Traveling in a Pandemic: Maine
“Let’s go to Maine. It’s cooler and no one goes up there.” - everyone in New England.
Preparations & Packing
Packing enough gear and food into a Rav4 for two people for 9 days, plus room to sleep is one helluva tetris game. Here’s what we did:
Water- one 6 gallon jug (stowed away for the end of the trip), one 3 gallon jug (easily accessible for refilling bottles), two nalgenes & two hydroflasks, and one 5 liter bag for backpacking. These we’re all full at the beginning of the trip and we came back with about 4 gallons extra (after refilling the 3 gallon once)
Gear- It’s important to explain that my car roof has a metal basket, a rocket box and paddle holders on bars. This system really made traveling with all our toys possible. All boating, climbing and backpacking gear went in the rocket box. The shredder was rolled up and strapped to the basket and paddles obviously went in the paddle holders.
Tip: paddle holders are insanely useful for big trips. Nothing messes with accessibility or optimal space utilization more than a long stick with a flat blade. My paddle rack consists of a base somehow attached to my bars (ask my dad, it’s his creation) with toe straps (for biking) to hold the paddles in place. It’s half jury rigged, but it’s held up for over 12 years!
Camping- 1 tent, 2 backpacking pads, 2 big pads for car camping, 2 sleeping bags and a rumple (boujee, but useful AF if you make the investment).
Tip: I found a brand new rumple on Ebay, sent a lowball offer to the seller and negotiated my way up to $40 for a blanket that usually costs around $120. The greatest piece of advice I can give anyone is that you almost never need to pay full price for gear. Figure out what you want and then look on websites like ebay, steep & cheap and sierra trading post. The trick is to have a list of gear you would like and casually search as you go. If you expect to just hop on and find exactly what you need, in the time you need it for 75% off, you’ll probably be disappointed.
Kitchen- Colman 2 burner stove with 2 bottles of propane (only used one), jetboil with one large bottle of fuel (we went through most of this), one camping pot, one cast iron pan, one spork, one knife, one dish rag, a spunge, two reusable paper towels (check out grover.com) & two insulated cups. All gear was held in a collapsible bucket.
Other random gear- running shoes, boating shoes and crocs were all thrown in a bin. Solar powered bug zapper, two collapsable chairs, a hammock, rain fly, chess board, monopoly deal and extra straps were all in a secret compartment under the floor of my trunk. Three fully charged battery packs and the cords to charge everything in one small bag. Rain jackets, pack towels, toiletry bags and wet bathing suits were all held in a net basket attached to the ceiling with bungee cords for easy access. One bag of “important things” (headlamp, toilet paper, batteries, medicine) hung on the passenger headrest and one bag of “safe things” (wipes, mask, gloves) hung on the driver’s.
Just to drive there and back, we layed one seat down and stacked all sleeping pads to make a bed so the passenger could sleep. Once we arrived, we rearranged.
Food (the most important part)
All food was packed behind the front seats for two reasons: It’s easily accessible & the coolest part of the car.
One food bin had meals; soups, rice, etc.
One food bin had all the random things; olive oil, hot sauce, spices, coffee & pour over set up, cold brew coffee and mini starbucks bottles (convenient for driving), tuna in bags (so many different flavors), single serve almond milk (does not need to be refrigerated until opened, so it saves space in the cooler), pb&j, tea, whiskey and sandwich bags.
Two cardboard boxes, each large enough to fit a 12pk, held protein bars & baby food (don’t knock it until you haven’t had vegetables for a few days and you open a pouch of apple, pear, spinach. It’s delicious and easy on the go!)
One bag held snack stuff; goldfish, pretzels, date & coconut balls, almonds, etc.
One stiff bag held bread, bagels & buns.
The cooler in the back held chicken salad, taco dip, spinach and artichoke dip, salsa, single packs of guacamole, cream cheese, pedialyte (replaces electrolytes after working out all day), chocolate milk and maple syrup for coffee (YUM!), three separate kinds of soysage, dark chocolate, leftover birthday cake and pickles in bags (for less mess). We opted for large freezer bags instead of ice. This kept the cooler cold for the majority of the trip & no water mess. Totally worth the investment.
