wind and waves to High Bank campsite.

August 24.  The park provides a service that transfers your gear past Chase Rapids so you can negotiate the white water in a light canoe.  Celeste didn’t want to run the rapids so we (and our stuff) were portaged in a ranger truck for $10.  It has to be the best deal in Maine. It is the same price whether you go in the truck with your stuff or not and the ranger was very friendly. We camped at Grey Brook which was listed as a double site but was really a single.  I enjoyed the dark sky and Milky Way that night. It is a good idea to bring binoculars - and a water-tight plastic bag for them.

August 25.  We arrive at Long Lake Dam and see the warning sign on the left side of the river.  The dam has been allowed to deteriorate and is now something of a cascade.  We had no clear instructions on what to do after seeing the warning sign but I knew the portage path was on the right side so we went to that side and walked our canoe along the brush.  About 10 feet from the edge of the dam/waterfall we found the path.  Some "line" their canoes over the cascade but we carried our stuff and put the canoe on our wheelie carrier.  A number of rapids occur farther down the river and we got hung up twice on rocks but never capsized.

 

Past Long Lake dam the waterway becomes more river than lake.  Canoeing here is definitely not placid floating because you have to be on constant lookout for submerged rocks.  Rapids also became more frequent and required rapid maneuvering.  Canoeing here is a good relationship-building (or -destroying) exercise.  We got pretty good at it.

In the middle of Round Pond we paused our paddling and found it absolutely quiet - no planes, no cars, no nothing.  We camped at the Tower Trail site and found that the lookout tower has been permanently closed for some time now.   Even without the side-hike we enjoyed this campsite and saw an amazing sunset.

That night the spell of solitude was broken by the sound of logging trucks on the far side of the lake around 2:00 a.m.
August 26. We feel lazy and lounge around until 11 a.m. After we took off, we grounded our canoe three times in shallow areas.  Experts can read the water to know where the deeper water is; we are not experts.  A disadvantage of doing the Allagash in late season is that it is common to have low water. Our water level was decent so we can only blame our ineptitude. After five hours we arrived at Ramsey Ledges, averaging 3.1 miles per hour.

August 27. We lunch at the Allagash Falls rapids. The portage trail was easy to spot and from the deep gouges in the stone steps, obviously well-used.  Portaging our stuff took us about an hour and a half.  We went upstream a little bit to catch a view of the falls but we were too worn out to go close.

 
We arrived at the Twin Brook campsite at 4:00 p.m. after a 16-mile day. The site is up a very steep bank.  There was lots of noise and dust on the gravel road across the river due to log trucks.

 

August 28.  The biggest rapids we encountered were just beyond boundary of the Wilderness Waterway and had high standing waves. It was very thrilling. Since we were not quite sure where the White Church landing was, we stopped at each landing we saw.  One of them came up on us suddenly so we headed straight to shore and got hung up on a big rock.  The water was not deep but it was very fast and it took us a while to get off the rock.  My lesson was to not try to cut to shore at the last minute.  White Church landing was a little farther down the river on the left side and we could see our truck parked there.  We paid our parking fee in the private home and loaded up our truck.  Around noon we drove through Allagash Village, which had no internet or English radio stations or open restaurants in that season, and headed back to Boothbay.

Someday we would like to take our grandkids on the Allagash - when they are teenagers.