A city's oasis

"Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean."

- Naturalist John Muir  

LEWISTON, Maine — Call it a slice of heaven or a lush oasis which sits quietly in the middle of an old Maine mill city.
 

This fertile tract of land is walled off by huge pine trees and tall grass. Streams, ponds and hiking trails run up and down Thorncrag Nature Sanctuary.  

It's tallest point is 510 feet. The sanctuary is managed by the Stanton Bird Club, which was founded in 1919 and began receiving donated parcels of land over the last 90 years. The "Crag" once belonged to the Thorne family in the 1800s before eventually becoming a wildlife habitat.
 

The sprawling city surrounds this 357-acre wildlife preserve, but when you begin walking the trails and become enveloped in its magnificent greenery and soothing solitude, you forget that you are in the heart of Lewiston. The city's noises fade away as you venture deeper into the forest and head for the top where an open meadow greets all hikers — and it is all free of charge.
 

Making you way up solid walking trails and narrow paths is not a difficult climb. Old landmarks, which can be traced back to the 1800s, line some of the obscure trails. This habitat is also used for snowshoeing and cross country skiing during Maine's endless winters.
 

Anthony and I started at the Montello gate and briskly walked up the steep blue trail, which is marked by spray painted trees every 50 to 100 yards. It is a half-mile walk to Anthony's Fireplace, which sits on a small open field. 

I was carrying a full pack with water, food, bug spray, binoculars and a camera when we stopped to take a breather at a unique bench called Kavanaugh Bench before we continued our trek to a large pond, which is teaming with frogs' eggs at this time of year. The murky pond supports a variety of wildlife. It is an eye-opening event when the frogs take over the pond later in the summer and disrupt Thorncrag's silence with their croaking.
 

We followed a narrow path that circles the pond and trudged up a shady steep hill toward Anthony's fireplace. The huge fireplace is surrounded by large stone benches. It is a quiet area to rest and down water and a quick snack. About a couple hundred yards away on the yellow trail, we pass Miller's Fireplace and Gordon's Ledge and park ourselves at Landry Memorial Bench, which is the summit at Thorncrag. We reach for the binoculars and peer through a narrow clearing of trees where we see a snow-capped Mt. Washington looming in the distance on a clear day.

We packed up our grub and water and headed down the sometimes difficult trail toward Whale Rock, which is giant boulder that resembles a whale. When we finally made our way down the hill without losing our footing, we decided to visit Whale Rock another time and turned west. Anthony and I carefully walked through a washed out path of protruding rocks and meandering small streams. We stopped to listen to the running streams and birds interrupt the forest's tranquility.

We moved gingerly through the rocky terrain and found the trail up to the meadow a safer climb. 

We halted our advance at a wooden park bench and munched on more snacks, but the black flies and mosquitoes were out to get us. We moved on past the Farmstead Foundation and took the orange trail to the other side of Thorncrag before turning onto the red trail where we passed Cellar Hole and Springhouse Foundation on this day in May.  

The entire two-mile hike took about two hours after making numerous stops along the way to refresh ourselves.

We often take advantage of this oasis, which is 15 minutes from our home in Auburn. It is a convenient way to visit Mother Nature on hot summer days without spending an hour on the road. 

For more information, checkout www.stantonbirdclub.org.