Little Big Trailer in the Great North Woods
Pulling into Baxter State Park in northern Maine, the ranger looks a little horrified. “Do you have reservations?” in a polite tone that sounded like she was sure we didn’t. Unspoken was “OMG, that’s HUGE!!!”
Traveling in the South, the most common comment on our trailer was “cute”. A few campgrounds refused to let us make reservations, since our 21 feet was too small. (Camp sites are charged by the site, not per foot, so it shouldn’t make any difference what size we were).
“Did you make reservations on-line?” the ranger asked. “Yes,” I replied.
“But did you talk to somebody in the office?” Again, “Yes.” Her eyes got ever bigger, "Are you sure?"
“We have to measure your trailer.” Pizza maestro Tony, fresh off Criehaven, had his even smaller trailer behind us. “And his, too.”
The ranger station had measuring sticks for height and width. We were both OK, she confirmed our paper reservation slip. Yes, paper: there is zero connectivity up north, so the park insists you bring a paper copy of your reservation. There is no way to confirm it electronically. This is the only park or campground I’ve visited that required a paper reservation slip.
Baxter is a special park for Maineiacs. Despite its name, it is NOT part of the state park system. Governor Baxter, a one term governor 1921-24, tried very hard to get the legislature to buy Mt. Katahdin (the highest peak in Maine, a mile high at low tide)*, but they were too cheap and refused. So he bought it himself, the first 6,000 acres, and donated it to the state.
He didn’t trust the State Park system to protect it properly, and he did not want the park to be a burden to the state’s taxpayers. He endowed it with $7 million dollars (over $120M in today’s dollars) so it would be self-supporting, and continued to buy land and donate up till 1962. The Park is now over 200,000 acres, about a quarter the size of Rhode Island, and is by far the largest park in Maine. In comparison, Acadia National Park is under 50,000 acres.
The park now has an “extension”, Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument, which is another adjoining 87,500 acres. Roxanne Quimby, the business manager of Burt’s Bees, gave it to the National Park Service with an endowment for maintenance. She wanted it to be a National Park, which requires Federal legislation. Political gridlock stopped the legislation from passing, so the government accepted the land as a National Monument by Presidential Proclamation (Obama).
Unlike most politicians who get their name on something because of other people’s money, aka taxpayers, Percival Baxter fully funded the park, and it continues to operate outside of the state budget, depending on the endowment's financial returns, admission charges for out of staters, firewood sales, etc.
Governor Baxter was adamant about protecting the land as wilderness. Unlike US national parks which are very car-centric with beautiful drives to scenic overlooks, Baxter’s road (singular) has essentially no view points; visitors have to hike into the lakes and mountains. There is no electricity in the park, not even at ranger stations, and no streetlights. There is no running water except streams, and no sewer hookups, dumps, or showers. There are no garbage cans: pack it in, pack it out, no exceptions. Dogs can be very damaging to the natural fauna; pets are prohibited. The one road (44 miles) is not paved, although it is well graded. It is a beautiful wilderness. No outside firewood is allowed as it may contain insects and other pests bad for the forest.
There are very few campsites. Some are for tents, and others are leantos where even tents are prohibited. There are about 40 “tent sites”, which mean one can drive to it, or pretty close. Mathematically that is one tent site per 5,000 acres. However, perhaps only a dozen sites permit a (SMALL) RV or trailer. Most of the camp sites one has to hike or canoe several miles; there is no road access at all. There are also a few cabins to rent that have propane lights. Many(all?) campsites have outhouse toilets. The campsites are nice, with fire rings, picnic tables, cleared and raked land, etc.
Organizing this trip was non-trivial. One has to make reservations exactly four months in advance, at midnight, online. Sorta like getting tickets to a rock show (not really, and there aren’t any scalpers). I needed two spots, so I had preselected three pairs of sites that could work for us. At 11:59 pm the website still did not let me make reservations. By 12:01 am I could get on, tried to snag my first choice, and failed due to fat finger mistakes. Uh-oh, and somebody else got it. I tried the second set, and scored, but just for the first night of our planned five night stay. Phew!