To ensure food stayed fresh as the cooler became less cool, we did not open a container until the one before was totally empty. For example, we ate chicken salad on hotdog buns topped with pickles as a snack 4 or 5 times in a row before we switched to taco dip. (Both killer snacks!)
Breakfast & lunch consisted of a combination of snacks and cooler food. We pretty much ate non stop throughout the day.
My secret for making all food taste great while camping is a pre made jar of saucy sauce.
Recipe for a small Masson jar (or whatever):
One part soy sauce, one part balsamic, one part olive oil, one part open for optimal shaking.
Add in a splash of maple syrup (honey or agave works too), sesame oil and hot sauce. Next add garlic (at home I use fresh, on the road I use powdered, I think it keeps better), ground pepper and literally whatever else. Paprika, ginger, cumin, rosemary, etc could be added or you could just say fuck it and it would still taste great.
Itinerary
Wednesday- I woke up at 1am, made coffee and was driving by 1:30. This allowed us to pass through New York early and avoid most traffic. Snack stops were taken anywhere we found secluded woods or a river ideal for skinny dipping. We arrived at our first camp spot early evening, set up and ate a delicious dinner of Indian food and rice (both in a bag and only needed to be heated up) this meal cost about $4 and took less than 5 minutes to make (most of that time was me trying to screw the fuel canister to the jetboil). We camped on the beach at Schoodic Bay, about 40 minutes inland of Acadia. We found directions to this spot on Freecampsites.net and let me tell you, it was awesome! The water is warm, the sites are large and you can camp there for 14 days.
Thursday- we drove into Acadia, hung out on loop road, checked out a few of the “had to see” spots and found that a million other people had to see them as well. We pretty much spent the whole day trying to find a nap spot in the shade and near some water and eventually ended up at a pull off by eagle lake. In my opinion, if you want to really see acadia, you should do it November-April because the place was packed. We headed back to our cool little camp spot on the lake early, had sweet potato corn chowder with rice and soysage links for dinner ($5, about 10 minutes) and played monopoly deal for the rest of the evening.
Friday- What an amazing day! We woke up super early, packed up camp and headed into Bar Harbor before the crowds set in. We supported the local climbing shop, got some breakfast and headed to otter cliffs to climb. While the actual otter cliffs were busy, we repelled down and hung out on the lower cliffs exposed at low tide. We were totally by ourselves! After climbing, we went to Great Head and again, lost people. This is a very direct trail that leads to a ton of seaside cliffs great for scrambling around. On our way out of town, we stopped for a lobster roll and headed to a friend’s house for the weekend.
Saturday- We slept in a bed, ate amazing food and chilled out with wonderful company. This was also an ideal opportunity to refreeze the cooler bags and refill the water. The one thing we really wanted to do was avoid people, so our tour guide Joelle took us to a local beach near Castine. Out of respect for the locals, that is all the direction I will give. This place was amazing! Virtually no people, refreshing water and lots of hermit crabs to entertain small children (or me) for hours.
Joelle, if you’re reading this, we so dearly appreciate your warm and generous hospitality. Our trip was only heightened by your company and wonderful food! We look forward to visiting again.
Sunday- We woke up early, reorganized the car and headed off to Clifton Crags (parks pond bluff) for some serious slab climbing. We only saw two other groups, both locals, and had no trouble finding a 5.8 sport route. After a couple hours of climbing, we drove about an hour to our next campsite. We originally planned to camp at Rocky Lake, but two out of three primitive campsites were taken, so we headed to the next lake over (second lake) and found a waterfront campsite totally to ourselves. We had mac & cheese with leftover soysage links for dinner ($3, less than 10 minutes) and enjoyed a little whiskey in our birch beer while we played chess.
Check out the yoga video I recorded at this spot
Monday- breakfast was bagels with cracked pepper salmon (from a bag) and fresh pick raspberries from camp. We packed up and made our way to the Cutler Coast Trail for our next camp spot. Somewhere along the way, Adam (who was navigating between google and a Maine gazetteer) said, “Let’s go to Jasper Beach!” ( near Machias) and it was well worth the trip. Probably not that well known, we harly saw any people here. The beach is covered in the smoothest rocks I’ve ever seen and surrounded by rocky coast and coves. A very very cool way to spend the day. We made it to the cutler coast trail system (a 9ish mile loop on the coast with multiple campsites) and despite a parking lot full of cars (mostly day hikers) found the first campsite open. We camped in between a rocky beach and a cliffside point, giving us a pretty sweet spot with a sunrise view from our tent. We enjoyed rice, black beans precooked in a “zesty sauce”, Mexican soy protein, single serve of guacamole and cherry like tomatoes ($7 because the beans were expensive, less than 5 minutes to cook)
Note: Mosquitoes were bad all day, but about 5 minutes after sunset an army attacked making it unbearable to do anything other than run into the tent. No brushing teeth, no peeing, just sitting there and watching them try to get into the tent. It was awful.
