The Pemadumcook Chain of Lakes are a set of large lakes in north-central Maine in the United States.
Name
Thoreau's Pamadumcook or Joseph Chadwick's Bennedumcook is rendered by the United States Geographical Board in an 1897 decision as "Pemadumcook Lake".
Geography
The Pemadumcook chain of lakes forms the largest body of water in view as one gazes south from Mount Katahdin. If one takes a landscape picture from that summit, these lakes span the distance from the Piscataquis Mountains in the west to North Twin dam on Elbow Lake in the east. It is the fifth-largest lake system in Maine, exceeded only by Moosehead Lake at , Sebago Lake at , Chesuncook Lake at , and Flagstaff Lake at . The Pemadumcook Chain of Lakes occupy . Individually Mooselookmeguntic Lake is larger than Pemadumcook, but it is not larger than the chain.
The series of lakes are named Ambajejus, Elbow, North Twin, Pemadumcook and South Twin Lake. The lakes are part of the West Branch of the Penobscot River. The West Branch enters the northwest corner of Ambajejus, and the current flows south through that lake. The channel passes Deep Cove on the east and Porus Islands to the west. The river channel then passes east through the east end of Pemadumcook into the head of North Twin Lake at Indian Point. The channel then follows a southeasterly course across North Twin Lake, staying between Perrow Point and Spring Island, and then veering eastward past Snake Point in sight of the settlement of Norcross. The channel then passes due east through the Elbow to North Twin dam. The length of the channel is about . The combined length of the lake from the North Twin Dam, following the channel in reverse to the Porus Islands and thence to the northwest corner of Pemadumcook at Nahmakanta Stream, is nearly . There is a large boulder in Nahmakanta Stream where the Appalachian Trail appears on the south bank of the stream. It is not prudent to take a motorboat west of the boulder.
The meaning of Pemadumcook in Penobscot is "lake with gravelly or sandy bottom or sand bars". The principal islands in the lake include the Porus Islands in Pemadumcook, Jo Mary Island on the south side of that lake and Moose Island and Gull Rock on the north side of the lake. The Porus islands, while principally in Pemadumcook, do divide Pemadumcook to the west and south from Ambajejus to the north. The islands separating North Twin Lake from South Twin Lake are all south of Spring Island. The channel between North and South Twin Lake between the western shore and these islands runs north and south and is called the Narrows. The islands in South Twin include the Rock Pile which marks the southwest corner of the archipelago of islands separating North and South Twin Lakes, Peanut Island, and the reef that runs between it and the Rock Pile to the north. There are a couple of islands in Partridge Cove at the southeast corner of the lake, and Oak Island and several other islands are on the south side of the lake at the mouth of Ragged Brook.
The deepest parts of the lake are , about southwest of Moose Island in Pemadumcook, and , just north of the ridge in Ambajejus Lake. There are numerous rocks in the lake, and the spring runoff brings many logs floating about. If the water is quite high one need not concern oneself about boulders in the middle of the lake. Exceptions include but are not restricted to a large reef at the west end of South Twin Lake that runs north and south and a large rock pile north-northwest of Partridge Cove which is usually marked. There are a couple of reefs in North Twin and a long reef about north of Indian Point Island. The Porus Islands and Deep Cove have plenty of boulders. There is a surprising rock pile about east of Jo Mary island.
Watershed
The inlets to the lake are at Ragged Brook and Lincoln Brook on South Twin, the West Branch of the Penobscot at Ambajejus, Jo Mary Stream on the south side of Pemadumcook, and Nahmakanta Stream at the northwest corner of Pemadumcook. Twitchell Brook enters the lake near a point where the Appalachian Trail provides a view of the lake, but there is no inlet.
Road access to the lake is provided by Maine State Route 11 on the east side. This runs past Partridge Cove at the southeast corner of South Twin Lake and then serves the area up to Norcross. Millinocket is about east of Norcross on Maine Route 11. The paved portion of the Millinocket–Baxter State Park road gives access to Spencer Cove at the northeast end of Ambajejus Lake about from Millinocket. A dike at Spencer Cove created by the Great Northern Paper Company prevents water from flowing from Ambajejus Lake, spillway elevation , into adjacent Millinocket Lake, elevation .