Tag Archives: Appalachian Trail

Katahdin Woods And Waters National Monument

Katahdin Woods And Waters National Monument: A Pretty Magical Place

Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument Information – excerpt from a great piece from nationalparkstraveler.com by Kurt Repanshek on November 30th, 2016

“Perhaps I most fully realized that this was primeval, untamed, and forever untamable Nature, or whatever else men call it, while coming down this part of the mountain.” — Henry David Thoreau.

Katahdin Woods and Waters in Maine
The country’s newest national monument, Katahdin Woods and Waters in Maine, offers a rich variety of winter activities, such as hiking or skiing along the Katahdin Loop Road/Ray Pasnen

Thoreau’s impression of the Maine North Woods, penned during one of his three trips to the region in the 1840s and 1850s, more than likely would have been different had he visited in winter today.

Though the woods still appear primeval in some spots, the hand of man is evident since Thoreau’s days. This winter, the first visitors will explore Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument by snowshoe, snowmobile, and skis. They’ll find an inviting landscape of thousands of acres of backcountry.

Lucas St. Clair, whose family donated 87,500 acres through its Elliotsville Plantation, Inc., nonprofit to the federal government in late August to create the monument, recalls: “Some of the more memorable experiences for me over the years have been going in the winter to really remote sections of the monument on skis. You just see so much stuff that you typically don’t see. Moose at really short range. You can see all the tracks so much more clearly.

“It’s really cool to be skiing along and see all these lynx tracks and drops of blood in the snow where a lynx had eaten a rabbit. You don’t see that stuff in any other season,” he adds.

Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument in Maine offers miles of winter trails to explore
With nearly 90,000 acres, the new Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument in Maine offers miles of winter trails to explore/Ray Pasnen

Elliotsville Plantation, has cut roughly 20 kilometers of crosscountry ski trails near the northern tip of the monument, and 32 miles of snowmobile trails over the years. Those trails, with their connections to Baxter State Park and other snowmobile routes, offer nearly 100 miles of trail to explore.

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Winter visitors can choose from a number of other lodging options:

  • Mount Chase Lodge is just 16 miles from the monument, on Shin Pond, operated by the same family for past 40 years. They have private cabins, main lodge rooms, with fare such as pan-seared salmon with blueberry chutney and grilled marinated Portobello mushrooms.
  •   The New England Outdoor Center cabins can accommodate from six to 14 guests, and are just 8 miles from Millinocket. St. Clair says, “They have snowmobile rentals, ski rentals, and there’s skiing trails right there at the lodge, and you can easily access the monument for snowmobiling from the lodge.”
  •   The Matagamon Wilderness Lodge’s cabins can handle up to a dozen, and it’s right at the entrance of the monument’s cross-country ski trails.

“From a national park perspective, people think of Acadia National Park and the summer on the coast,” says St. Clair. “But the winter inland is really a pretty magical place.”

South Jersey woman rescued from Maine mountain

Panoramic photograph of Mount Katahdin from Abol Bridge.
Panoramic photograph of Mount Katahdin from Abol Bridge.

A hiker from South Jersey had to be rescued from one of Maine’s highest mountains on Saturday afternoon.

The unidentified 29-year-old woman from Moorestown was medevaced off Pamola Peak in Baxter State Park when she fell ill while hiking with five other people, park officials said in a news release.






It took a park ranger 80 minutes to reach the group after a 911 call was placed at 11:57 a.m. The Maine Army National Guard Air Evac unit removed the woman at 4:20 p.m. and flew her to  Millinocket Regional Hospital after it was determined she’d require further treatment.

Officials noted that had there been lower cloud cover or rainy weather, an evacuation by helicopter would not have been possible. Instead, transporting a patient from the 4,919 foot mountain to the nearest road would have required 30-40 people and would have taken 24-36 hours to complete, according to park officials.

Pamola Peak is about a mile away from Baxter Peak on Mount Katahdin,  the highest mountain in Maine at 5,267 feet.

The more than 200,000 acre park is in the wilderness of north-central Maine and is roughly the same size as Middlesex County, New Jersey.

source:  nj.com

by Jeff Goldman.  He may be reached at jeff_goldman@njadvancemedia.com.  Follow him on Twitter @JeffSGoldman.  Find NJ.com on Facebook. 

