Photo by Matthew P. Murphy

Maine Island Trail

The Maine coast is a ragged one, with some 3,000 miles folded into 375. Summer breezes provide pleasant predictable conditions with just enough fog to make it interesting. Thanks to the Maine Island Trail, a network of islands and mainland sites, this coast is available to boats large and small.

This was the United States’ first water trail, and it opens the gates to a paradise for small boaters. There are islands for camping, islands for visiting; some are public and some, accessible due to the generosity of their owners, privately owned. The trail starts at the New Hampshire border and ends in Eastport, with sites generally no more than 10 miles apart. Its terrain varies from the open beach country in the southwest to granitic boulders in the east. It’s best to think of it in several sections.

Its creator and sustainer is the Maine Island Trail Association, which has a volunteer stewardship network and publishes an annual guide to the trail. Membership provides the guide and allows access to the privately owned islands. (Maine and Massachusetts colonial law prohibits landing above the low tide line without permission, except for the purposes of “fishing, fowling, and navigation.”) Put-ins are outlined in the guide, and range from state- or town-paved boat launching ramps and parking areas to spots that you can only access with a hand-carried boat.

Courtesy of MITA

The 375-mile Maine Island Trail runs from the New Hampshire border eastward to Machias Bay. It includes more than 190 islands and mainland sites, which can be used for day visits or camping.

My favorite sections are those you can explore for days, leave, and then return to the spot you left from to continue the journey; these include Muscongus Bay, where the islands run in long rocky strings, and the round granite islands off Stonington that lead you down to Isle au Haut. Stonington’s archipelago is suited especially well to sea kayaks but also to small sail and power craft.

Its surrounding islands are within an easy day’s paddle of each other; the longer legs of a small shoal-draft sailing boat allow you to venture beyond the immediate islands over into Eggemoggin Reach or farther into Penobscot Bay. A small powerboat can easily round Isle au Haut, weather permitting, for a look at its wild southern end, a trip that is a major adventure in a sea kayak.

Resources

Maine Island Trail Association website

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