NEWRY – Ten years and about $400,000 later, the rugged Mahoosuc Mountains range has a new 42-mile backpacking trail: the Grafton Loop Trail.
Although the 17.1-mile leg to the east of Route 26 has been open for nearly three years, don’t expect the western portion to open anytime soon, says Grafton Loop Trail Coalition leader Landon Fake.
An unexpected exploding real estate market complicated the premise on which the trail was based, a public-private land partnership.
Landowner agreements are not in place for some sections of the trail on the west side of Route 26.
Since 2003, on the western portion, Fake said Wednesday afternoon, “There’s been a lot of land that we put the trail on that has changed hands, or is changing hands, which has made negotiations more complicated. Hopefully, we’ll get it sorted out by mid-summer. Until we get those in place, we can’t open the trail.”
Still, he worried about an influx of hikers after seeing a colorful feature story in Backpacker magazine’s May issue, that prematurely touts the much-anticipated trail.
“In spite of the Backpacker article, we’re having to say it’s closed. We don’t want to encourage people to use the trail,” Fake said Wednesday afternoon in Newry.
Trail work on the western portion is essentially complete. All that’s lacking are signs, which Dan White alluded to in his Backpacker magazine story, “Thrown for a Loop: Tag eight North Woods summits on Maine’s dazzling new trail.”
The loop trail connects to the Appalachian Trail on Old Speck Mountain (4,170 feet elevation), to the west of Route 26, and Baldpate Mountain (3,812 feet elevation), to the east of the highway.
The western leg passes through dense undergrowth on Sunday River Whitecap, a 3,335-foot mountain between Slide Mountain (3,250 feet elevation) and Stowe Mountain (2,730 feet elevation).
The eastern side tops Puzzle Mountain (3,142 feet elevation) and traverses some of the area’s most spectacular peaks in the rugged Mahoosuc Range.
On Wednesday, the start of the west leg section was marked by a trail sign located just over 4 miles north of Route 2 and about a half mile south of the east leg’s parking lot.
The white Appalachian Mountain Club sign, mounted in front of a blocked dirt road, read, “Grafton Loop Trail – Sargent Brook Tentsite 5.4 (miles).”
Fake said that people had been parking along the road there, but it’s private property, so no parking signs had gone up.
Additionally, he said the new trailhead sign would be taken down.
“We don’t want to send people down a closed trail,” he said.
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