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National Geographic : 1974 Feb
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lakes-Eagle, Churchill, Umsaskis, Round Pond-had once been the scene of massive log drives. And yet, hidden among the trees just back from Eagle's shore, resting on tracks that now lead from nowhere to nowhere, stood two black steam locomotives of the Eagle Lake and West Branch Railroad, which less than fifty years ago had hauled 80,000 cords of pulpwood annually 15 miles to Umbazooksus Lake. It was also hard at times to realize that these were still working woodlands. I was savoring the silence one morning at our camp on Churchill Lake, throwing bread crumbs to the Canada jays and watching the early mist slowly lift from the water. But just then, as if in derision, a chain saw started to buzz in the woods to our right. And it was hard to picture, with so few people about, that nearly 10,000 visitors would use the waterway during the year. "We've had up to 90 people in one campsite," Leigh Hoar told me. "And the numbers climb every year. We're going to have to keep the lid on use, keep strict control over access, and perhaps require reservations." B ETWEEN LONG LAKE and Round Pond (after the embarrassment at Chase Rapids) the Allagash River wound for nine or ten leisurely miles through a magnifi cent forest of spruce and fir, whose dense, lofty phalanxes pressed in close on either side. Allagash Falls, farther downriver, may be more dramatic, but this to me was the scenic climax of the trip. There was a majesty to this forest, and a brooding, secret air. We floated quietly down this narrow aisle, moved to si lence, and thus surprised a deer as we round ed a bend. With graceful leaps it bounded Eyeball to eyeball with a yearling moose, a canoeist backpaddles for a better look, disturbing the animal's browsing but not its composure. For nearly twenty minutes, man and moose shared the calm of the river. Then the moose finished a lunch of tender aquatic plants and ambled across the stream and into the woods. America's Wilderness: The Allagash 183
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