Tuesday - The sunrise was absolutely beautiful. It almost made the mosquitoes worth it. On our hike out, we skinny dipped in the ocean and I went for a run on the blackpoint trail that parallels the coastal trail. This trail was amazing and possibly one of my favortite trails to run. It was beautiful, scenic, flowy and the best part, no people or mosquitoes! Eventually we tried to make our way to moosehead lake via a road that takes you past Hay Brook Falls. After finding out that we were in a tropical storm warning we decided to set up camp asap. We found campsites near Hay Brook on the map but a mile before we got there we came to a bridge. $16 per person to drive across and $30 per person to camp. We said fuck that. Luckily the woman was super friendly and directed us to a public land reserve on Seboeis lake (below Millinocket) . We found multiple lakefront campsites, a boat ramp and a dock, deep enough for diving. We decided to car camp, made lots of ramen and mac and cheese for dinner, popped open a bottle of wine, turned on Meru (a great climbing movie) and waited for the tropical storm to arrive. It sprinkled a little bit around 11pm, but that’s about it.
Wednesday- We needed to find a new route to moosehead lake since we didn’t feel like paying a $32 toll and decided to go north to Golden Road that bordered Baxter State Park. You have to pay to get into the park and I believe they only let so many people in, so we figured the best way to experience the surrounding beauty was on this random road. Man, were we right! Golden Road takes you to the Blueberry Ledges Trailhead (access to hike into Baxter without paying), the Appalachian Trail, a small store and the Penobscot River. As we continued down this road, we found a pull off with a short trail down to white water and could see a rafting trip setting up to run the rapid. We walked down and watched the rafts run Nesowadnehunk Falls, eddie out, pull the rafts up the rock, fairy over and run it again. Even though we brought our boating gear, we figured that finding a shuttle in a pandemic would be difficult and ultimately assumed that we wouldn’t get to use it. This little slice of heaven was perfect for us because we were totally self sufficient! We immediately inflated and ran the rapid 5 times; Attempt 1, rode the rooster tail, punched the hole and flipped bigger than shit. Attempt 2, same thing but we tried to push our weight forward to prevent the shredder from going tits up, it didn’t work. Attempt 3 & 4, ran the left and right side of the rooster tail, still got some of the hole and smoothed it. Attempt 5, we got cocky and tried the boof, but it was wayyy too low and we ended up going head over tits. All in all, the best merry-go-round I’ve ever been on! Despite the amazingly friendly locals inviting us back to Big Eddy’s (a campground and what seemed to be the local congregating spot), we headed for Moosehead Lake, our last stop on this tour. We followed the golden road all the way to Kokadjo and while it was beautiful, I wouldn’t suggest it. When we told a local that was our plan he said, “did you bring a patch kit for your tire?”. The road was rough, long and totally void of people. We assumed that Moosehead’s beauty would attract the same crowds as any of the coastal spots we had previously checked out, but to our surprise, no one seemed to know about this totally breathtaking area. We had zero trouble finding a camping spot at little moose lake and if I could do this trip again, I would spend the majority of my time between here and Baxter. We finished up the remaining food in our cooler, set up the bed in the back of the car and slept for a few hours before I woke up once more at 1am to drive home. We made it back home around 4pm on Thursday, which gave us enough time to unpack the car, write this blog and head to the upper yough on Friday.
I hope this blog inspires you to do some traveling, exploring and people avoiding of your own.
If I had only one piece of advice to give for this whole trip, get a Maine gazatteer! Most of Maine has zero cell service and a lot of hidden gems. Pick a destination and try to get lost along the way, who knows what you’ll find!
To my adventure partner Adam, traveling with you has been a delight.
Lots of love,
The Wild Child Yogi
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