Our summer of camping: A preview
Back in March, G and I were looking ahead to our summer plans—first up, a conference for G in New Orleans, where I’d get to play tourist while he was at the conference. Then, a two-week trip to the West Coast. We planned on a week in Washington State, meeting up with G’s dad and visiting G’s sister’s family. From there, G and I planned to take off for a weeklong road trip down the Oregon Coast and into Northern California. We were looking forward to a few camping weekends as well, but most of those hadn’t been planned out at that point. And then, well, a global pandemic. Needless to say, our plans went out the window once COVID-19 hit. We canceled all of our bookings and flights and even the two camping reservations we had already booked. We cleared our calendars. And then we learned that Gavin’s kidney was again failing and in the range of needing a second transplant—possibly as early as late summer/fall, if a donor match were secured. As of right now, we’re not sure where we are on that timeline. As for summer plans? One thing was clear: we’d be staying pretty local and pretty isolated. Thank goodness that camping has built-in physical distancing. And with our NEMO Heliopolis Privacy Shelter and our 2002 VW Eurovan Weekender, we’re as self-contained as we can be, short of being in a full-on RV!
As our state’s began its stay-at-home order in March, we knew our summer would be unlike any we had experienced in recent memory. There would be no big trips this summer. We hoped we’d be able to camp, but even that seemed iffy, as we waited patiently to see what our state’s campgrounds would end up doing. By the end of May, we learned that a few of the New Hampshire State Park campgrounds would be opening for New Hampshire residents, and those few would be operating at 50% capacity. We checked dates and availability and booked two parks for the end of May and early June: Lafayette Place Campground in Franconia Notch State Park and Gilson Pond Campground in Monadnock State Park. You can read about our those weekend camping trips here and here.
Within a few weeks, we learned that Maine would be allowing residents from New Hampshire (and Vermont) to travel to the state without having to undergo the required 14-day quarantine. And so, with return visits to Lafayette Place and to Gilson Pond booked, we started making reservations at Maine State Parks. And once New Hampshire opened a few more of its parks late in June, we booked a few more of those parks too. As I write this, we’re currently scheduled to be camping 30 days this summer, in 11 different parks (I’m hoping those numbers increase with the addition of more reservations—we’ll see!) throughout Maine and New Hampshire. Our trips range from about an hour and 20 minutes to five hours from home, and most will be just Friday-Sunday visits; however, we’re planning on a few three-night camping trips for some of the parks that are farther away. Here’s the plan so far, with campgrounds listed in in the order we’ll be visiting them. If you’ve visited any or have any suggestions, please be sure to leave a comment, as we’d love to hear more before we go!
Lafayette Place Campground
Franconia Notch State Park
Location: Franconia, New Hampshire
Distance from home: 127 miles (2:02)
Notes: We camped here YEARS ago, back when we were newly married and had a tent. We’ve planned two trips to Lafayette this summer. Read about the first weekend here, and be sure to read part two—coming soon!
Gilson Pond Campground
Monadnock State Park
Location: Jaffrey, New Hampshire
Distance from home: 82.6 miles (1:37)
Notes: We’ve planned two trips to Gilson Pond this summer. Read about the first weekend here, and stay tuned for part two—a return visit after Camden Hills SP.
Location: Camden, Maine
Distance from home: 147 miles (2:39)
Notes: I was hoping to camp here last summer, but we didn’t get there. So, this summer, it’s top on my list. I’m looking forward to not only camping at the park but also checking out Mount Battie while we’re there! Stay tuned!
Location: Gorham, New Hampshire
Distance from home: 126 miles (2:31)
Notes: I really don’t know anything about Moose Brook State Park, other than 1) it’s one of the ones open for camping this summer and 2) we were able to get reservations. According to the description on the park’s webpage, Moose Brook State Park is “located in the White Mountains Region just north of the Presidential Range, Moose Brook State Park is in an area of unparalleled scenery and offers a variety of outdoor activities. The park is ideally located for fishing in the Peabody and Moose Rivers. Moose Brook flows through the park and after passing through a shallow warming pool, feeds the swimming area with cool, clear mountain water.” Sounds great to me! And maybe G and I will have to try fishing again—we’ll see!
Location: Pownal, Maine
Distance from home: 86.9 miles (1:26)
Notes: This state park is a hop, skip, and a jump for us at just shy of 1.5 hours from home. Bradbury Mountain State Park is located in Pownal, just about five miles from downtown Freeport (home of the L.L. Bean flagship store). We didn’t originally have this park on our list, but after making a change in the weekend we’d be headed up to Cobscook, we figured we’d do a night at Bradbury to break up the trip before heading up for two nights at Cobscook. Bradbury Mountain State Park has a ton of trails of varying lengths and suited to all ability levels, so we’re looking forward to checking those out. And, as close as this park is to home, we’re hoping that it we love it, it will become one of our go-tos.
