Chapter Two, Debar Pond

This is the a continuation from yesterday's post. We'd hiked in to Debar Pond, enjoyed the water and taken a brief excursion toward its eastern shore. Then I tried to hike along its western shore but became mired in deep mud and fell several times. That's when I turned back. But as we were preparing to return to the car I spotted another trail heading southward down the western shore of Debar Pond and, of course, I just had to go see where it would take us:

This trail was not covered in my guide book so I really felt as if I was exploring unknown territory. We passed through deep forests and ferns of many species, some of them even taller than Seamus:

The trail seemed well worn at first, giving me the idea that it was commonly hiked. But the farther we went, the more overgrown it became:

I eventually came to believe that we were following an old woods road, used either for logging or for someone's private camp many years ago. There were old barrels used as culverts in places, some of them still functioning as intended, some of them nearly rusted away:

The trail offered no views of Debar Pond and took us higher and higher up the mountainside:

I finally stopped when we arrived at the tall, precipitous side of a mountain. No way was I going up there although there might have been spectacular views. We turned back toward where we'd begun:

When we returned to the access point for Debar Pond, I almost didn't let the dogs go in again. But they'd had so much fun the first time that I relented:

And Daphne went in way over her head and actually swam. Fergus soon followed:

Then Daphne began jumping out of the water in great leaps as she circled, reminding me a salmon making its way upstream. She was having more fun than I think I've ever seen a dog have. I wish I had a video of it, but I did get this photo of her in mid-leap:

But eventually I called them out of the water. Seamus resisted momentarily, but soon we were on our way back to the car:

The trail from the water to our car was less than a mile in length, but the scenery was pure wilderness nonetheless:

And I was considering what our next adventure would be that day as we traversed the boardwalk back to the trail head. But I'll post about that tomorrow: