Bulletin For August 5th 2022 (Aug 05, 2022)

Meeting Date: August 5, 2022

Presiding: President Michelle Fortin

Greeter: Dick Bean

President Michelle opened the meeting at 07:30 and greeter Dick Bean shared some inspiration.

Attendance:

23	Live
6	Zoom
1	Visiting Rotarians
0	Guests
1	Guest Speakers
31	Total

Announcements:

There will be a Zoom “Happy Hour” to say farewell to long time member and past president Jeannie Richardson the 23^rd from 6 to 7 pm. (Bill already sent out the Zoom link)
Concert Update: Eric Anderson
- Roughly 100 people at last Sunday’s concert
- They raised $214
- Rotarians in attendance: Eric, Aron Labrie, Dick Bean and Judy Goodnow.
- Concord Coachmen and Nashua’s Granite Statesmen
- August 14^th will be Open Mic Night. FYI people don’t have to sign up in advance but registration is required. Congrats to Dean Cascadden for getting his form in and on the list.
Auction Update: Matt Dodge
- Theme for the online auction is “Blast Off to Our Future”
- John McCaulley is working on the logo for us
- List of 280/290 businesses sent to the club for all to review in terms of soliciting items
Michelle reported that Gerry Carrier is still suffering from what is believed to be long Covid. He’s isolating at camp. Gerry told Michelle that breakfast invoices should be going out very soon.

Sergeant at Arms: Bryant Stevener

Birthdays: None

Fines:

One logo fine: Mike Griffin, but also a happy buck for his guest Mark ?, who’s president of the Lakes Region Rotary Club.

Happy Bucks:

Mark ? (guest) gave a happy buck because he didn’t want to get fined. “Thank you for having me. It’s my first time visiting another club”
Tom Ives: Sunday was his 40th wedding anniversary
Judy Goodnow: she had a great trip to Alaska. Saw glaciers, bears & whales. Michael, her husband, tested positive upon return so she went to Maine to escape. Hopes everyone stays healthy
Linda Bliss: Happy buck for Peter Imse. She’s never seen anyone so agile post knee surgery. “Apparently he’s doing his homework”
Matt Gatzke: He’s back in NH. His brother got through 1 of 3 parts of his surgery and received better news than expecting.
Dave Scanlan: Breakfast has taken on a life of its own. Evelyn was supposed to cater this morning but "we" were unable to reach her. Luckily Ian at the Southender didn't get the message not to make the sandwiches, so they were hot and ready for pick-up.
Dave also reported that he received a call last night that his son got engaged!
Dave Gazaway: paid a late fine and reported that he had a great time at the Freese Brothers concert. He also congratulated Dick Swett on is great grandparenting skills.
Michelle Fortin: She had a lovely time having lunch and doing some shopping with her daughter in Portsmouth recently. She also did a lot of yard work with her parents. Loves helping her mom, especially since she was diagnosed with cancer 4 years ago.
Jerry Kingwill: disappointing buck: Unable to go home to South Africa due to travel issues. He was looking forward to attending the 200th Anniversary of his high school.

Program:

Tom Ives introduced his guest speaker: Peter Bloomfield, longtime resident of Bow. His wife is Pansie and they have 3 sons.

He was involved with the Boys Scouts / Cub Scouts for many years but they moved to Hollis, a big mistake, according to Tom. Peter loves the water and travels the world sailing.

They went canoeing together again this year and hit some rapids with waves 2/3 feet high.

Peter:

Canoed with Tom and Brian in Maine and Canada. Done most of the rivers in Maine. Before they go on a trip they practice on the gem in our backyard, the Merrimack. They have on average 150 pounds of gear and personal belongings. One of their trips is on the Allagash. It starts on Chamberlain and Eagle Lake. Classic trip runs 95 miles north to the Canadian border.

It is primarily all wilderness. Maine is the most heavily forested state. There are some rapids but mostly flat water. The scenery is breathtaking. This is one of the more fun rivers with at least some rapids.

Allagash has 3,000 visitors a year. Down from 7,000-10,000. Sometimes they have to get out and walk the canoe through some of the smaller rivers. Sometimes they just get up, grab a cup of coffee and take off in the fog. They see a lot of moose and eagles. They’ve even seen an eagle swoop down and snatch a fish right between their two canoes. Occasionally they get stuck. Tom admits it goes a lot faster than the video clip Peter showed, but they have relaxing times too. They like to lay on their backs on the nice warm gravel after a long day of paddling.

History:

Dams built in the 1860’s
Built to control the water flow and bring logs to Canada
1902 they put in a tramway to bring the logs. This was used for 5-6 years and then they abandoned it.
1925 a railway was put in to haul the logs
1931 they clear cut the whole area and again all equipment was abandoned. The locomotives were just sitting out in the woods
The Lombard was the first skidder used in the woods in place of horses to haul logs
Mr. Lombard created it and then sold to Caterpillar for $5,000
They saw an abandoned air strip in a beautiful area where the river can get really wide.
Towards the end of May you can still see large ice piles, which the group might chip away at and use the ice for “happy hour”
They eat well; cornbread, peach cake and lots of fresh bread
Occasionally they have little fish
Great place to recharge their batteries before returning to civilization

Questions:

Matt Gatzke: When do you need to take the canoes out due to the rapids, how long/far do you have to carry them? Also, what do you do with your cars?
- Peter: Roughly 100 yards.
- Tom: Getting around the rapids they get out and “line” the canoes and control them with ropes so their belongings staying in the canoe. This way they can control them from the banks.
- Peter: sometimes they have to bring their cars to the final point and drive one back to the starting point. But they like to have outfitters bring their cars to the finish line.
Mike (our guest) liked the photo of the group almost tipping in the rapids.
Linda Bliss: How many times have you dumped and lost equipment?
- Peter: they dump at least once a trip but only lost a fishing pole this last time.
Eric Anderson: How many hours do you paddle daily?
- Peter: Roughly 6 hours.
Bob Couch: do you rent or bring your own canoes?
- Peter: it depends on where they are traveling and the group size.
Michelle Fortin: how do you know where to camp? Do you research it or wing it?
- Peter: The beautiful thing about ME is there are set camp sites. Almost feels like “glamping”.
Dick Swett: How many other canoes do you typically encounter, especially now since the numbers have dwindled?
- Peter: We see some but by no means is it crowded.

They save the Brews and Canoes on the Merrimack.

President Michelle: A toast to Rotary the world over.

Respectfully Submitted,
Tanya Frost