Basin Camping

We fit in a weekend of hiking in early June at the Basin Campground just over the Maine border in New Hampshire. The basin is a scenic pond framed by tree-covered mountains and a dipping ridgeline. The campground was blissfully quiet and staffed by a friendly retired couple who we quickly befriended due to Steve and Ron's common interests....(cycling, GPS & DeLorme products). They clued us in on the best trail to take for our day hike up local Mt. Meader. We set off shortly after after getting our tent up in the mosquito-infested wooded campsite (who forgot the bugspray!?!?) Fortunately the mosquitos don't like altitude, and we do, so we left them behind after about twenty minutes of constant slapping and scratching.
The views above the basin were beautiful and we had a leisurely lunch on top before heading back down to attempt a dip in the pond. Cooking dinner in our campsite was quickly ruled out as an option during our tent set-up episode, so we decided to cook by the basin, which was mercifully swarming with dragonflies, whose appetite for mosquitos meant that we were no longer on the menu for the bloodthirsty bugs. Our dip in the pond was also nixed after Steve spotted a six-inch leech swimming around in the ankle deep depths of the pond. Oh, well...

A sweet little wildflower along the trail

Beautiful, yet leech-infested

By nightfall a nice cool breeze kicked up and we were able to return to our campsite to make a fire and read by headlamp mosquito-free. The next morning the buggers had made a comeback, so we hastily took down our tent, packed up and were back home by 10 am.

Camping in June in Maine is always a bit precarious due to weather and insects, but its still always worth the effort to get away and see something new, right?