Fort Kent girls use trip to build bond

Coach Dan Cyr takes his Fort Kent girls soccer team down to Boston for an annual summer trip, but he prefers the Warriors not think too much about soccer during the time away.

Sure, there will be a little bit of the sport mixed in with the three-day trip. The group was to attend a Major League Soccer game and play two friendly high school matchups, but soccer isn’t the point of the trip.

“It’s basically a bonding thing, where they develop friendships, and the cultural thing, the change of scenery, seeing what the city life’s about,” Cyr said Friday morning. “Then we come home to our rural, country living.”

The team and several chaperones were due to leave early Saturday morning, with a possible stop at L.L. Bean in Freeport, and then head to the new CMGI Field for a New England Revolution-Kansas City Wizards game at 4 p.m. (the Wizards won 4-2).

The whole crew camped out, and over the next two days they had a number of activities planned, including a trip to Quincy Market in Boston, games against high schools from Methuen and Salem, Mass., and a stop at Hampton Beach, N.H., on the way back to Maine.

Cyr only allows three tents for all of the girls and chaperones. This year the entire group numbers 24, and the girls will have to crowd into two tents.

“If they have to pack 10 into a tent, that’s fine and dandy,” he said. “They sleep crossways and sideways but that’s all part of it. The girls remember those things.”

The girls raise money for the trip by working at Camp Kick It, a soccer camp for kids ages 5-11. Cyr organizes the camp but the girls on his team do the coaching. He pays the coaches per session and the more sessions they work, the more of their trip is paid. Incoming freshmen don’t have to pay for the trip.

Cyr said Fort Kent will open its soccer season the first week of August. Many Aroostook County schools open early for the potato harvest and then close for a few weeks in the fall.

McMillan leaves Rams swimming

Ginny McMillan, who coached the Bangor High girls swim team to runner-up honors at the Class A girls championships and a Penobscot Valley Conference title last season, has resigned after four years with the Rams.

McMillan’s husband Sean, who served as an assistant coach, said they are expecting a baby in August and didn’t feel they would have enough time to coach.

Under McMillan the Rams won three straight PVC titles and never finished below third place at the state meet.

McMillan attended Bangor High for three years and graduated from Gould Academy in Bethel in 1990. She swam for the University of Maine for two years.

Both McMillans were standout swimmers during their days at Bangor High (Ginny McMillan was known as Ginny Farrington then).

She replaced Nick Voikos before the 1999-2000 season.

Jessica Bloch can be reached at 990-8193, 1-800-310-8600 or jbloch@bangordailynews.net.