740 Miles; Nuataaq on the Northern Forest Canoe Trail

In the process of developing the Paddling Bag, we made sure to stress test it in all types of brutal situations. No test could have been more rigorous or true to real conditions as when co-founder Bobby Nolan pushed himself and the bag to their limits across 6 weeks and 740 miles on the Northern Forest Canoe Trail. 

This route begins in Old Forge, New York, and ends in Fort Kent, Maine, crossing 59 lakes and ponds and 23 rivers and streams as it weaves through Vermont, Quebec, and New Hampshire before crossing Maine South to North. During this time, the Paddling Bag was his primary dry bag, ensuring his most important goods were kept free from water damage.

Bobby was prescient enough to record his journey from beginning to end in the form of a diary, like all great explorers. The following are the excerpts from his diary, and tells his complete story on the Trail from start to finish.

May 9 - Old Forge, NY
I began my 740 mile solo canoe journey from Old Forge, NY to Fort Kent, ME on Sunday morning. So far so good and updates to follow.

May 15, 2023
Day 9, 165 miles. Said goodbye to New York State after capsizing in the Plattsburgh Rapids at 5:30am this morning. Got to shore downstream and all my gear was still there lashed to the boat in waterproof bags. Crossing the Adirondacks was awesome and beautiful and a pretty tough haul with lots of take out, carry, put in, repeat but I feel really good and I got to operate two locks! Some places I’ve been before and many new. So hello Vermont! You will be brief as I head up to Quebec on the Missisquoi River before returning to Vermont then crossing over to New Hampshire and, finally, Maine’s Rangeley Lakes region up to Fort Kent. The idea that I can make it to Fort Kent was starting to creep in just a little bit before disappearing in staggering defeat as I got swept down the Plattsburgh rapids holding onto my boat with one hand and my paddle with the other. Then something really cool happens and the cycle continues. Happy belated Mother’s Day Moms!

May 20, 2023
Day 14, 243 miles. Greetings from beautiful Mansonville, Quebec! Where to start? The Missisquoi River coming out of Lake Champlain is 68 miles upstream to Mansonville, QC. Paddling upstream was fine but the last fifty river miles has numerous class 1 and 2 rapids that you have to get out of the canoe and pull the boat thru walking in the river. The first two sets of rapids gave me all that I could handle. Each took over an hour. The water level was just too low and there were no decent channels to walk thru against the current. I finished the day soaking wet and took off my shoes and my toe was puffy and infected. I hung up my wet clothes and they froze solid. I knew there was no way I could make it to Mansonville. The next day everything got warm and dry when the sun came out. I took care of my toe (which is fine now), paddled a few miles to the next set of ledges, got out, hauled everything up a hill and walked 8 miles along the rail trail to Enosburg Falls, VT pulling my boat and gear on wheels. I checked into a small hotel and I reread the maps and other info on this section. I felt the river was impassable, at least for me, and I was worried that my trip was over. I was really discouraged. My only option was to walk another 32 miles to Mansonville which I did in two days. Definitely the right choice. I’m really exhausted but I’m in a friendly B&B with a bed and a shower and lots of food and my spirits are high. Next up is Lake Memphremagog back down into Vermont. It will be great to be back on the water.

I have another story, about the kindness of strangers, that I will share in the next few days. It’s a really good one. Definitely better than this one!

May 21, 2023
Day 15, 263 miles. Prouty Beach Campground, Newport VT.

Here is my story of the kindness of strangers but first a message from the department of too much information… I began this journey in search of certain things. It started for me three years ago during the first summer of covid as I approached my 60th birthday and it evolved with every new door I stepped thru in ways that surprised me very much. I wanted to find that place inside of me from long ago before life left its marks. We all have that and I know we can all relate. And I want to see beauty first in all people and things before I see the rest of what is there.

This trip has been really hard but I’ve been overwhelmed by beauty and kindness every day including the kindness and encouragement of all of you as I make my way. I go thru new doors every day as everything is falling into place just as I had hoped. Sorry if this is too much but it’s important to the story I’m about to tell and others I will tell along the way. So here is the story about the kindness of a stranger.

On the morning I capsized in the Plattsburgh rapids I took refuge in a McDonald’s in Cumberland Bay on Lake Champlain. I found an inn at the top of North Hero Island on the GPS app and made a reservation. It was the only overnight option I could find on my route that day except for a primitive campsite described as marshy and buggy with warnings not to stay there. By the time I was ready to go I felt it was too windy to cross Champlain in my canoe so I walked 4.5 miles to the ferry and crossed the lake. I traveled a total of 25 miles that day most of it thinking about staying at an inn with a bed and a shower and a restaurant. When I finally got to that spot on the GPS I could not find the inn. I called them and I was six miles past it. Someone posted it at the wrong location. I was totally exhausted as I looked at my map. I was resigned to the marshy, buggy primitive site 3 miles further and prepared to shove off when a man about my age out for a walk stopped and asked me what I was doing. I told him about my trip and getting dunked and the inn and hoped that maybe he would let me camp in his yard. Then he said it.

