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Northern New England: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont

flows east for a while, then turns south. It eventually empties into the Kennebec River near the town of Brunswick. Maine experiences four distinct seasons. Winters are cold and snowy. Summers tend to be humid and warm, but generally not hot. Spring arrives relatively late, and autumn early. Frosts typically occur as late as May or, in northern Maine, June. And ther- mometers begin dipping below freez- ing in late September. Temperatures tend to be milder in the south and along the coast. For example, on an average day in January, Portland will experience a low of 13º Fahrenheit (–11º Celsius) and a high of 31ºF (0ºC). In a typical winter, about 72 inches (183 cm) of snow falls on Portland. By contrast, Caribou— located in the northern county of Aroostook—gets about 112 inches (285 cm) of snow in a typical winter. In January, Caribou residents can look forward to a bone-chilling average daily low of 1ºF (–17ºC), and an aver- age daily high of 20ºF (–7ºC). In July, Caribou’s average daily temperature

Did You Know?

West Quoddy Head, a small peninsula near the Maine town of Lubec, is the easternmost piece of land in the conti- nental United States.

The Appalachian Mountain region also contains Maine’s biggest lakes. Covering about 120 square miles (311 sq km), Moosehead Lake, in Piscataquis County, is the largest. In all, Maine has more than 6,000 lakes and ponds. Some 32,000 miles (51,500 km) of rivers and streams flow through Maine. The Kennebec is Maine’s longest river. It flows 170 miles (274 km), rising at Moosehead Lake and emptying into the Gulf of Maine near the city of Bath. Four tributaries com- bine in east-central Maine to form the Penobscot River. It runs south for nearly 110 miles (177 km) before emptying into Penobscot Bay. The Androscoggin River enters Maine’s Oxford County from New Hampshire,