Day 115: Eastport to Cobscook Bay State Park

September 23, 2021

Down East Sunrise Trail

“This trail is a bit rough,” Patrick says and continues, “but we are seeing nice scenery.” Rachel then adds, “if this was the Pamirs or Spiti Valley, we’d think it was great. Maybe after riding all those other rail to trails that were limestone or paved, and asphalt, we are just getting soft.”

We start out early re-tracing yesterday’s route through town, over the causeway and Sipayik trail for 7.5 miles to US 1. The tide is out making the area look very different from when we rode in with high tide yesterday afternoon. We cross US 1 from the Sipaki Trail and ride onto the 8 mile extension of the Down East Sunrise Trail. The original trail is 87 miles from Ayers Junction to Ellsworth. This newer part is very rough in places with big gravel, but takes us through some fantastic landscape. We cross several estuaries that are now just deep mud gullies since the tide is out. There are fields of reeds and one swamp full of dead trees that could be straight from Lord of the Rings. When we reach Ayers Junction trailhead, we cross Route 214 and realize we are about 10 miles from Meddybemps. There are four locals unloading their bikes to ride the trail which is encouraging that the surface will improve. And it does. We ride through forest, and marshes filled with cattails.

We leave the trail at Dennysville to retreat to US 1 and stop at the Cobscook Café for a second breakfast. We then continue about five miles on US 1 to the entrance into the Cobscook Bay State Park. The name Cobscook comes from the Passamaquoddy word meaning “boiling tides,” Here the average tide is 24 feet. The 888 acre park is surrounded on three sides by the salt waters of Cobscook Bay. We arrive around noon and take an awesome secluded tent site on a peninsula and watch the tide reach its highest point at about 2:00 pm.

By the time we eat our peanut butter sandwiches for dinner the water has dropped at least ten feet.