• Tide and Current Taxi: 2013

When the sun rose the next morning the island was strewn with color; canoes, tarps, backpacks,

and the tent that May built with driftwood tent poles and paddle anchors.

It slept six people comfortably.

The campers were just starting to wake up,

so I took a refreshing dip in the river,

and set about making breakfast.

About half the weight Lindsay Z., Mauro, and I carried for the first day of the trip was dedicated to having a hot cup of coffee that morning.

I also planned on oatmeal, but forgot about utensils. Lindsay L. improvised with a recycled bowl and shell found on the island. “Its good!” she said, but no one else would try the shell-spoon.

A few more of us went swimming,

and I took some pictures of the boat crews. This was the scout boat; Shana, Nick and Seneca. Their job had been to travel ahead and ‘read’ the river. There were rapids, dams, and waterfalls that the scout boat guided expertly through.

This was my boat with Mauro, and Linsay Zappas. We were called ‘The Boat’ or ‘Mauriendsay’ and we brought up the rear of the expedition.

Here are members of ‘Discovery 69’ and the ‘The Doritos’.

This boat crew saved the expedition twice. Anastasia, Michaela, and Kristian’s team (Kristian must have been off exploring the island during this photograph) first solicited help from the postman who drove us around the dams, and it was Michaela who gave me duct tape for my leaking boat.

Of all the crews and boaters, Seneca seemed the most equipped for this kind of travel. I think he could have kept going for months.

We gathered for a group picture. (from the left, that’s Anastasia, Michaela, Prerna, Harold, May, Kristian, Zach, Josh, Danny, John, Mira, Joiri, Trevor, Eric, Shana, Jordyn, Chris, Nick, Linsay L, Linsay Z, Seneca, Sam, Louis, Mauro, and Omar)

We packed up, leaving only the driftwood from May’s tent standing on the island.

As we set off down the Kennebec I noticed that something was wrong,

There were now only 8 boats instead of 9.

It turned out that the Doritos ran aground on the far side of the island and had to paddle back upstream.

I felt much better when the boats were all together again.

Our mission the second day was to go a little slower, do some improvised fishing,

take in some of the scenery,

and many of the boats grouped together in what became known as ‘canoodling’.

It was a good day for taking it easy.

Then the Doritos had an idea. “Why don’t we attach all the boats together and take a picture from high up.”

“Sounds pretty good.” I said.

We set up the shot,

but it seemed like the situation called for something special. You see, we had been in a kind of photo-texting war with Sarah, the director of Skowhegan.  A few days prior, some of the participants had climbed Mount Katahdin, and as a joke, they sent Sarah a photo of them pretending to be dead:

“Disaster on Mt Katahdin!’ the caption said.

Sarah got back at the group with this picture. “Disaster!’ she wrote, “We forgot to tell you Jay Z was coming to lunch!” This is what we were missing.

Having no access to photoshop, we decided to stick with the dead routine for our message back to Sarah.

She replied with this one. ‘You guys are killing me.’ she wrote.

A few miles on, we began to see a strange formation in the river.

There was a string of little islands constructed out of timber and landfill.

Omar suggested that they were the foundation of an old train bridge.

The largest island in the string was a real island,

and we stopped to swim.

Zach conducted swimming competitions in the fast current,

Mira started a group drawing that she turned into a bottle-message-time-capsule,

Mauro fished,

Prerna hunted for signs of life on the island,

and the only other person we saw all day was two hundred of feet above.

Soon it was time to go.

I wasn’t sure how long it would take to paddle to Augusta, and that was the only place that we would be able to take the boats out of the water.

In a few hours, we began to see signs of civilization,

and the spires of Augusta came into view.

As we approached the first bridges of the city, I notice that the group had stopped moving and lashed their boats together.

Luis was teaching them all a song that he wrote about the river.

“The Kennebec is like an angry wife….” it began.

It was like the group was having a hard time letting go of the river. When the our landing spot was in sight, the boats hung back, clinging together.

The first person we saw in Augusta was a teenager. He appeared to be waiting for us to pass so that he could tag the bridge.

We noticed the remains of Edward’s Dam that separated the upper and lower Kennebec.

Now that the dam has been removed, tidal water comes all the way into Augusta, along with some of the fish that used to flourish in the Kennebec.

It also meant that we had reached our goal of traveling to the ocean, technically, by reaching salt water.

It’s just that the ocean met us half-way.

Now we had to make a decision: should we stop here in Augusta or keep going to the next town?

Luis read to the group about some of the local attractions in Augusta.

“Pond Town Tavern, Top Nails, Fat Toads Pub, Riverfront Barbeque and Grill…”

The decision was made.

We stowed everything under the boats,

and the first group hit the town.

Mauro, Omar, Louis and I stay back with the boats,

but we didn’t miss anything in the way of food.

Between the three of them, delicious snacks come out,

and drinks.

It felt funny to have stopped moving.

Soon it was my turn to go into town,

and I met up with the gang for BBQ.

After only two days on the river, it felt like a feast.

Back at the little park where we docked the boats, something was happening.

An extremely active metal band was playing before a subdued crowd.

There was some dispute about weather they were actually playing their instruments, or just singing along with prerecorded tracks,

but whatever they were doing, it was with lots of enthusiasm.

It is sort of hard to describe what happened next.

The enthusiasm was infectious,

and we ran for the stage.

The song was an ACDC cover…

“Cause the walls start shaking… the earth was quaking…”

“my mind was aching… and we were making it…”

“and  YOU…  shook me   ALL… NIGHT… LONG…”

“You guys should come on our next tour.” said the lead singer,

but it was time to continue our own tour.

Harrold came running down the gangplank, holding out a fan of dollar bills.

It turns out that some of the crew purchased raffle tickets at the concert. Harold won the entire pot. 97 of Augusta’s hard earned dollars were now in Harold’s possession.

We slipped off into the setting sun like pirates,

still laughing and singing along on the other shore.

We could still see the party across the water,

but it would be easier to get picked up from here.

We had just one more prank to play.

Everyone acted dead when the Sarah and the rescuing committee rolled up to get us.

It didn’t last long, everyone piled on our rescuers as though we’de been at sea for months.

Louis, Linsey, and Mauro performed the Kennebec song for our rescuing committee,

complete with chorus line.

We still had work to do.

I mostly took pictures as the crew lashed the canoes onto the truck,

and everyone piled into the vans.

Back at the common house, Harold spent his 97 dollars on beer, and we told stories from our trip.

Thank you Skowhegan Class of 2013, Sarah Workneh, Guy Debord, Nick Johnston, Jeff Williams, Michael Berryhill, Ronny Quievedo, everyone who aided and abetted the most fantastic journey.