2025-06-27 - last updated 2025-06-30 (changelog)
This trip was planned slightly last minute - it wasn’t until just a few days in advance I realized that Fiona and I were both available, there were still campsites available, and the weather looked pretty good - a bit windy the first day and mostly sunny with a slight change of rain all weekend.
The idea was to arrive at Trout Brook Campground Friday in the early afternoon, rent a canoe and spend the first night at Togue Ledge campsite, the closest camp site. Then Saturday morning we could head about 4.5 miles further down the lake to Pine Point, and hopefully have time to explore down the lake to Webster Brook and the East Branch of the Penobscot River. Sunday we’d paddle the 4.5 miles back, maybe checking out the part of the lake around Hay Brook along the way if we felt up to it.
Unfortunately at the last minute the forecast took a turn for the worse, with rain and wind when we got there, and a thunderstorm possible on the morning of our last day. I felt we’d be OK as long as things didn’t get worse. In the past I would not have had any way to get an updated forecast. There’s no cell coverage in the park, so I might have cancelled the whole trip with that much uncertainty, but last year I got a Garmin inReach Mini 2 on sale. I got the minimal model because I really only wanted it for the emergency SOS feature, but I can also use it to get detailed weather forecasts via satellite, so we could always check it and decide whether to leave a day early during the trip.
We arrived at the park at about 2:00, and of course it started pouring while we were loading up the canoe, for just long enough to get us soaked. It lightened up while we paddled, but the wind (10 MPH steady from the NW with 25 MPH gusts) still made it challenging, and I never put down the paddle to take pictures. The wind reminded me very much of our last trip to Grand Lake Matagamon, which also had challenging wind, and I didn’t take many pictures then either.
But once we got there I took this picture standing on the point looking back at the campsite:
Here is what the lake looked like:
The next day the weather was a little better:
With all the rain I learned a few ways that I can improve the waterproofing of our equipment! In particular the supposedly waterproof compression bags that contain our summer sleeping bags are definitely not waterproof, and I threw a few things in my bag at the last minute that I completely failed to protect from water. Fortunately it mostly stopped raining after we got there, and the wind helped everything important dry relatively quickly, and the truly waterlogged items were not vital.
Before we left the campsite we were visited by this guy:
This is a snapping turtle about 16” long. It was so still we thought it might be dead, but as soon as we left the area it disappeared. Based on the fresh piles of dirt behind its rear legs I think it may have been looking for a place to lay eggs. (We didn’t disturb it on purpose, but it was right next to the trail down to the water and I didn’t see it until I was almost right next to it.)
And here’s the last view of the camp site as we paddled away:
Overall Togue Ledge is an OK but not great campsite - there is no good place to land the canoe (especially in the wind) and it was very hard to find a place to hang our food. On the other hand, the tent site is in a nice spot, close to the water but with just enough trees to provide significant protection from the wind.
The next morning we slept in a bit, then packed up and headed up the lake towards the Pine Point campsite. The weather was beautiful, but it was still windy enough to make paddling challenging. For about half the trip we were heading directly into what I’d estimate were 5-10 MPH steady wind with (fortunately infrequent) 20 MPH gusts.
We found a nice spot about halfway to stop for a lunch break. Here’s the view of the lake from there:
The second half of this paddle was more protected from the wind and went by much faster than the first half.
About 3/4 of the way to Pine Point we passed Second Lake Campsite. This looks like an interesting site with a little beach perfect for landing the canoe and some rocky areas that look great for swimming:
Shortly after passing the Second Lake campsite we also passed a series of 8-10 small sandy beaches similar to the one pictured below. One of them had a very old faded sign that said “Sandy Saw Beach”. Unfortunately I didn’t get a picture of that sign but here is one of the beaches nearby:
Nearby there’s a cool dead tree, so old it has split in two, but still clinging to a boulder:
The Pine Point campsite is another great looking site with a decent sized sandy beach to land the canoe at and some other rocky spots that looked good for swimming around. However with fewer trees between the site and the water, it didn’t feel quite as private as some others and I wonder how exposed it is to wind.
Sometime while paddling we realized we could see Katahdin in the distance! From the other parts of the lake it is either blocked by trees or the nearby mountains, but we had travelled far enough to significantly change our perspective of the rest of the park!
Unfortunately I didn’t think to get a pictures of that either, but below you can see the view from the campsite with the mountains looking different in the background:
And looking further down the lake towards the northwest tip where Webster Brook and the East Branch of the Penobscot River enter:
After we got out of the canoe and started checking out the site, we realized there were 15-20 of these interesting butterflies hanging out around camp, flying around and sunning themselves. I would look these up later, they are White Admiral butterflies (Limenitis arthemis).
While resting after our long paddle I checked Sunday’s weather forecast and unfortunately, it wasn’t good news. The thunderstorm prediction had been changed from just in the morning to any time from 10am - 4pm and while the wind was going to be variable all day, it would be mostly in directions that require a significant amount of paddling against it again. Unfortunately Garmin doesn’t give any forecast of gusts, but with storms possible I had to assume they’d be bad.
So our choices were to either head home now (adding an another day’s worth of paddling to today’s itinerary), or wait until tomorrow and risk one of the following happening:
In the end it just seemed foolish to take a risk that was easily preventable, and we decided to head home immediately to get back before dark. Fortunately we had not unpacked too much, so we had a snack and headed out at about 5:30pm.
By this time the wind had started to calm but we still had a helpful tail wind for some of the paddle back. I estimated it to be a 2 - 2.5 hour trip, which should mean getting back 30 - 60 minutes before dark, but we’d never paddled this far in one day before and were on an new part of the lake to us, so I was feeling a bit anxious about getting back before dark at first.
About half way back it was obvious we would easily be back an hour before dark, the wind had died down completely, and the weather overall was beautiful. This was the most relaxing and enjoyable paddle we’ve had in this area, especially paddling back up a glass-smooth Trout Brook. During this part Fiona and I agreed we’d definitely be coming back as soon as we can to explore more of the lake!
