In mid-August, I decided that this would be the year to realize a long-cherished dream: I would spend the winter in solitude at my off-the-grid cabin in the Maine Woods. It’s nestled among fir and spruce, birch and maple, on the shore of First Roach Pond, just east of Moosehead, Maine’s largest lake. As the...Read More

The wild is not limited to remote places far from our everyday lives.  Even in towns and cities, the wild is around us, though we often fail to notice it.  Our neighbors include creatures who, though they are not human, are fellow beings nonetheless.  That understanding makes my world feel richer, more alive, less lonely. ...Read More

Last week, I spent a night at Pemaquid Point, best known as the home of the iconic lighthouse featured on the Maine state quarter. I believe it’s also a strong candidate for the best spot in Maine to watch the sun rise above the ocean. A spectacular sunrise depends on clouds: just enough to provide...Read More

On the last day of May and the first of June, I explored a primeval forest in the North Maine Woods: a five-thousand-acre enclave of virgin woodland, the largest contiguous tract of old growth east of the Mississippi. It’s an anachronistic island surrounded by the younger forests typical of Maine today – regenerating woods that...Read More

The shoreline of Achor, my land on First Roach Pond, is fringed with a typical Maine Woods assortment of second-growth trees. Tall, evergreen spruce and fir. Birch and maple that change from the green of summer to the yellows and reds of fall to the bare starkness of winter. An orange-berried mountain ash here, a...Read More

I spent the last few days of 2019 (December 27-30) at my off-the-grid camp on the shore of First Roach Pond. On December 31, I was back in Internet-land to welcome 2020, and watched the live stream from Times Square as twelve o’clock struck. What a contrast in night experiences! At camp, I stood all...Read More

After my last post, on May 2, I walked five more days along the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal to reach its terminus in Cumberland, Maryland, a small city in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. En route, I passed through the Paw Paw Tunnel, a notable feat of nineteenth-century engineering. Over the course of fourteen...Read More

Since my last post, I’ve spent another six days traveling on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal towpath. I go for long stretches without seeing any other hikers or bikers; occasionally, a squirrel scampers across the path ahead of me or I spot some white-tailed deer. As the new leaves grow bigger on the trees, I...Read More

This week, I’m continuing along the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal towpath toward its terminus in Cumberland, Maryland. At the moment, I’m in a library in Shepherdstown, West Virginia; I crossed a bridge over the Potomac River from the Maryland side to charge my electronics and pick up supplies. I thought some of you who read...Read More

I’ve spent six days hiking the C & O Canal towpath. The canal starts in Georgetown, a neighborhood in Washington, DC. It parallels the Potomac River along the western border of Maryland to Cumberland, nearly 185 miles in all. I began walking at mile marker 5 – on the Maryland side of the MD/DC line...Read More