I called the next day to extend our reservation for the five nights, and almost everything was OK. One of the sites I picked did not permit (was too small) a trailer. I figured I would wing it, anyway all the other sites were gone. Tony’s Casita trailer is pretty compact.
Logistics are always a fun pastime in our family. We had the exact days marked out, so we scheduled the quasi-famous Criehaven pizza party for the week prior to our Baxter adventure. Tony and I make well over 20 pizzas for the all-island community parties each year. In addition to classics like red pizzas like spicy beef, pesto and artichoke, and margherita, we do some experimental pies, such as baba ganoush (eggplant), oysters Rockefeller, and Indian saag tofu.
My friend Betsy borrows our house every summer for a week, so we scheduled her family for the week after the party, while we were in Baxter. She would take care of Pemba while we were traveling.
We tow behind a Tesla, so there was additional planning how to tow and return from an electricity-free zone. I am sure we were the first electric car towing a trailer ever to camp at Baxter.
The campsites were a bit challenging to get into. Mine had a very sharp curve to back uphill into the site over several significant rocks. It was not even slightly level, and I had to use all my leveling blocks. Even the ranger was impressed how well that went. Tony’s site was a bit tight, but again it all worked out fine.
Normally Boma (our trailer) is plugged in every night since we are also charging the car. We have solar, but it rained every day, and the site was heavily wooded, so no charging: full on boondocking for five nights. We carefully rationed our electricity for our CPAPs (breathing machines,) and mostly used rechargeable flashlights. We ran out of power about 2 am on the last night, so a little less sleep than normal. No crisis.
Another benefit was the total lack of connectivity, a rare thing for us. We did not even hear about the Monday Mar-a-Lago search until Friday. No news penetrated the Great North Woods! We may have been the last folks in the USA to hear the clamoring from Florida. Yay!
Traveling in the South, the most common comment on our trailer was “cute”. A few campgrounds refused to let us make reservations, since our 21 feet was too small. (Camp sites are charged by the site, not per foot, so it shouldn’t make any difference what size we were).
“Did you make reservations on-line?” the ranger asked. “Yes,” I replied.
“But did you talk to somebody in the office?” Again, “Yes.” Her eyes got ever bigger, "Are you sure?"
“We have to measure your trailer.” Pizza maestro Tony, fresh off Criehaven, had his even smaller trailer behind us. “And his, too.”
The ranger station had measuring sticks for height and width. We were both OK, she confirmed our paper reservation slip. Yes, paper: there is zero connectivity up north, so the park insists you bring a paper copy of your reservation. There is no way to confirm it electronically. This is the only park or campground I’ve visited that required a paper reservation slip.
Baxter is a special park for Maineiacs. Despite its name, it is NOT part of the state park system. Governor Baxter, a one term governor 1921-24, tried very hard to get the legislature to buy Mt. Katahdin (the highest peak in Maine, a mile high at low tide)*, but they were too cheap and refused. So he bought it himself, the first 6,000 acres, and donated it to the state.
He didn’t trust the State Park system to protect it properly, and he did not want the park to be a burden to the state’s taxpayers. He endowed it with $7 million dollars (over $120M in today’s dollars) so it would be self-supporting, and continued to buy land and donate up till 1962. The Park is now over 200,000 acres, about a quarter the size of Rhode Island, and is by far the largest park in Maine. In comparison, Acadia National Park is under 50,000 acres.
The park now has an “extension”, Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument, which is another adjoining 87,500 acres. Roxanne Quimby, the business manager of Burt’s Bees, gave it to the National Park Service with an endowment for maintenance. She wanted it to be a National Park, which requires Federal legislation. Political gridlock stopped the legislation from passing, so the government accepted the land as a National Monument by Presidential Proclamation (Obama).
