Member Trip report

Chamberlain Farm in the Allagash

11/13/2021

Trip Report/Photos from BillyB1976

Featured Photo

My goal for this trip was to find the safe in a cellar hole at the former Chamberlain Farm on Chamberlain Lake in the Allagash Wilderness Watery. I did find the safe after looking around for a while.

I've posted a lot of pictures of machinery and artifacts.  Some people may find this stuff boring or just junk.  I agree that it is not "get your rocks off" exciting, but I did have a good time looking around the site. It is interesting to think about what went on here when the farm was in operation. 

From what I could find, in 1846 Eben S. Coe and David Pingree built the farm.  The farm was used as a supply depot for logging operations in the area and was in operation until the early 1900s.  It was a fairly large operation, and was 600 acres at one time. Coe died in Dec. 1899.  With his death, and along with changing technology, operations at the farm slowed down.  In 1931 the farmhouse burned down. 

The camp that is there now is a rental owned by Nugent's Camps.  I read somewhere that the camp used to be a stable on the farm, so it is possible the camp is an original building.

Thoreau camped here on July 28, 1857 and also purchased some supplies.

I didn't meet any people on the hike.

It is about a 1-mile hike to the farm from my parking spot.  I spent over 3.5 hours exploring around the site.  I wanted to explore more, but with short days I decided to leave so I'd have mostly daylight on my drive back to paved roads, 62 miles away!

For being hunting season, there wasn't a whole lot of road traffic in the woods. 

My total road mileage for the day was 210 miles, with 120 of that on unpaved woods roads.

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