Shake Down and Planning

Scout trip day 2. After a night of no sleep with an ill scout, one thing I’ll remember for a long time is the third adult leader of our crew saying when he woke up, “What happened? I had no idea you guys were up all night, I must of slept through all of it.” Well, it was a good thing he slept through all of it because after we stopped at the Dunkin for coffee and breakfast sandwiches, I handed him the keys to the van and said, “Your turn to drive, I’m sleeping now.” And with most of the other scouts oblivious to what had happened the previous night except that one of their friends wasn’t making it on the trip, we headed farther north to Grand Lake Matagamon, about a 3 hour drive, just past Mount Katahdin and the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. I slept for most of the highway part which turned out to be only an hour and a half or so, but at least it was something. We stopped for more gas and a bathroom break at which point I called the base camp to let them know about our situation. It wasn’t a problem, we just needed to figure out how to get the scout to his dad. After some brief discussion, we decided that once we got to the lake, I would head across in the boat with the staff from the camp and all the scouts and the other 2 adult leaders would drive the departing scout a couple hours south to alleviate the drive for his dad who was planning on doing the whole drive up and back, a total of at least 14 hours, in one day.

When we got to the lake, clouds had moved in and the sky began spitting a cool rain. We parked, threw on our class A uniforms and rain coats, unloaded our gear onto the pontoon boat for transport to base camp, moved the van, and got under way. I don’t know what I was expecting, but even in the rain, the view was beautiful. There were a few houses on distant shores of the lake, but it was largely uninhabited and with the clouds hanging low over the water and obscuring the larger hills around, it gave one a sense of serenity and remoteness. On the boat ride over, one scout had their hat blown off in the wind, luckily to be retrieved, and upon arrival on the distant shore, with a brief history of the massif overlooking our departure point and the Penobscot legend behind it, we met our guide for the week who cheerily got all our names and led us up to the camp. Where the base camp is located used to be an old camp for loggers returning from the back country, complete with post office, store, lodging and all of what would constitute a small town. Soon after dropping our packs under a pavilion on the outskirts of a clearing, we headed up to the map room, formerly a post office, where the scouts were shown essentially a map of the whole northern 3/5 of Maine and were told that was their playground. In order to prepare a trip for the scouts, the staff had them pick a few things they were interested in doing, the scouts finally deciding on rump bumping, wildlife viewing, and fishing as their top picks. They also indicated they didn’t want to push themselves too hard on the water, which I personally thought was a good choice as most, if not all of them had never been on a week long canoe trip unsupported by others. Once they made that decision, they were told they would be back later at which point 2 different trips would be pitched to them and they would decide on which one they wanted to be theirs.

Upon leaving the map room, our guide took the scouts down the hill and I headed over to the office to make sure all the medical paperwork was in order (which it was as I went over it again and again and again). The scouts at that point were brought over to the commissary to check out their tents, backpacks, kitchen gear, paddles, life vests, helmets, and food for the week. I sat back upon leaving the office and watched it all unfold, attempting a few times to lay down on a bench and catch a few minutes of sleep to no avail. I enjoyed seeing them be taught how to pack their gear, load their food in reverse order in the packs, and work together to make it all happen. Once all the food was packed and tents and kitchen gear loaded in “Kendra” our kitchen backpack that must have weighed around a hundred pounds, it was time for our gear shakedown. We moved on over to the pavilion where we had initially dropped our gear and were told to lay out everything we brought to make sure it wasn’t excessive. As compared to some other past units, we had done our homework, performed our own shakedown, and passed with flying colors. We had one large 110L backpack for 2 people so everything had to be concise and necessary. We then shoved all our gear into the larger backpacks and headed back to the map room to find out where we were headed.

As I sat in the back of the room behind the scouts listening to the two trips being pitched, I silently hoped they would choose the first option, only because it sounded like more fun to me. But as the adult in the room, I only watched and hoped. When they did in fact choose the first option, I was inwardly elated. We would be canoeing the Allagash River starting at Churchill Dam and following it to its terminus at the small town of Allagash where it meets the St. John River, just about at the Canadian border. By then it was go time. We headed back down to our gear to find the other two leaders who had driven the scouts south had finally arrived just in time to pack up, head down to the lake, load up our canoes and head to our campsite for the night, Trailbound 1. It was literally a 5 minute paddle a couple hundred yards down the shoreline, but intended to get the scouts used to loading their gear in a canoe, unloading it, setting up pack lines, storing canoes on shore, and setting up camp.

Trailbound 1 was a trying spot, the path littered with poison ivy and a short, but steep muddy slope up to our campsite, but the sun had finally come out and things were beginning to dry. We all helped out that first day, sloughing gear up the muddy slope, handing packs up and stowing our canoes on dry land. Once at our little clearing, our guide indicated it was now up to the scouts to set everything up. That was more than fine with the adults, especially the two who were running on fumes with very little sleep from the night before. The two of us with little sleep were so gassed and tired that almost everything that happened became hilarious. The other leader at multiple times spread his gear out around him looking for things that were right in front of him, then wandered the campsite with a toothbrush as I was sitting crying from laughing so hard. The scouts for their part were tired by that point as well from a full day of activity, but we pulled it all together and got it done that night. I forget what we had for dinner, but it was good. And soon after dinner, I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore and headed into bed for an early morning rise and paddle across the lake to get our ride even farther north. Finally, sweet sleep on a small pad on the ground.