Unlike most politicians who get their name on something because of other people’s money, aka taxpayers, Percival Baxter fully funded the park, and it continues to operate outside of the state budget, depending on the endowment's financial returns, admission charges for out of staters, firewood sales, etc.
Governor Baxter was adamant about protecting the land as wilderness. Unlike US national parks which are very car-centric with beautiful drives to scenic overlooks, Baxter’s road (singular) has essentially no view points; visitors have to hike into the lakes and mountains. There is no electricity in the park, not even at ranger stations, and no streetlights. There is no running water except streams, and no sewer hookups, dumps, or showers. There are no garbage cans: pack it in, pack it out, no exceptions. Dogs can be very damaging to the natural fauna; pets are prohibited. The one road (44 miles) is not paved, although it is well graded. It is a beautiful wilderness. No outside firewood is allowed as it may contain insects and other pests bad for the forest.
There are very few campsites. Some are for tents, and others are leantos where even tents are prohibited. There are about 40 “tent sites”, which mean one can drive to it, or pretty close. Mathematically that is one tent site per 5,000 acres. However, perhaps only a dozen sites permit a (SMALL) RV or trailer. Most of the camp sites one has to hike or canoe several miles; there is no road access at all. There are also a few cabins to rent that have propane lights. Many(all?) campsites have outhouse toilets. The campsites are nice, with fire rings, picnic tables, cleared and raked land, etc.
Organizing this trip was non-trivial. One has to make reservations exactly four months in advance, at midnight, online. Sorta like getting tickets to a rock show (not really, and there aren’t any scalpers). I needed two spots, so I had preselected three pairs of sites that could work for us. At 11:59 pm the website still did not let me make reservations. By 12:01 am I could get on, tried to snag my first choice, and failed due to fat finger mistakes. Uh-oh, and somebody else got it. I tried the second set, and scored, but just for the first night of our planned five night stay. Phew!
I called the next day to extend our reservation for the five nights, and almost everything was OK. One of the sites I picked did not permit (was too small) a trailer. I figured I would wing it, anyway all the other sites were gone. Tony’s Casita trailer is pretty compact.
Logistics are always a fun pastime in our family. We had the exact days marked out, so we scheduled the quasi-famous Criehaven pizza party for the week prior to our Baxter adventure. Tony and I make well over 20 pizzas for the all-island community parties each year. In addition to classics like red pizzas like spicy beef, pesto and artichoke, and margherita, we do some experimental pies, such as baba ganoush (eggplant), oysters Rockefeller, and Indian saag tofu.
My friend Betsy borrows our house every summer for a week, so we scheduled her family for the week after the party, while we were in Baxter. She would take care of Pemba while we were traveling.
We tow behind a Tesla, so there was additional planning how to tow and return from an electricity-free zone. I am sure we were the first electric car towing a trailer ever to camp at Baxter.
The campsites were a bit challenging to get into. Mine had a very sharp curve to back uphill into the site over several significant rocks. It was not even slightly level, and I had to use all my leveling blocks. Even the ranger was impressed how well that went. Tony’s site was a bit tight, but again it all worked out fine.
Notice the huge height difference between the trailer tongue and the car hitch
Mt. Katahdin over Kidney Lake
Was it worth it? YES! We had beautiful hikes, met interesting people, and had a great time. Swam in the lakes. Unsurprisingly, we ate well, including quite a bit of leftover pizza (we made waaaay too much this year), and other delicacies from our fellow foodie Tony.
Dwelley Pond
Another benefit was the total lack of connectivity, a rare thing for us. We did not even hear about the Monday Mar-a-Lago search until Friday. No news penetrated the Great North Woods! We may have been the last folks in the USA to hear the clamoring from Florida. Yay!
* Heights above sea level are measured from the mean high tide. Mt. Katahdin is 5,269 feet. Low tide in most of Maine is at least 12 feet below high tide.
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