Maine Misadventure

riverman wrote:
"Memphis Jim" wrote in message
oups.com...
This post was buried in an older thread. I feel so proud of it I want
it up front.

It's about a recent experience I had in Downeast Maine.



Sounds like my entire teenage years. I spent many a summer (and winter) in
the blueberry barrens. By the way, the region you were headed for (sounds
like around Cathance Lake?) is not so great for winter fishing.

--riverman


While we are on the subject of Maine, may I ask, how far outside of
Maine is is where a "camp" must properly be called a "cottage"? I
always want to call people's summer homes "camps" no matter how many
luxuries they contain.

Pete

"Peter A. Collin" wrote in message
...
riverman wrote:
"Memphis Jim" wrote in message
oups.com...
This post was buried in an older thread. I feel so proud of it I want
it up front.

It's about a recent experience I had in Downeast Maine.



Sounds like my entire teenage years. I spent many a summer (and winter)
in the blueberry barrens. By the way, the region you were headed for
(sounds like around Cathance Lake?) is not so great for winter fishing.

--riverman
While we are on the subject of Maine, may I ask, how far outside of Maine
is is where a "camp" must properly be called a "cottage"? I always want
to call people's summer homes "camps" no matter how many luxuries they
contain.



I think it has more to do with yearly income than anything else. Everyone I
knew who had one, had a 'summah camp out in the woods'. Out of staters who
could afford a summah place in Maine had a 'cottage on the lake'. I think
once you are out of ME, NH and VT, you can call them 'Cottages'.

I suppose it really has to do with what you use them for. Camps are used
mostly to hunt from, I think. And even if you don't hunt, if some owner
sometime in the past used it for hunting, its a camp.

--riverman

"Peter A. Collin" wrote in message
While we are on the subject of Maine, may I ask, how far outside of Maine
is is where a "camp" must properly be called a "cottage"?


Vermont.


Joe F.

There are several long term trends that are making parts of Maine, and
parts of other states in the northern U.S. have more wilderness.

In the case of Maine, much of the state used to support a small farm
economy when the U.S. was much more agrarian than it is now. Now in
most of Maine, smaller farms are not economically productive (with the
exception of Aroostook County in the northeast of the state where
potato farms predominate). Over the past hundred years, much of
interior Maine that used to be farmland has reverted back to woods.

At the same time, over the last 40 years or so the population of the
state has consolidated toward coast, toward the southwest, and toward
urban areas, such that there are towns throughout Maine that are slowly
dimming and blinking out. Close to where I will be living there is one
town that no longer exists as a coporate entity, Centerville, and two
others that are trying to go in that direction, Whitneyville, and
Cooper (on Cathance Lake) Deorganization means lower taxes for these
towns on the brink. When deorganization succeeds, local control of the
community is given up. This ultimately furthers the trend toward
forested land.

Finally, much of the land in Maine is owned by international timber
companies. Currently they are managing much of the land for pulp
production, and letting forests regrow. If you didn't know better you
might assume much of the land is preserved.

The town where I am buying a house once had about 2500 people and was
an industrial center for cutting wood (thorough water power). Now the
mills are gone, along with the dams (thank goodness). If you didn't
know the history of the town it would be hard to imagine how industrial
the town was in the past.

That is what I meant.

Thanks Petah I appreciate your comments. Good to know that there are
former Mainers on the board.

That's exactly my point.

As my wife and I looked at new places to settle, we found that we were
attracted to places with zero or negative growth rates, places where
strip mall development and suburbanization was not occurring. (I live
in Memphis, Tennessee, a healthy hub of suburbanization, where no
development project is ever turned down, so I know of which I speak).

We have found that while we did not necessarily want to live in the
woods, we did want to live in a place where the suburban imprint had
not taken over. Places like Maine, apart from southern Maine, northern
Vermont, and northern and western New York fit the bill. If you
haven't been to rural sections of New York, you really cannot
appreciate how rural it can be.

The tension you feel when you realize that you are really lost, really
in the middle of no where, and you really have to consider what the
weather and nature have in store for you is a real moment of clarity.

The exact place I was heading toward was the Blog Brook Flowage, North
of Cherryfield, in Deblois township (Delorme map 25). I really didn't
think the fishing would be good, but I had a fly rod and was ready to
try. I didn't have a boad, canoe, float tube, etc. so I was trying to
find water that had a little movement.

Willi wrote:
Memphis Jim wrote:

There are several long term trends that are making parts of Maine, and
parts of other states in the northern U.S. have more wilderness.

In the case of Maine, much of the state used to support a small farm
economy when the U.S. was much more agrarian than it is now.



Thanks, your and Greg's explanation make sense. For some stupid reason,
I assumed that since our Country's population is growing, all areas of
the Country would have population increases.

Check out:

http://www.patagonia.com/enviro/repo...o_common.shtml

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

Memphis Jim wrote:
There are several long term trends that are making parts of Maine, and
parts of other states in the northern U.S. have more wilderness.

In the case of Maine, much of the state used to support a small farm
economy when the U.S. was much more agrarian than it is now.


Thanks, your and Greg's explanation make sense. For some stupid reason,
I assumed that since our Country's population is growing, all areas of
the Country would have population increases. The area I live in and the
areas I most visit all are places with considerable growth and the
issues are dealing with this growth while still retaining the open space
that makes the areas desirable. Although ranching isn't profitable for
smaller operations (and VERY difficult even for big ones), the land
they're on is very valuable and many ranches get sold and developed into
"gentleman ranchettes". Thankfully the majority of the mountainous areas
in CO, NM, WY, MT, and UT are National Forests. Hopefully they'll stay
that way.

Willi