Hotels

Flying and Fishing: Sporting Camps

One of the purest Maine experiences has long been the tradition of spending time at a sporting camp deep in the woods, by a lake or stream, just you and a few buddies. Some are so remote that no roads exist; you need to fly in. Charter services will meet you at Bangor, Maine's little airport for a fee, then ferry you by van to a nearby lake for your seaplane flight. Once there, you spend a week hiking, testing out your fishing skills, dubbing around in canoes, or just hanging out on porches relaxing and working through piles of summer reading.

One of the best sporting camps in Maine is Bradford Camps (tel. 207/746-7777; www.bradfordcamps.com), a compound of rustic log cabins right out of an L.L.Bean catalog on unpopulated Munsungun Lake. Meals are served in a 1940s-style dining room. The lake is some sixty miles from the nearest town, so two floatplane services offer access for $180 to $280 per person (round-trip): Katahdin Air in Millinocket (tel. 207/723-8378) and the more convenient, but also more expensive, KT Aviation (tel. 207/945-5087) in Bangor.

The tiny fishing community of Grand Lake Stream has several sporting camps thanks to the great local fishing. Try Weatherby's, The Fisherman's Resort (tel. 207/796-5558; www.weatherbys.com), an established getaway with good fly-fishing courses. You can drive here (it's about 2 hrs. from downtown Bangor, maybe 6 hrs. from Boston), but once again a floatplane from Bangor is the best way if you're coming from afar. Charter rates include a half-hour flight from Bangor; contact the resort or KT Aviation (tel. 207/945-5087).