Sandra's Kenduskeag Adventure

by Chad Gilley
April 19, 2000

The Kenduskeag Stream Canoe Race is a rite of spring. As sure as the first peepers, or the first robin or blooming pussy willows let us know that spring is well underway, the Kenduskeag Stream Canoe Race is a sure sign that winter is gone, and better weather is close at hand.

For 34 years canoes and kayaks have gathered by the bridge in the little town of Kenduskeag, next to the Grange Hall, to start the sixteen and a half mile trek over flat water and white water through Six Mile Falls and the Shopping Cart rapids, into the concrete canyons of downtown Bangor, and ultimately to the Penobscot River.

The Kenduskeag isn't the first canoe race of the season, but it is the biggest. Partly because it's televised live on Bangor TV and radio, partly because it's so close to Bangor, and partly because it's the Kenduskeag Race, it attracts people every year who never compete in another canoe race. People come from all over New England to gather by the Kenduskeag Grange Hall.

My family first decided to go to the Kenduskeag Race last year, to cheer on my sister, Candy Perkins, a veteran of the canoe race circuit, and her son Tommy, a high school kid who's been at home in a canoe for as long as I can remember. Last year watching the race was great fun. Standing with a large crowd of onlookers on the banks of Six Mile Falls, watching people gingerly negotiate their way through the rocks and rapids is a thrill especially when there's just as much chance the racers will swim as make it.

We had so much fun that this year I called my sister in advance to let her know we were coming. I was quite surprised when she told me that her son Tommy had another partner. Candy hasn't trained for canoe season this year, and Tommy was looking to win this race. "Do you want to paddle with me?" I do have a little experience in a canoe. My father dragged my brother and I along on long canoe trips when we were young a few times and paddling sixteen miles is hard hard work. Plus my sister is a competitor. I knew that anyone paddling in the front of her canoe would be paddling hard the entire way.

"Who Me? No way. I'm pasty white computer boy remember?" Phew. I dodged that bullet. Then I called my wife, Sandra. "I'll do it!" she said. Sandra had never ever set foot in a canoe and certainly didn't have a clue what she was getting into. But once said, she was into it.

As we drove to Kenduskeag the morning of the race, we noticed that every other car had a canoe or kayak or two on the roof. The variety of colors and kinds of boats that lined the banks of the Kenduskeag Stream was amazing. While I took my sons to the breakfast at the Grange Hall, Sandra and Candy got the boat together and dragged it to the shore.

Every competitor in the Kenduskeag Race gets a number. The boats start the race in groups of five in one minute intervals. This year four hundred thirty two boats started the race. It took nearly an hour and a half to get them all started. Boats one through five went first, then six through ten and so on until finally number 432 started under the bridge.

I was watching for three boats. Time Warner Cable Director of Advertising Sales Bill McEnaney and his friend Craig Wells were in boat number 61. They've paddled in the Kenduskeag race twice before. My nephew Tommy Perkins and his partner Bobby Hessler were in boat number 135. Serious competitors in the junior/senior class, they knew they had a chance to win, and they were going for it hard. Sandra and Candy were in 154. Candy was racing her seventh Kenduskeag race. She knew she had an amateur in the front seat, but still was hoping for a respectable run. Sandra just wanted to survive.

We saw them all off and then jumped in the car. Next stop: Six Mile Falls. If there's one spot that gets all the attention in the Kenduskeag race, it's Six Mile Falls. The Falls are right off Route 15 and hundreds of people line the banks to watch the competitors pass through the class three rapid. The fact that a good percentage of those competitors will wind up swimming there might have something to do with the number of onlookers. TV cameras broadcast live and radio commentators follow the action. It's a scene that's quintessentially Maine.

The first few people down the river portage around the Falls. They carry their canoes rather than risk them in the Falls. These are hard-core competitors, and they sprint down the portage path. A short while later, the first boaters start coming through the Falls. Rescuers in wet suits stand in the shallow water ready to assist people who may take an inadvertent swim in the very chilly winter run-off in the Kenduskeag. The first few people through the Falls, experienced paddlers, glide through effortlessly. Later the less experienced will be keeping the rescuers busy and the debris of swimmers and paddles and boats will fill the pool below the falls, creating obstacles to be avoided by people who come after. The rescue crews will try and keep the channel open, but sometimes boats come so fast that's not possible.

The first of the boats we're following is Bill and Craig in 61. They easily slip through Six Mile Falls. At almost the same time, we see Tommy and Bobby in 135 also pass with ease. They've chewed up the fourteen-minute difference in start times between them and the 61 boat in the first ten miles of the race. They continue down the river, paddling intently, like a graceful, well oiled machine.

Now it's time to wait for Sandra and Candy, who started a few minutes later. While we're waiting many other canoes and kayaks pass the Falls, some make it, some don't. We watch the Gumby boat successfully slip through. A large inflatable Gumby wears a T-Shirt that says "Send Elian Home." Last year his T-Shirt said, "Gumby is Y2K compliant, but he can't swim." Later we learned that Gumby has raced every year since 1986. He's a Kenduskeag tradition. With every successful passage, there's a smattering of applause from the crowd. As people dump, you hear the OOOOOHs.

After about forty-five minutes, we see Sandra and Candy in their red canoe. Later we learn that TV reporters who interviewed them above the falls delayed them. They make it through the falls, but just at the end, when it looks like they've made it, BAM, they hit a submerged rock and over they go. Sandra keeps hold of the canoe. With the help of the rescue crews, they dump the water they've taken on and take off again to finish the final six miles of the race.<(Click for 256k Real Video)

There is one more rapid before the finish line in Bangor. Where the Kenduskeag passes through a deep rocky gorge you'll find Shopping Cart. I never did learn who gave these rapids their names. We skip that one to go right to the end, in downtown Bangor. There old stonework and concrete banks tame the Kenduskeag, which flows under road bridges and footpaths. By the time we get there Tommy and Bobby have finished, as have Bill and Craig. We learn that Bill and Craig dumped at Shopping Cart. Bill says the water is really cold.

The scene it the end of the race is similar to the start. Canoes and kayaks line the bank of the river, but the people, who've been paddling hard for more than two hours are spent. A lot just strip off their wet paddling clothes and bask in the sun. Some load their canoes onto cars as they wait. Others get massages or eat something to replenish their bodies. We head over to the bridge that serves as the official finish line. There, inside a U-Haul truck sits the race official in front of his computers. As racers pass under the bridge, he enters their numbers into the computer. They yell out their numbers as they pass, just to make certain he gets it. Before long here comes Candy and Sandra, number 154. Later Sandra tells me she was "Very very happy" to see the big red "Finish Line" sign.

Our sons help Candy and Sandy pull their canoe out of the water. Sandra changes out of her wet clothes, and sits in the sun. She made it. Later she admits that a sixteen and a half mile race might not have been the best choice for her first canoeing experience.

Any boat not finished the race by 3:30 is disqualified. At 3:45 racers receive their awards. Tommy and Bobby won their Junior Senior class, First place! They both get a plaque in the shape of a canoe. I've seen those before. They're all over the walls of my sister's house. Add another to the collection. Bill and Craig beat their time for both their previous runs. They would have done better except for their swim at Shopping Cart. Candy and Sandy finished the race in just under 4 hours, including the delays for the TV interview and the short swim at Six Mile Falls.

After the race is over I ask Sandra how it was. "It was pure hell. I'm so glad it's over." But this story is going to go a long way. I expect though, that next year, if Candy asks Sandra to paddle in her boat, she'll hesitate a bit and then say "Sure,” but I could be wrong.

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