ABANDONED TRAILS OF ACADIA NATIONAL PARK: THE OLD EAGLE LAKE ROAD

Roads don't just disappear, but back when I first moved here I was convinced that must of been the case, because i could not figure out why old maps showed the Green Mountain Survey Road, the Green Mountain carriage road and the Cadillac and gorge Trails all starting along the Eagle lake Road. I searched up and down the Eagle lake Road and could not find a trace of any of those locations, how could they simply have vanished? In reality, they had not vanished, they were where they had always been, the reason I wasn't finding any of those locations was because over time, a section of the Eagle lake Road had been abandoned, rerouted with a new section of roadway. This happened because when the park Service decided to build the park Loop Road, they needed to build a bridge over the Eagle lake Road so traffic would not be impeded. But there was no place along the current Eagle lake Road to build such a bridge, so a section of the Eagle Lake Road was rerouted to where it is today, where it passes under the large stone arch bridge.
So the old maps were not wrong, the road itself had been changed - if you look at the map you will see where the old Eagle lake Road once was, the section that was abandoned. Its along that section of abandoned roadway that the start of the survey road, the carriage road and those two abandoned section of trails can be found. This abandoned section of road is easy to locate, it begins directly across from the Cleftstone Road, blocked off by a few large granite blocks, and the power lines still run along the abandoned section of road. With this information, the start of those abandoned trails are easy enough to locate, they are well worn. But as for the start of the old survey road and carriage road, they are not so easy to find, well hidden behind trees. Follow the abandoned section of the Cadillac North Ridge Trail, about a third of the way along the old road on the left, and stay to the right the whole way (some minor trails run off to the left and led to some houses) it will bring you to a well worn section of the old survey road, right leads you back to the old road, left leads to the newer section of the gorge Trail. At that point a section of the survey road was destroyed in the building of the one way section of the Park Loop Road.
When the Park Service talks about the newer sections of trails it has built, such as the newer section of the Cadillac North Ridge Trail, and the newer section of the Gorge Trail, they usually use language like, it basically follows the original trail, or some language to that effect, and for good reason, they could not rebuilt the original trails there as they once was because to do so would mean crossing private property, and unlike back in the day when many land owners welcomed such trails, todays land owners want nothing to do with them. To rebuild the abandoned section of the North Ridge Trail, they would have to come pretty close to Mountain Ave., as the original trail did back in the day. And to accurately rebuild the abandoned section of the Gorge Trail, that would require running a new path along the old route, from the North Ridge trail over to mountain Ave, and along East Street, all private property today. Once the gorge Trail left East Street, it continued through the woods until it came to an intersection, left took you to the golf Course, right took you in the direction of the official Gorge Trail..

Now the map below highlights why the Park Service can't rebuild the old trails along their original route, Mountain Ave and East Street are all private property today, and as this map shows, the gorge Trail once skirted the entire length of East Street. The key to unlocking any of this was in learning that a section of the Eagle lake Road had been abandoned, . Once there was no West Street Extension and people entered the National Park along Highbrook road, However, if you were to walk along the abandoned section of of Eagle Lake Road, you would spot several unmarked paths, well worn, branching off of that stretch of abandoned road. About half way along you come to a very well worn path to the left, this path runs up through the woods and veers away from Mountain Ave. at one point, joining up with the Cadillac Mountain North Ridge Trail, and along that abandoned section of trail is several lesser worn paths which all lead to houses over on Mountain Ave. As the map below shows where the Gorge Trail once ran along one end of Mountain Ave, following East Street to its end and continuing up through the woods. The new section of Gorge Trail the Park Service recently built is there best attempt of reopening that old gorge trail by Mountain Ave.