QUICK TRAIL FACTS
- Preserve Size: Not sure
- Trail Mileage: 3.3 miles in network
- Pets: yes
- Difficulty: easy
- Sights: historical sites, Perham Stream, views, old cemetery, peat bog, fields, museum
A Scenic 7 hike!
Perham Stream Birding Trail is one of the seven hikes in the High Peaks Alliance Scenic 7 guide and challenge. The guide is incredible — it’s filled with detailed information, up-to-date maps, photographs, and recommended routes for each location.
In the many years I’ve been walking Maine trails, I’ve never encountered a place quite like Perham Stream Birding Trail. It is filled with well-preserved history and beauty — mountain views, fields, forests, and a stream with both placid stretches and rushing falls. It’s also also touching, a spot that reflects a family’s enduring connection to a particular spot, and one man’s commitment to saving the land and taking care of it.
The first thing you notice after driving along a long dirt road is a well-tended trailhead. The fields at the start of the trail are mown and dotted with bird feeders. Each parking spot along the fence is marked with a handwritten sign saying “trail parking.” A small kiosk contains preserve information.
Almost as soon as my friend and I closed the car doors after parking, Carson Hinkley walked out of his old farmhouse across the dirt road to greet us, holding a laminated map of his preserve’s walking trails, urging us bring it on our walk. He says he tries to greet every walker to ensure they know what to look for.
Carson explained that he is a seventh-generation inhabitant of this area, which was formally known as the Perham Settlement. He can recall centuries of history here as if it all just happened a decade ago. (The site has been inhabited by Europeans since about 1690, according to extant records of a Swedish trapper who lived here. I’m not sure of the Native history, unfortunately.) Carson has dug up the diaries and farming journals of his grandparents, and their parents, and their parents. In his barn, on which he’s spelled out in big letters, “Perham Settlement Farm Museum,” he keeps farming and household implements saved through time.
The barn, by the way, feels a bit like stepping into a planetarium, because Carson’s father and uncle pricked thousands of holes into the roof with nails. Each hole lets in a point of light, like a star.
Although the land now has just a few houses spaced out along the dirt road, once it was a thriving community of a few dozen families. (Carson says they produced different items and bartered among themselves for every need they couldn’t supply themselves.) A few cellar holes are still visible in the land — stone-fortified gaps in the ground. Rusting old cars from the mid-20th century have been left in the fields — remnants from more modern times. Hinkley has marked all these sights with signs.
Additionally, his research has shown him who was buried where in the old cemetery on the grounds, and he has placed laminated handwritten signs in front of the worn stones — if they once had an inscription, they’ve since eroded away. “Old man Joe Rowe, died around 1850” and “Alberton Moulton, age 10 years.” Some of the marked gravestones, standing in a line, face out toward the field and peat bog, placed there as if to watch the changing seasons and passing wildlife. Hinkley’s own parents are buried here in the cemetery — his mother, who lived here with him, just died in the spring. On his father’s grave, Carson has written: “Wilson Earle Hinkley, March 8, 1923. July 9, 2003. Born on the land, died on the land.” The cemetery is just one spot you can visit on the 3.3 miles of trails that Hinkley keeps up meticulously by driving his lawn mower through the trail system every week or two weeks.
The views from the meadows of surrounding mountain peaks are incredible, especially from the large field farthest away from the farmhouse. Mossy trails weave through forests, grassy tails edge fields. The trails that thread through forests occasionally open into small grassy areas, creating ideal bird viewing terrain. The trail system includes two overlooks for mountain viewing. (One is a bit overgrown at the moment, however.) Most of the paths are wide, easy, and pretty, almost wheelchair accessible (a wheelchair could get down part of the main path heading out toward the meadows). Definitely don’t miss the meadow-loop trail closest to Carson’s farmhouse — the views of the meadow are lovely, and Perham Stream is beautiful, with a few deepish pools and a small cobblestone beach.
Since High Peaks Alliance conserved the land, it has developed a couple more walking trails in addition to the mown and mossy tracks. The Perham Stream Trail hews close to the river, bringing you to the water’s edge to take in its large, rounded boulders, small falls, and pools. This trail is a bit rougher than the wide ones that swing around the property. Additionally, you can now make a complete loop from the post office cellar foundation back to the main trail along a footpath.
Directions: From Farmington, take Route 4 North to Phillips, turning right at the junction of Route 4 and 142. At the stop sign, turn left. Stay on Route 142 leaving Phillips and drive 2.5 miles from town, turning left onto the East Madrid Road at the Manzer sign. Drive 4.7 miles, until crossing a small bridge over the Perham Stream. Look for the birding trail kiosk and park on the side of the road.
