Sebago Lake

The landlocked salmon of the northeast are named after this lake. Salmo salar sebago, sea salmon that got left behind when the ocean withdrew.

As the glaciers retreated this whole watershed sat under seawater. The land rose once the weight of the ice came off, the sea pulled back, and the salmon and smelt swimming here stayed where they were. They adapted to fresh water and never went out again. Sebago is the deepest lake in Maine at 316 feet and remains one of the better salmon fisheries in New England.

The narrow water at Naples is the other thing worth knowing. The Songo River winds between Sebago and Brandy Pond, and partway along it sits Songo Lock, built in 1830 for the Cumberland and Oxford Canal that once carried barges from Portland right up into these lakes. Twenty seven locks lifted boats as far as Sebago and one more got them past the Songo. It is the only one of the twenty eight still standing, and a lockkeeper still works the gates by hand.