Kayakers undaunted by downpour, late night ‘Bigger than Rodeo’ video set at Ski Rack tonight

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Did you get caught in the rain last Saturday? I was talking with a colleague Monday about his weekend and the topic of weather naturally popped up. Dick Shaw, our resident historian, author, and editorial page assistant, had attended the Blistered Fingers Bluegrass festival in Sidney. Right in the middle of Rhonda Vincent’s (the reigning queen of Blue Grass) set the heavens opened up and dumped barrels of water on the show. Shaw said Vincent grabbed her mandolin and the band headed for their tour bus like a blue streak.

What water that didn’t fall out of the sky in Sidney drifted eastward and baptized me and a gaggle of friends paddling on the upper reaches of the Bagaduce River in Brooksville (or Sedgwick depending on which side of the river we were on at the time).

The idea for this trip began months ago when my wife Kathy was looking at a brochure for kayak trips offered by Karen Francoeur at Castine Kayak Adventures. The horseshoe crab mating tour grabbed her eye, and she decided that was something she wanted to do since these prehistoric critters of the deep don’t get to these parts much (other than to mate). I was delighted and a bit surprised, since Kathy has pretty much left kayaking to me.

Last year we nearly got to the point of doing some paddling together but a car accident messed up her shoulder just enough to put paddling off for the season. Once last fall she got a chance to paddle on Pushaw with me and our friend Robert Causey. Other than a couple of evening excursions in a tandem kayak to view the phosphorescence, that’s been it.

I’d picked up a new kayak the week before and this would be the perfect trip to christen it.

So off we headed Saturday morning, bright (well, not really too bright) and early (OK, not that early), and set course for Bagaduce Falls in Brooksville where we’d rendezvous with Francoeur, Dave and Deb Morrill of Orrington, Charlie (the eagle guy) and Barbara Todd of Orrington, Mike Granger of Sedgwick, and Annie Cardinaux, who is studying eel grass for the Bagaduce Watershed Association this summer.

We arrived at the launch site a little early and did a little bird watching while waiting for the gang to show up. Several osprey were soaring about, a mature eagle glided overhead and landed several hundred yards downstream on the shore and a merganser with half a dozen chicks on her back drifted in the current not far from shore. And of course there was the usual compliment of gulls and cormorants.

Bagaduce Falls is a natural attraction like Blue Hill Falls. The incoming tide is squeezed through bridge abutments and forced out the upriver side much like water coming out of a hose nozzle. It makes for some awesome whitewater, and folks who river kayak often play here. As the tide rises the water level downstream can get a foot or two higher than the upriver side until the upriver side is full.

Then as the tide drops the flow reverses and the whitewater is on the downstream side of the bridge.

At the appointed hour our group assembled, introductions were made, boats outfitted, and we launched, making our way upstream along the shore. Here and there someone would call attention to a crab sighting and we’d rally around the spot. And so we progressed, slowly, up river, taking time to check out a commercial oyster farming operation and some strange jelly-like blobs that none of us could identify. We decided they were alien pods.

Slightly less than 2 miles upstream, we put ashore for a stretch at Granger’s house for a snack and a drink. Having a place to go to get away from the bothersome mosquitoes was great.

After getting back on the water we headed a little farther upstream to catch a glimpse of a nesting eagle. As we got to within a safe viewing distance (you don’t want to roust a nesting bird) it began to rain a little, then a little more, and in minutes it was coming down in buckets. The water around us was clapping with the sound of millions of huge raindrops colliding with the surface.

As we made our way to the western shore I glanced over at the nearby island and there on a limb overhanging the water, looking damp and ruffled, was a mature eagle. I think I saw him shrug his shoulders as if to say, “Nice weather, huh?”

We regrouped to wait for the storm to pass, then assessed our degree of dryness. Granger offered to transport anyone who wished back to the put-in point. Kathy and I and Annie opted to get out of the rain and the rest of the group paddled farther up river. They told me later they saw another half-dozen eagles.

The downpour turned into a light rain and after a while it stopped altogether. Kathy and I took some time to explore Cape Rosier and later hooked up with the group at Dennett’s Wharf for drinks and a bite to eat.

Monday evening I met Causey at Gould’s Landing at Pushaw Lake for what I thought was going to be a short paddle around a few islands to celebrate the summer solstice. We got on the water around 7:45 p.m. and headed north past Dollar Island and then Hardwood Island. Then we passed Lakeside Landing and kept on past the Twin Islands and headed on north to Causey’s former haunt, the Bunny Hutch (he’s a city boy now). I figured we’d ask his former landlady for a ride back down the lake to get our vehicles and that’d be it.

Well, when we got to her shore, we weren’t sure we wanted to bother her, so we turned around and headed back through a cloud of mosquitoes. It was just about dark, by this time, and we were more than 4 miles from our put-in. About a mile and a half into our return, just off Lakeside Landing, we decided it was time for a snack. We rafted up and Causey had me extricate a soft-sided cooler he had in his rear hatch.

Out came a container of smoked salmon dip, some crackers, a package of pepper-seasoned Monterey Jack, and a couple of beers! I turned on a white marker light and we drifted in the dark on a warm breeze while enjoying dinner alfresco and discussing the potential design of a table we could use to tie two boats together to make such a picnic a little more user friendly. The only convenience we’d be missing then would be a restroom!

Dinner complete, we packed up the leftovers and headed south, navigating toward streetlights at Gould’s Landing in the distance. A crescent moon rode over our right shoulders. The rhythmic swoosh of our paddles, the yodeling of loons and an occasional barking of a dog in the distance provided our return symphony. Bullfrogs at the landing signaled our arrival a little after 10:45 p.m.

I got word too late last week to let you whitewater aficionados know about this awesome-sounding film that’s coming to the Ski Rack on Hogan Road at 6 p.m. tonight (Saturday). Entitled “Bigger than Rodeo,” it’s a video put together by Karl Moser and Chris Todd, both radical water kayakers from Orrington who have taken this video on a tour of the country.

Two years ago this duo joined forces with a friend and formed The Epicocity Project, a kayaking video company. Moser sent me an e-mail describing the birth of this video: “After numerous adventures, mishaps and one world record waterfall (105 feet) we have completed our first video … and we are touring the country with it. When I got the chance to organize the premieres for our video, I knew that I had to bring it back to the boating community that supported me when I was an up-and-coming boater.”

For more information check out www.epicocity.com for some great whitewater and waterfall shots.

The fourth annual Old Fort Western Fort to Fort Canoe, Kayak and Bicycle Expedition is set for Sunday beginning at 8 a.m. from the public boat landing on Water Street in Waterville, but participants are free to put in whenever they wish. The concept is to travel by one of these conveyances between Fort Halifax in Winslow to Fort Western in Augusta (or any part of the river or roads between the two) and you get free admission to Fort Western.

This is not a race and participants can catch a free shuttle bus from Fort Western anytime from 2 to 4 p.m to get back to their vehicles.

Free water and snacks for all will be available at the halfway point at the Sidney boat landing thanks to the volunteers from the Women’s Center at Inland Hospital, Waterville.

Bicyclists can travel between the two forts via Route 104 on the western side of the Kennebec River or via Route 201 on the east.

For more information call 626-2385. A message will be left on the Fort’s answering machine by 6 a.m. on the morning of June 27 in case it is necessary to cancel the day’s events due to weather or dangerous water flow.

Jeff Strout can be reached at 990-8202 or by e-mail at jstrout@bangordailynews.net.