The official boat launch requires navigating through Round Pond before reaching South Pond.
South Pond is a 284-acre body of water located in Greenwood, Oxford County, Maine (see The Maine Atlas and Gazetteer map 10 B4). This pond is part of a cluster of lakes bunched together in this area and which I have fished for salmonids in the past (click here, here, here, and here). The public boat ramp, called the Mike Giunta memorial boat launch, is located by Howe Hill Road off Route 26 (Main Street) in Greenwood. I have to look for the place because it is not clearly indicated, either on Route 26 or Howe Hill Road. The hard-topped ramp is narrow, steep, and next to deep water. Plenty of parking is available. I found it challenging to retrieve my boat at the end of today’s trip because I had to place the trailer mostly out of the deep water and on the steep launch. It took a lot of arm juice to manually crank my boat up unto its trailer… Access to South Pond from this location is tricky. With the ramp in your back, navigate to the upper right-hand corner of the (unnamed) water body and pass underneath the railroad tracks. From there, navigate to the left through Round Pond until you enter South Pond through a wide but shallow passage. I was disoriented and got lost while motoring through Round Pond and its multiple islands and shallow weedy areas. I used the GPS on my phone to get me out of the maze… It takes about 15 minutes of no-wake boating to reach my destination from the boat ramp. While trolling, I noticed a small beach at the southwestern end of South Pond next to Greenwood Road. I checked it out at the end of this trip and found a small, dirt boat launch next to the beach. This launch is not shown on The Maine Atlas and Gazetteer. A large sign states that the beach is for use by local residents only. I do not know if this restriction also applies to the launch next to it… Plenty of parking is available across the road from this launch.