I can give you a place to stay.

May I camp in your yard?

I’ll make up a room for you in my house. Have you had dinner?

I was overwhelmed with gratitude. As we walked to his house he told me he planned to retire there with his wife in a few years. She was back at home taking care of her father. I asked him what she would think of him inviting a total stranger into their home. He just smiled and shrugged. We had dinner and talked. I did laundry and dried my wet clothes and took a shower and slept in a bed. The next morning I wrote down his info and we had breakfast before he got on a zoom call for work and I walked off thinking how I could pay it forward.

This morning a young man fishing on the pier near Mansonville, QC with some others offered to help me put my boat in the water and asked where I was heading. He seemed a little troubled but definitely was not looking for anything from me. We chatted and connected a bit as I loaded the boat. He told me he suffered from depression and asked if I would friend him on Facebook and he spelled out his name. I thanked him, wrote down his name and pushed off. When I got to Newport, VT I friended him on FB.

The first man was my peer and could have easily been my neighbor and friend. The second comes from a much different place. I saw that by accepting his help and talking to him and even by friending him on FB.

And as I’m writing this a family of French Canadians sharing a pavilion with me just gave me a chocolate bar from Quebec and three pieces of cake. Carrot cake, red velvet and chocolate. They have a small poodle that looks like Penny who barked and growled at me but I was persistent and we eventually became friends.

May 24, 2023
Day 18, Total miles 314. Good morning from North Stratford, NH! Yesterday was a long day. I spent most of it paddling down the narrow and meandering Nulhegan River through a beautiful forest. The price to pay for this was beaver dams. Lots of them. Most had a small channel I could squeeze through. Some I could go right over. And some I had to get out of my boat and pull it across. On the last one I dropped my paddle and watched as it floated down the river and landed about 100’ away. I used my spare paddle to retrieve it and was on my way. The day ended with a ten mile walk bypassing the class 3 rapids and Nulhegan Gorge on the steep final descent to the Connecticut River.

Reaching New Hampshire is a big deal for me. Coming up I have the Connecticut, Upper Ammonoosuc and Androscoggin Rivers and ending with my home field the Umbagog National Wildlife Refuge. The last two rivers will be upstream and there will be more walking but I know this part of the route and I’m excited to be here. After crossing Umbagog I will enter the great state of Maine, the next big milestone, and I will be half way to Fort Kent.

But right now it’s cold and raining and I don’t want to get out of my sleeping bag. Maybe I’ll make this my first “zero” day and ponder why Google Maps is telling me it will take 12 hours to walk across the street.

May 26, 2023
Day 20, 360 total miles. Milan, NH. This is my solo canoe that I paddle on my journey. She was custom built in 1987 in Quebec and is made of Kevlar with wood gunnels and birdseye maple decks and weighs 38 pounds. She’s a beautiful canoe and gets a lot of attention because of the craftsmanship and unique color.

This boat was treated like a museum piece by everyone who ever owned her, including me. Then I took her on a 100 mile trip to the Allagash in 2021 where she took on some damage hitting rocks in the rapids and scraping bottom in low water. This trip has inflicted even more scars as we make our way, together, through sometimes unfriendly waterways. I believe my canoe is living the life she was intended to and prefers being out there versus sitting on a rack. She’s a tough boat and she was made for this.

As I was paddling out of Mansonville, Quebec on Lake Memphremagog on day 15 I connected several dots in my head and decided to give my canoe a name. The “SE Clough” after our mother, Shirley, who was born in Montreal, Quebec and raised in Brooklyn. Shirley passed away 12 years ago. She was a real beauty, perhaps even a museum piece. Her father called her Rough, Tough Shirley Clough. But she suffered the unthinkable and later a serious health crisis that left her incapacitated. Yet she endured with all the love still strong in her heart. She was the toughest person I’ve ever known.

At that moment on day 15 as I paddled south from our mother’s birthplace on a beautiful day in the SE Clough I thought of her and missed her. The suddenness of it took me by surprise. But it shouldn’t have. I just had to connect the dots.

May 28, 2023
Day 22 (morning) 378 total miles. Mollidgewock State Park Errol, NH.
I’m more than halfway to Fort Kent!

Some good wildlife sightings this week including my first two moose of the trip and a mink swimming across the Connecticut River. This morning I will paddle the last part of the Androscoggin before crossing Lake Umbagog into Maine. I plan to spend the night at the mouth of the Rapid River and do some fly fishing.

