Rich Akin
” Check that out”, said the hunter in the passenger seat of the snow and mud covered four wheel drive pickup, as it meandered along the rough and rutted dirt logging road. “How the hell did they get that thing set up way the hell back in here?” came the response from the driver of the truck. “We must be 15 miles in from the nearest paved road”, he added. They were looking at a slide off camper that had been set up apparently for deer hunting. They thought for a moment what it might be like to be camped out here, basically in the middle of nowhere, thirty miles from town.
They were in fact hunting also, but were staying in town at a hotel which proudly displayed a “Hunters Welcome” banner above the vacancy sign. As they neared the cut back trail off the logging road which led back in to where the camper sat, they couldn’t help but notice how narrow and sloped the cut back appeared. Upon further assessment, they noticed a large tarp outstretched from the rear of the camper with a makeshift table set up under it with some coolers nearby. Any thoughts they began to have about how maybe this wouldn’t be too bad were quickly dashed as they noticed several foot long icicles forming on the camper overhang which reminded them of that night’s forecast calling for temps in the teens with more snow on the way. The tarp rattled and furled in the cold, Maine, November wind as they quickly rolled up their windows, turned up the heat in the truck and slowly drove off. “Screw that shit!” exclaimed the driver to his passenger, “I can’t imagine coming back to that desolate icebox after being in the woods all day”. They began justifying to each other all the “more accommodating” features their hotel room in town offered beginning with heat, hot meals, a warm bed, a hot shower, television, telephone, facilities and of course a nearby drinking establishment with a jukebox and maybe a friendly lady.
I often wonder how many times this exact scenario plays itself out each season as a truck passes this camp setup, which in fact is an accurate description of the camp my brother Gary and I set up each year in the Northern Maine Woods. However, due to our desire to find a very secluded area each year, there are not too many trucks that actually do see our camp. We anxiously await all year for our annual Maine hunt, which has historically taken us each year to a different region of the state. This past season, however, we believe that we have found an area we will be calling home for awhile. It has the remoteness which is a must for us, which in turn makes for little hunting pressure. We also enjoy the various different types of terrain features including peaks and ridges as well as the mix of a hardwoods, hemlocks, clear cuts, and swamps. When our camp is set up, believe it or not, it affords us damn near all of the previous mentioned accommodations with the exception of the television and the friendly lady, which neither of us are the least bit interested in having anyway while on this annual trip.
Being successful in Maine is no easy task. We have all read about the guys who just happened to get out of their truck, walked 100 yards and shot a big racked buck. I’m not going to tell you that I wouldn’t have shot him, but I will say that this sort of luck has not come my way, and further, I don’t expect it to in the near future! We watch with amazement and awe as we see huge bucks being weighed in each year at the local inspection point. We enjoy taking pictures and we shake the hunter’s hands and hear their stories on how they got their bucks. Seeing is believing, and after a couple days of not seeing much while hunting, it does your inner fire good to see that look on a hunter’s face who just shot the biggest buck of his life that’s sporting a heavy, wide rack. Without a doubt, the real reason we hunt Maine every year is to be able to experience the vastness of this huge wilderness, not to mention it puts us where the largest whitetail bucks in the Northeast are. For this reason, we use the camper which enables us to put it just about anywhere we decide, hopefully on firm level ground, but that’s another story!
Camping out, miles from nowhere, only serves to make our trip more enjoyable. It gives us a sense of being that much closer to the woods and obviously that much further away from our daily lives that we’re putting on hold for awhile. My brother often says, “It’s not just about the buck you shot, it’s how you got him.” We both sincerely believe that success is much sweeter when you know you’ve worked harder to achieve it. Hunting in Maine is relatively still new to us, but, we are learning more each year, we know this. Taking a buck in Maine that field dresses better than two hundred pounds will earn you “The Patch”, a red embroidered insignia in the shape of the state that is awarded to you and usually sewn to the shoulder of your hunting coat. If you think this sounds rather insignificant, all I can say is go there!
Neither of us has earned this honor yet, but to say that we are inspired to do so would be a major understatement! Our hunting days are long. We usually are only there for a week, although this coming year we are planning to stretch it out a few more days. We pray for snow, but understand we have to take the weather hand we get dealt and hunt our asses off regardless. The camper is indeed a welcome sight at the end of the day! We are both self proclaimed master chefs and bartenders and also great hosts, however, we’re still waiting for our first guests to stop by after five hunting trips up there! If you should happen to stumble across our set up, we’d enjoy the company.
Adirondack Camp Journal 