PA Police Captain to Hike Appalachian Trail on Retirement

Peters Township Council has hired a new deputy police chief to replace Capt. Michael Yanchak, who will retire at the end of the year.

When Pennsylvania Police Captain Michael Yanchak of the Peters Township police department retires Jan. 6, the 33-year department veteran will be anything but idle.

He plans on hiking the Appalachian Trail, the 2,200-mile marked trail that stretches north from Mount Katahdin in northern Maine south to Springer Mountain in Georgia.

“Being able to walk through a piece of history intrigues me,” said Yanchak, 64.

Besides Maine and Georgia, the trail goes through parts of New Hampshire, Vermont, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. It is also in close proximity to major battlefield sites such as Antietam and Gettysburg and Washington, D.C.

“The United States is very large and I have gotten to see it in bits and pieces,” said Yanchak, an avid hiker. “But, I feel like I’ve missed a lot.”

Mount Katahdin and Baxter State Park.
The northern end of the Appalachian Trail is Baxter State Park and Mt Katahdin. photo: Tim Pasanen

Yanchak has been busy prepping for the excursion at his Canonsburg home. For months, he has been dehydrating food, pouring over maps, reading and talking with people who have hiked the trail for tips. He said his wife Melody, their daughters, Meredith, 33, a theater teacher in Texas and Melissa, 35, a keyboardist in Arkansas, and their son Michael, 36, a one-man vocal band who lives in Pittsburgh, have been extremely supportive. In fact, Meredith plans on hiking with him in June, when she is on summer vacation.

“My kids have all back packed since they have been 4 or 5,” he said. “They have all been hounding me for my daily itinerary.”

Yanchak said he will begin his hike somewhere in southern New England in May and walk 15 to 20 miles a day. To prepare for his journey, Yanchak said he will begin taking progressively longer hikes with a 35-pound backpack to make sure he is in shape.

“Bears won’t bother me,” he said.

Besides fulfilling his goal, Yanchak said he views the upcoming trip, which should last six to 10 months, as cathartic. He said he doesn’t know whether he will miss police work, despite being a police officer half his life. He also doesn’t know whether he will go back to work, or remain retired.

“When I come off the trail, everything should be clearer,” he said.

Yanchak started out his law enforcement career as a state corrections officer in Montgomery County. After three years, he left that position and enlisted the military and became a military police officer. Following a three-year stint in the service, he returned to work as a corrections officer, but when an opening on the Peters Township police was posted, he applied and got the job. It also gave him an opportunity to return home to Western Pennsylvania.

“I believe we all have to give something back to society,” Yanchak said. “Me being a police officer is my way of giving back.”

Yanchak said he has been on a number of interesting calls over the years as a police officer, including one on a hot Memorial Day weekend several years ago. He was called to administer CPR on a man who was having a heart attack. Yanchak said he saved the man’s life. But a month later, the man shows up at the police department.

“He wanted to complain to the chief I broke his ribs,” said Yanchak, who was the only person in the station at the time. He said man did not recognize him. “I took his name and said I would leave a message for the chief and I did.”

source:  thealmanac.net

Walking to Katahdin – Appalachian Trail video

Video – Walking to Katahdin

Experience Mount Katahdin and the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine. 2181 miles, 14 states. Great video!

More about Mount Katahdin and the Appalachian Trail

Mount Katahdin (pronounced: kah-Tah-din) is the tallest mountain in Maine at 5,269 feet (1,606 m or just shy of a mile). The mountain was named ‘Katahdin’ by the Penobscot Indians.  The term means “The Greatest Mountain” in their language. Katahdin is the centerpiece of Baxter State Park: a steep, tall mountain formed from a granite intrusion weathered to the surface above the treeline. The flora and fauna on the mountain are those typically found in other regions in northern New England. Katahdin has been known since time immemorial to the Native Americans in the region, and has been known to Europeans since, at least, 1689. Or, possibly, long before.  It has inspired hikers, climbers, journal narratives, paintings, local hit songs and a piano sonata. The area around the peak was protected by Governor Percival Baxter starting in the 1930s and is now known as Baxter State Park. Katahdin is the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail, and is located near a stretch known as the Hundred-Mile Wilderness.