Location: Edmunds Twp, Maine
Distance from home: 302 miles (5:05)
Notes: I’m really looking forward to checking out this park, the most remote of any that we’re visiting this summer. The park is near the Maine/Canadian border (not that we’ll be able to visit Canada, based on COVID-19 restrictions, though!) and, according to the park’s webpage, “Cobscook, the Maliseet-Passamaquoddy tribal word for "boiling tides," aptly describes this setting where the tidal range averages 24 feet and can reach 28 feet (compared to a 9-foot average tide along Maine's southernmost coast).” The park is also just a half-hour from Quoddy Head State Park, our last stop during last year’s three-week road trip through Maine and the Canadian Maritimes, so perhaps we’ll have to make a return visit!
Location: Freeport, Maine
Distance from home: 80.3 miles (1:25)
Notes: This little gem of a campground is one I stumbled upon last summer, and we visited twice (you can read about that visit here). It’s close to home and makes for a great not-so-far-away weekend jaunt. Winslow Park is located in Freeport, home to the famous L.L. Bean Flagship Store, which, if you haven’t been, is well worth the visit! Interesting fact: due to the COVID-19 pandemic, L.L.Bean, which is open daily 24 hours a day, closed its doors on March 17. That closure was only the fifth time that store has closed and the first time it had closed for more than 24 hours. If you’re wondering about the other times it closed (like I was!), Wikipedia to the rescue: the store, “originally opened in 1917, has been open 24 hours a day since 1951, with the exception of two Sundays in 1962 when Maine changed its blue laws; The flagship has closed to honor the death of US President John F. Kennedy in 1963, as well as the deaths of founder Leon Bean in 1967 and his grandson Leon Gorman in 2015.”
Location: Washington, New Hampshire
Distance from home: 88.1 miles (1:39)
Notes: This is another park that G and I visited years ago. If memory serves, I believe we rented a canoe and paddled a bit around the ponds. Like Gilson Pond Campground, Pillsbury is just about an hour and a half from home—yet feels so far away. According to the park’s webpage, “Pillsbury State Park is one of the more primitive and lesser known gems of the New Hampshire State Park system.” We’re looking forward to returning!
Location: Weld, Maine
Distance from home: 144 miles (2:41)
Notes: Once we learned that Maine was opening to out-of-state visitors and allowing New Hampshire and Vermont residents to visit without having to quarantine first, G and I knew we wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to visit some parks and parts of Maine that we haven’t been to. Mount Blue is one of those places—along with a few others on this list. In searching for information, I stumbled on a great blog, Rubys on the Road, featuring a family blogging about their mission to visit all of Maine’s state parks. Talk about inspiration! I found their descriptions of the parks SO helpful, and G and I are looking forward to seeing how our experiences compare. This description of the campground at Mount Blue has me excited to visit: “It is incredibly beautiful here. Like breathtakingly beautiful. This park is supervised by a string of mountains and hugged by a lake.” Can’t wait!
Location: Dover-Foxcroft, Maine
Distance from home: 199 miles (3:27)
Notes: This park will be another new-to-us park, and based on some of what I’ve read, it will be awesome. Rubys on the Road rated it their favorite park, and Yankee Magazine rated Peaks-Kenny as the best lakeside state park in 2016. I’m not really sure what to expect, as G and I don’t know this part of Maine AT ALL but we’re looking forward to exploring a new park and a new part of Maine. According to the parks’s webpage, “The 839-acre park lies in the Central Maine Highlands, an area renowned for its natural beauty and outdoor opportunities with Moosehead Lake, the Appalachian Trail, the southern end of Baxter State Park and other outdoor destinations all within a morning's drive.” Sounds like an adventure!
Location: Greenville, Maine
Distance from home: 227 miles (4:02)
Notes: Maine is a HUGE state. HUGE. And ever since 1993, when G and I first landed in New Hampshire, we’ve stuck primarily to the Maine coast. This summer, we’re exploring parts of Maine that we’ve never been to, and so we’re a little excited to check things out. Lily Bay State Park is located on the shores of Moosehead Lake, Maine’s largest lake, measuring 40 miles long and covering 74,890 acres. I’m not even sure I have a sense of how big that really is, to be honest. It’s also deep, with a maximum depth of 246 feet. Whoa.
Location: Rangeley, Maine
Distance from home: 171 miles (3:10)
Notes: As of right now, the last park we’re slated to visit and camp in is Rangeley Lake State Park in Rangeley, Maine. We had originally scheduled ourselves to be at Lamoine State Park in Lamoine, Maine, but we decided that we wanted to try a location that would be new to us. While Lamoine would be new to us, the area would not be, as we’ve visited Acadia National Park and its surrounding area nearly every year (and sometimes multiple times per year) in our 21-year marriage. So, we updated our plans to sub out Lamoine for Rangeley Lake SP instead. We’re hoping the crowds will be a little thinner than they might be near Acadia, and the Rangeley Lakes area is one we’ve talked about visiting but never have—so now’s the time. As we’re often visiting Downeast Maine and since Cobscook is now tops on our list, we’re sure we’ll be visiting Lamoine State Park in due time.
That’s it for now—but we still have a few open weekends that might need filling! And with any luck, we’ll be able to camp well into October in the van, so I may be updating this post as we decide. Without epic road trips and travels to write about this summer, I’ll instead be focusing on recapping our closer-to-home adventures. As we camp throughout the Granite State and Vacationland, I’ll be sharing our journeys through text and photos.