The trip transitions here. Maine will take me thru fewer towns and more vast wilderness as I make my way north from Rangeley toward Moosehead Lake then the Allagash Wilderness Waterway with its spectacular views of Mount Katahdin and finally, hopefully, Fort Kent. I hope to be there in three weeks.

Thank you all for your kind words of encouragement. They give me strength! I’ll try to post updates in Rangeley and Jackman but I’m not sure where else I will have a signal before Fort Kent. I’ll send daily updates to Valerie from my satellite device. There are some big challenges ahead but I have no plans to give up!

May 30, 2023
Day 24, 420 total miles. Rangeley, ME. Two days ago my old friend Umbagog greeted me rudely kicking up big gusts as I crossed the lake from NH into ME where I rushed to the shore and sat on a rock for over an hour waiting for the wind to die down.

But yesterday Maine injected new life into me. It is vast and stunning with its majestic mountains rising up around me as I paddled through some bigger lakes. Lower Richardson, Upper Richardson, Mooselookmeguntic and Rangeley Lakes were all quite friendly with little wind and lots of sunshine. They were blissful.

I chose my island campsite on Mooselookmeguntic last night so I could get up early this morning and watch the sunrise. When I arrived at the site there was a red squirrel on the picnic table. He stared at me and made that annoying squirrel screech before I chased him away but he lurked nearby unafraid. I knew he was trouble and would go for my food bag the first chance he had and he did just that. Before I went to bed I looked for a good tree to hang it from with my bear kit but none had the right horizontal limb that I needed so I hung it on the same line I was drying my clothes on knowing full well he could tightrope that line with ease.

The next morning I woke up around 5:00am but I couldn’t bear to get out of my warm sleeping bag to watch the sunrise. Then I heard a rustling sound and I knew it was the squirrel on my food bag. I shot out of the tent and there he was sitting on the bag just about to chew right thru it so I chased him off, turned around and watched the sunrise.

June 5, 2023
Greetings! I just arrived in Jackman, ME. I’ve been out 30 days and covered 506 miles so far. This will be my first “zero” day. First stop Mama Bear’s Resataurant where I ordered the Papa Bear breakfast. I may have two.

Since my last check in I’ve traveled north on lakes and rivers deeper into Maine’s wilderness and backcountry while seeing incredible nature and wildlife. In a few days I will cross Moosehead Lake, the largest lake in Maine, then up toward the Allagash Wildreness Waterway covering the route taken by Henry David Thoreau on his third expedition through the wilds of Maine in 1857.

Here is my entry from the last three days which includes an unexpected series of events as I took on one of the most difficult sections of the Northern Forest Canoe Trail.

My 27th day on the trail was a memorable one. Spencer Stream is a seven mile section of river running through a beautiful and remote wilderness valley that requires walking the entire way upstream on slippery rocks while pulling the canoe over and through numerous rapids and ledges. There is no portage option and the only way out is to make it all the way to the end at Spencer Lake. I needed to begin early because it would likely take all day. As Spencer Stream approached it weighed heavily on me.

The night before, I camped on an island called Island of the Giants named after its towering white pines. I staged my gear and food for the day in advance, set my alarm for 5:00am and woke at 4:45. The first order of the day would be a one mile portage that included a close up view from the top of the spectacular Grand Falls, the largest waterfall on the trail.

When I arrived at the put in I launched my canoe into the Dead River and paddled back to get a photo of the falls from below. It was then that the first unexpected event occurred. I missed the turn into Spencer Stream and paddled downstream on the Dead running two sets of rapids, the second giving me all that I could handle. A third set appeared ahead of me that was far beyond my capabilities so I paddled to safety in an eddy near the shore, realized my mistake and considered my options.

Bushwhacking thru the dense forest was not possible so my only alternative was to pull my boat one half mile back up through the rapids I had just run and it wouldn’t be easy. I was safe in the eddy but definitely in a predicament.

I used the walking stick I had cut and carved from a fallen tree the night before and struggled as I tracked my boat up close to the shore and through the rapids occasionally grabbing overhanging tree branches along the way for leverage and support. I finally arrived at Spencer Stream at 10:00am. A late start.

After two hours of tracking up Spencer Stream I checked my GPS and was disappointed I had only travelled 1.5 miles. My micro spikes had been lost to the river soon after I began and I switched from my neoprene socks and water shoes to a pair of lightweight trail shoes hoping they would better protect my feet. I considered for the first time that I might not reach the end before it got dark and I would have to stealth camp in the forest.

My progress continued to be very slow. At 4:00 I was a little more than half way there when I came upon a moose and her calf on the other side of a narrow section of the river. The mama intensely stared me down and stepped toward me grunting whenever I tried to pass so I backed off and waited about a half hour until they finally walked off into the forest. More lost time.

