Gulf Voices
Kayak guide finds like-minded soul in river book
Printer Friendly Page
By Lee Bumsted
THERE WAS A STRETCH of time in my adult life when I didn't live in Maine, but often vacationed here.
After I moved back, friends asked me where I would travel on holidays, since I was living year-round
in my vacation destination. I replied that I would happily explore close to home. A sea kayak has
proven to be an ideal way to do just that. It allows me to see the bays and rivers of coastal Maine,
to quietly observe wildlife and shorelines from a position just a few feet above the water.
Gibson shares his delight in discovering how quiet and relatively undeveloped these river shorelines
are today, while recalling their role as transportation corridors for early inhabitants. He notes
that they once hosted much industry, from manufacturing to shipbuilding to ice harvesting. For
instance, there were 47 ice-harvesting operations on the Kennebec by 1900. As the old industries
disappeared, the vegetation grew back in. Shoreline trees now serve as perches for ospreys and
bald eagles.
As he paddles along, Gibson finds that his kayak's hull is not coated with oil slicks and industrial
effluent, as it might have been in the past. He recalls the days when effluent fumes ate away the
paint of riverfront buildings, and when you could smell some rivers before you could see them.
(I can still remember the noxious odor of the Androscoggin from my days living in Lewiston,
a mile from its shores.) He describes how the rivers have a long way to go, however, before they
are truly restored.
In Rivers of Memory, Gibson delves into more than the rivers' past and future. He celebrates what
they offer today. “With the seat of your pants in a kayak, you are of the river and see the passing
world from an unguarded angle,” he writes. “That angle always reveals something of the character of
a place that cannot be obtained from land.”
He enjoys stealthily observing the land he paddles by, and happening upon wildlife unaware of
his presence. He finds his method of travel also gives him time to ponder and reflect. Kayaking
mostly on August weekdays, Gibson is surprised that he sees few other boaters. “There cannot be
many places on the entire Eastern Seaboard where one can have a whole river to oneself, but here
is one in Maine,” he writes of his trip along the Sheepscot. Much of what he sees is similar to
what people travelling these waters 200 years ago would have seen, and he notes how rare that
opportunity is.
“There are fewer and fewer points where we can experience the earth unvarnished. We turn to high
mountains, to islands, and to rivers for this connection.”
The author feels there is no need to travel to remote regions when there is so much to see close
at hand, if only you find ways to look for it. Like Gibson, I find joy in visiting Maine's
nearby coastal waters in my kayak. I also enjoy revisiting them. Every summer I spend a week
paddling the same favorite part of Penobscot Bay, and each time I discover new perspectives on
the landscape and seascape. I am delighted when I spot infrequently seen creatures, such as harbor
porpoises, but also happy to find the rugosa roses blooming in the same island locations.
Closer to home, I often paddle one section of Freeport's Harraseeket River over the course of the
summer. The trip is never the same twice: the light varies, a great blue heron swoops down or a
seal pops up, the weather shifts in unexpected ways. I learn more about the coast of Maine, and how
to experience it, each time I launch my sea kayak.
Gibson is the author of several New England hiking and travel books. In Rivers of Memory, nearly
two dozen of his evocative photographs accompany the text. River highlights are mapped out at the
beginnings of chapters. This is a book to inspire journeys of discovery, to reexamine the familiar
from new vantage points. John Gibson, with a little help from Henry David Thoreau, is an engaging
and knowledgeable guide to Maine's midcoast rivers.
Lee Bumsted is a Registered Maine Guide and the author of Hot Showers! Maine Coast
Lodgings for
Kayakers and Sailors. She lives in South Portland, Maine.
© 2005 The Gulf of Maine Times
John Gibson writes eloquently of exploring close to home in his latest book, Rivers of Memory:
A Journey on Maine's Historic Midcoast Waterways. Inspired by Henry David Thoreau's account of
his week-long trip by wooden dory along the Concord and Merrimack rivers in Massachusetts, Gibson
decides to use a kayak to take a closer look at the rivers near where he lives in Hallowell, Maine.
Each day for eight days, he launches his 15-foot-long boat and explores tidal rivers such as the
Kennebec, the Damariscotta and the Sheepscot. “Thoreau opined that we get used to viewing the
regional landscape, wherever we reside, so that it gradually becomes invisible to us,” writes
Gibson. “He suggested that if we move a little amidst the familiar landscape and look at our
surroundings anew, something will be revealed to us. I set out to do just that, to grow a
little wiser about my own neck of the woods, to give myself a geography lesson, and to come
home satisfied.”
Rivers of Memory: A Journey on Maine's Historic Midcoast Waterways by John Gibson, with photographs
by the author and maps by Ruth Ann Hill, Down East Books, Camden, Maine. $14.95, paperback,
176 pages including 23 black and white photos and seven maps, (2004).