-Allagash one of the many lakes in the Maine wilderness. 



Maine Wilderness 

 Sporting Camps 



by Edmund Ware Smith . . . photographs by John Calkins 



IN THE age of the surrey, the walkingstick, and the Inverness 

 cape, the range of the country's resorts was as narrow as a rail- 

 road track. Today, there are too many places to go! 



With vacation literature so stacked up that you can't decide 

 between Guelph and Guatemala, it is refreshing to return to the 

 day of numbered enticements. The old becomes new. For exam- 

 ple, what about the Maine woods and Maine's wilderness sport- 

 ing camps? Where are these camps? What can you do there? Are 

 they anything like dude ranches? 



Maine sporting camps were born early. Fishermen, hunters, 

 or amateur explorers stopped at lumber camps, or the unique 

 and very remote wilderness farms that supplied the lumber 

 camps. There they took potluck. Presently they began to hire 

 woodsmen for guides, using tent camps for bases. One of these 

 guides built a log cabin on a lake. The moment smoke rose from 

 the chimney and a paying guest moved in, the Maine sporting 

 camp came into being. 



The traditional Maine guide is a pleasing, cantankerous, origi- 

 nal, tall-taling, highly skilled woodsman and canoeman. Stand- 

 ing up in his canoe, he can do what the dude wrangler does 

 sitting down on his horse make it go and stop it right side up. 



Wyoming trails a scent of sagebrush and saddle leather. The 

 characteristic odor of wilderness Maine is spruce and hot pine. 



Many of Maine's truest wilderness sporting camps are in the 

 Mt. Katahdin region. This region lies roughly within the giant 

 fork formed by the east and west branches of the Penobscot 

 River, but it fans out to the north, east, and west. Within this 



-Looking across Mattagamon Lake from Foster's landing. 145 



