For
the first three hours, this is exactly how things went. One minor problem
after another. At lunchtime we were at Millinocket Lake, six miles from our
starting point. I wanted to be at Nesowadnehunk Field, another 34 miles away
before dark. At this point I thought maybe Wayne was right-maybe I had bitten
off more that I can chew. Here we sat, with the best of conditions, a bright
sunny day of about 10 degrees and making an average of about 2 miles per hour.
At this point in time though everyone was running, so we had a quick lunch and
got back at it again. We were on a real good trail now and things seemed to
look up a bit. Everyone was taking pictures of Mount Katahdin as we chugged
closer to Baxter State Park. The mood picked up and so did the speed. It seemed like
no time at all and we were at Baxter State Park gate. Much to our surprise,
Rob Robinson was there with his mobile lunch cart mounted on a tote sled.
Wayne asked Jack Sevigney if he wanted a hot dog and Jack said, “I don’t
remember this being here in ’61.
Our trip through Baxter Park was uneventful and beautiful. To look down
a long straight stretch at that long line of shiny antique sleds was quite a
sight for an appreciative antiquer. Believe it or not, at roughly 3:30 pm we rambled
into Nesowadnehunk Field before dark-this was unbelievable in that our average
speed went from 2 miles per hour to 10 miles per hour. I was sure happy to see
that ranger’s camp. Now it looked as though success was a possibility.
It was a great help having our support crew go ahead of us. When we got
to the rangers camp Park Director Buzz Caverly, Gene Nice and Richard Eaton
had the camps all warmed up for us. But the best part was yet to come-to say
that Gene and Richard are excellent cooks is an understatement. What we had
for supper that night was a real tribute to roughing it in the great outdoors.
We all had fresh Maine lobster and steak cooked to order. Surf and Turf in the
North Maine Woods. How they fed 18 people under those conditions, I’ll never
know but they did.
The next morning, the 18th, was a snowy one. After a good
breakfast, a few minor repairs and some head starts, things got under way.
David Johnson was doing a super job of super tuning the O-13SR with the
assistance of Edgar Hetteen to keep it running half decent with a weak coil.
We brought quite a few spare parts, but a coil for an Onan was not among them.
Our destination today was Nugent’s Camp on Chamberlain Lake some 35 miles
ahead through the Allagash. On this leg of the journey some pretty bizarre
things took place and our guides were especially helpful. This whole leg could
have been the ruination of our journey but due to good luck it went pretty
good. The first thing that happened happened to Paul Doherty. Paul was taking
a picture of Doubletop
Mountain when the oil
drain tube broke off his K-95. Ed Carr pulled out to go by him and noticed it
spilling oil all over the snow. Now Paul only stopped for just that instant.
If he had continued on he would have ruined the engine. We didn’t have a
spare one of them. Wayne squeezed the end of the drain tube closed, bent
it up 90 degrees and refilled the engine with oil. The next strange thing that
happened occurred at Nesowadnehunk Lake. Wayne was behind Jack Sevigney and
saw something familiar in the snow. He immediately motioned to his son Jeff to
catch and stop jack with the faster mustang. Jack got off his sled
and told Wayne, “My sled goes klunk-klunk”. Wayne said,” I shouldn’t
wonder, I just picked up one of the master links out of your track back in the
trail”. They put the master link back in and continued on their way. I told
you he was good at picking up the pieces.
After this we came to a stop for a break at Telos Landing about half
way to our destination at Chamberlain Lake. Jack once again walked up to Wayne
with a question. He was holding a little round headed quarter inch bolt in his
hand and wanted to know where it went. Without a seconds hesitation, Wayne
told him it went to the fuel pump of his K-12 Voyager. C.J. pretty near fell
over - to think he knew where that bolt came from that quick. He didn’t
realize that there are only two bolts shaped like that on the whole sled and
that they both hold the fuel pump on. Wayne went back and looked. The fuel
pump had all but fallen off. Jack
Sevigney
picked up the
bolt and laid it on the chassis.
We had everything that day, including whiteouts, slush and bad ice due
to
thoroughfares. This is where our guides came in handy. In the whiteout in the
middle of Nesowadnehunk Lake, the three of them went up and down the line and
kept us headed in the right direction. On Telos Lake they went ahead and found
the slush and open water and kept us away from that. We made pretty good time
overall though and found ourselves at the shore of Chamberlain Lake at about 2
pm. This is where another strange thing happened. I was standing with David
Johnson beside his O-13SR, which is a prototype he made in 1961. I noticed
that the bolt was missing out of the drive clutch. I started to walk to my
sled to see if I had one in my toolbox and about 10 feet down the trail I
picked up the one
that came out of David’s sled, complete with washers. Edgar Hetteen was
standing there and said,” that proves it, Allan and your father are watching
out for us today”. I think he was right. Now it was a matter of about 45
uneventful minutes and we were at Nugent’s Camps - our destination. I
couldn’t believe we actually made it. Patty Nugent was there to greet us.
She now runs the camps that she and her deceased husband, Al, had run for so
many years. She and “Nuge’, as her husband was called, were there to meet
my father and company 25 years ago. She’s a great lady - she had two fresh
pies all made for us. After our talk with Patty, we made our way a short
distance to our cabins and started hashing over the days events. Most of our
conversations on the trip were about the amazing old antiques and how we were
living in the past. It was just as though we were discovering snowmobiling all
over again. The same problems and the same remedies were right there. Several
of us members of the antique Snowmobile Club of America and now have a deeper
appreciation of what the club is doing by trying to preserve these old
machines.
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