More Maine Peaks

A returning guest working on this New England Hundred Highest (NE100, NEHH) came to us this past week hoping to get in one more trip to Maine, his last adventure getting him tantalizingly close to his end goal. It’s late season for bagging peaks in that part of Maine — trailhead access starts to become more of a problem than usual — but Redline Guide Ken Hodges knew they could slip in under the wire. Granted, people do take on these peaks throughout the year, but the challenges mount as soon as the snow starts to pile up on the logging roads in the area.

On tap this trip was East Kennebago (3791′) on day one with Mt Snow, Chain of Ponds (3960′), on day two, numbers 97 and 98, respectively. Mission accomplished. But do note that it wasn’t without some extra challenges. The roads up there on the access for their day two summit have changed significantly over the past few weeks. As a courtesy to our readers, Ken is reporting the following.

Access Update

Driving the five miles on North Road to the Snow Chain of Ponds trailhead, you can see all the logging that has occurred the past two years. When we arrived at the trailhead parking area it was surprising to see that there were two new very wide active logging roads continuing on into the forest. We drove up both roads aways and discovered the trail/Jeep road was off the logging road on the left, blocked by two boulders. We parked on a pull out on the new road and walked in from there saving almost a half-mile round trip. Cutting hasn’t started on this left hand road yet so I don’t know if that parking area will be available when that happens. —Ken