Shortly after that thunderclaps exploded above me and strong winds began whipping through the valley as the skies darkened and a storm rolled in. I unloaded my gear on the shore, pulled up my boat and found two trees where I could hang my 12x12 tarp in the forest. I got all my gear under the cover just before the rain started. I changed into dry clothes and set up my tent under the tarp where I spent the night. The next morning was cold and overcast as I broke camp, put on my wet clothes from the day before and re-entered the river. It was another five hours before I reached the end. I’m glad Spencer Stream is behind me but I appreciate the experience. The obstacles I had to overcome made it something I will never forget. I would not change any of it.

The last three days have really wiped me out and I’m happy to be in Jackman where I’ll pick up my final resupply, get some rest and plan the details for the last part of my trip. I’ll post another journal entry and some more photos before I leave town. It’s about meeting someone very interesting on Flagstaff Lake. Another unexpected event but this time a very pleasant one.

I had two Papa Bears.

June 6, 2023
Day 31. I’ll spend a second night in Jackman to rest up, get my gear in order, plan the last twelve days and wait for the wind to die down on Moosehead Lake. The forecast calls for light and variable winds on Friday so that’s when I’ll cross. If it doesn’t work out that way I’ll wait.

I expect to be out of cell contact until the end so I will be checking in with Valerie each day from my satellite device.

My entry yesterday was about unexpected events and how they impacted me under the circumstances. But there are pleasant unexpected events as well and this one definitely made an impact.

On day 24, after Rangeley and before Spencer Stream, I paddled up Flagstaff Lake having put in at Stratton, ME. Flagstaff is another gorgeous lake with views of the mountain range. It was a calm, beautiful day and I was able to take it all in peacefully and with no distractions.

I had decided earlier to camp that night on Hurricane Island. I set up my tent and ate dinner when another canoe pulled up. The paddler looked like he had a rough day. With an English accent he asked if I would share the site and I helped him lift his boat up the bank and onto shore. It was a beautiful cedar strip canoe. I asked him if he made it himself and he did. We introduced ourselves and he told me his name was Peter and as he walked off to another area to set up camp I thought he looked familiar.

Later as I sat looking at the view he came by with his dinner in a cook pot and asked if he could sit. He was most welcome. I quickly realized that Peter was Peter Macfarlane, explorer extraordinaire. After paddling the Northern Forest Canoe Trail from west to east in 2013 he wasn’t satisfied and five years later became the only person to paddle it backwards from Fort Kent, ME to Old Forge, NY. A seemingly impossible feat.

He was now recreating Benedict Arnold’s failed attack on Quebec City in 1775. It was the American’s first major defeat of the Revolutionary War and cost General Richard Montgomery his life. Of course I knew none of this. His knowledge of the history was astounding.

He had experienced a very difficult day and described going off course, bushwhacking through the forest and paddling alternative waterways to get back on track. But certainly not as difficult as Montgomery and Arnold and their men who began their doomed advance on December 31 under the cover of snowfall. He joked that he had no plans to attack Quebec City.

We swapped stories and watched the sun set over the lake. He is a remarkable guy full of insight and humanity and always with a big smile on his face. As he walked back to his camp that night he said “you’re doing this for all the right reasons” and when we parted ways in the morning he asked me to check in with him when I return. It was certainly a moment.

So tomorrow morning I will set off to finish this. Twelve more days. Peter Macfarlane told me I’m going to make it and I believe him. I’ll see you in Fort Kent.

June 17, 2023
Fort Kent, Maine

I did it! 42 days, 740 miles, 4 states, 1 province, 2 countries, 13 maps, 1 little green canoe. I will let the photos and captions tell the story since I last checked in 11 days ago. There’s beautiful wilderness, river otters and a surprise campsite visit by a moose!

For the last two years I’ve asked myself two questions. Will I make it? and How will it end? Well, I made it and it was far more than I ever hoped it would be. I can’t begin to describe it. As for the second question, it’s something that we never really know. We just continue the journey shaped by the experiences we have along the way. This was my experience and it will live strong inside me for as long as I am here.

And now I get to see Valerie. Tomorrow. No more satellite text messages! I’ve missed her terribly and I’m counting the hours. Hopefully she will forgive my appearance. ❤️

Thank you all for coming along with me. It was so wonderful to have friends from the time I was a young child up until now cheering me on together. Big shout outs to Oak Street, St Thomas, Bedell Ave, Maria Regina, SUNY Albany, work and Croton On Hudson! Your kindness and encouragement lifted me and I’m sincerely grateful.

Finally, huge thanks to the former thru paddlers, explorers and trail angels who helped me prepare, taught me how to read the rivers and run the rapids and checked on me along the way. I couldn’t have done it without them.

My journey is dedicated to our sister
Maureen Elizabeth Nolan
1964 - 1982
May your beautiful light shine forever inside all of us
as we take you with us everywhere we go.

If you want to see Bobby's story in full with all pictures he included, please check out his personal site here.