Moxie Pond Wilderness Preserve

The Appalachian Trail is the backbone of the East, traversing 14 states along the Appalachian Mountains from Maine to Georgia. While the trail’s footpath itself is protected, the lands surrounding it are often at risk. These landscapes are essential to the trail’s sense of nature and remoteness, while also providing important recreational access for local communities. For this reason, Trust for Public Land has identified 39,000 acres that must be protected to maintain and enhance the A.T. experience for the millions of hikers, campers, and visitors who explore the trail each year.

In 2020, we protected 2,620 acres at Bald Mountain Pond and have since turned our sights to an adjacent landscape—Moxie Pond. Together with Northeast Wilderness Trust, TPL is working to secure 1,845 acres of beautiful forests and lakeshore as the future Moxie Pond Wilderness Preserve. The future preserve will preclude development and logging along a five-mile stretch of the A.T., meaning hikers traversing this stretch will walk through permanently protected forests, enhancing the wilderness experience for generations. Public access to the Bald Mountain Trail, a well-loved local snowmobile and ATV route, will also be guaranteed. Protecting Moxie Pond’s shoreline will preserve scenic trail views while enhancing water quality for the forest and the surrounding plants, animals, and native fish.

Critical to protecting the integrity of the Appalachian Trail, Moxie Pond represents one of the missing puzzle pieces needed to create a more climate-resilient future for people and wildlife in the region. These vital landscapes support adaptation to a changing climate and must be preserved to ensure continued recreation, wildlife habitat, and meaningful connections to nature for visitors to Maine’s High Peaks.