Mountain Biking and Hiking Options

[Skimaine]

My brother-in-law is bringing his new GF to Maine for the first time in October. They want to hit the trails for a week. Their home turf is Lake Placid. We explained to them the awesomeness of the trails around Carrabassett Valley (and free accommodations) to no avail. They want to focus on the Maine coast. Everything from Portland to Lubec is in play.

I do some hiking but no Mountain biking, so I am looking for some options for them. For hiking I am suggesting, the Bold Coast in Cutler, Baxter and certainly Acadia. For Mountain biking I am thinking Camden Snow Bowl and Bradbury? I think they are both strong riders.

Any other thoughts?

[chriscarleton]

The MTB Scene in Maine is absolutely blowing up right now and even outside of a huge MTB riding destination like CV, there is still an abundance of riding available.

For the greater Portland area, I would not recommend Bradbury. Bradbury is one of the premier MTB destinations in the area but not much has changed their in the last 15 years other than a lot more roots becoming exposed and things getting a bit more technical. Portland is a great hub for MTB riding, especially if they are into the food/brewery thing (there's plenty of that too). I'd recommend that they download the Trailforks App to their phone and seek out a few spots in Falmouth ( Trailheads are 20 min drive from downtown Portland).

Blackstrap is probably the most popular and fun place to ride (and coincidentally has the most vert out of anywhere within a good size radius). Blackstrap is full of a mix of fun technical climbing and technical & flowy descents. Park at either the Hurricane Road trailhead or the Hadlock Road Trailhead. Whatever you do, don't let them start at the Blackstrap Preserve trailhead (very hard to ride hiking trails - not fun).

Here is our guide on riding in the Greater Portland Area:

https://www.allspeed.com/articles/falmo ... -pg183.htm
https://www.allspeed.com/articles/cape- ... -pg185.htm
https://www.allspeed.com/articles/gorha ... -pg186.htm
https://www.allspeed.com/articles/portl ... -pg184.htm
https://www.allspeed.com/articles/yarmo ... -pg188.htm

Send them into Allspeed and we can help them out with showing them some good routing to make sure they get the most out of their visits.

Also, we do group rides on Monday and Thursday nights and would be happy to have them join in. Tell them to drop me a line chris a t allspeed d0t com or call the shop at 207.878.8741. We'd be happy to help them out.

[Glade Monkey]

The only semi-challenging coastal hiking I know is within Acadia.
The multi-use trail in Camden SP lets you hit multiple "peaks" on both the ocean and lake sides.

The Bold Coast in Cutler is a beautiful hike, but mostly horizontal along cliffs. Many smaller similar preserves worth exploring up that way along the coast thanks to MCHT.org Slightly inland the Donnell Pond area is nice hiking with views of Frenchman's Bay.

On the southern coast, Morse Mountain near Popham is a nice walk. There are also some interesting walks down near Boothbay, but nothing challenging.

I always suggest to visitors that if you plan to go that far east in Maine, bring your passport and shoot across the bridge to Campobello Island for visit.
It is a beautiful area and you can tour Roosevelt's summer home, East quoddy headlight and stroll the rock beaches which are are all worth seeing.

[Skimaine]

Many thanks to Chris and GM.