Sitting by the boat launch on Bottle Lake and studying the map to find our way to the camp site on Junior Bay

Pocumcus Lake is a 2,201-acre body of water located in Sakom Township, Washington County, Maine (see The Maine Atlas and Gazetteer map 35 B2). It is part of the enormous hydraulically interconnected system that includes West Grand Lake, Scraggly Lake, Junior Lake, Junior Bay, and Sysladobsis Lake. We access this waterway via the public boat launch on Bottle Lake in Lakeville (see The Maine Atlas and Gazetteer map 35 A1), which links to Junior Lake via Bottle Lake Stream. For the record, Bottle Lake Road, which connects Route 6 in Springfield with the boat launch, is paved all the way and is therefore readily accessible even during mud season in late April. My son Joel, nephew Salvy, and I reach Bottle Lake in mid-morning. We overload our boats with all our camping and fishing gear and slowly navigate for one hour and 45 minutes to an unmarked camp site located at the tip of the peninsula that separates Junior Bay from Junior Stream. That will be our base camp for the next four day. We are here to experience the tremendous landlocked salmon and lake trout fishery that is awakening from its long winter slumber following ice out. One nice perk of camping in late April is the total lack of the dreaded hordes of mosquitos and blackflies. On the other hand, early spring can still be quite chilly in these parts of Maine.

Continue reading →