Crooked River Forest

This Loon Echo Land Trust preserve has two wide, easy-to-walk tracks crossing it, the Intervale and Evergreen trails, which are joined by a narrower path to form a roughly 2.1-mile loop. There is also a 0.8-mile ski trail marked on the map.

The trails split 0.2 miles from the parking area. The red Intervale Trail leads to the left, bringing you along the river on a flat, wide, easy forested trail. It’s lovely, peaceful, and quiet. It ends in about 0.6 miles at a nice spot by the river with high banks. You can return the same way or return on a loop via a former snowshoe trail, now widened and passable year-round, and the Evergreen Trail.

The Evergreen trail is a snowmobile path that brings you through pretty forest along a flat and easy path. From the trailhead, at 1 mile, the trail splits, with an unmarked trail on the left leading to a point high above the river and private property signs beyond. If you continue on the main Evergreen trail, it’ll soon reach the preserve boundaries, marked with a Trail End sign. Beyond, the snowmobile path continues.

The land trust says the Crooked River supports one of only four known native populations of landlocked Atlantic salmon in Maine and is the primary spawning and nursery area for salmon indigenous to Sebago Lake.

Directions: To reach Intervale Preserve, make your way to Scribners Mills Road in Harrison. The trail head is a 0.6 miles from the intersection with Maple Ridge Road, and half a mile from where Scribners Mills Road crosses Crooked River. The parking lot is very large.