In the last 8 years, we have written approximately 50 blog posts highlighting all of Maine’s State Parks, some of the Public Lands or Historic Sites, and lessons we’ve learned along the way. It’s always personal when you put your feelings and family experiences on paper, but this one hits different. 

This time we took our favorite people on earth to our favorite place on earth. The Allagash Wilderness Waterway. 

It was almost like everything we have done has led us up to this point in parenthood. For many years before kids we’ve said that the Gash was our “reset button.” If you need to escape the day-to-day and really get away, then that’s this waterway. We’ve certainly had our best of times here and it has also been a perfect distraction to climb out some of the worst of ’em. As a couple we might disagree on lots of things in life, but when on this river, there is never anywhere else WE would rather be. 

This is the real deal WILDerness though, so why take a 4 and 6 year old way out here? Well, because in many ways this is where it started. Actually, it is where we returned at one point when we didn’t believe we could even have children. Beaten up and broken down from things way out of our control, we landed the canoe on one river trip that left us not wanting to even get out. But that actually might have been the biggest reset we ever needed because Eloise wasn’t far behind…downriver and then the rest is history. 

We always preach, just jump right in and get your hands dirty. We even wrote a popular lessons learned post years ago about it never being too early to get outdoors with children. But there are some things you should really build on. Experience breeds confidence. This was a trip we had wanted to do and planned for after Eloise turned 3, but to the surprise of everyone, including us and even the doctors, Adeline showed up without warning or modern medicine. Funny to even think back on one amazing week in the Allagash region, when she was already rolling with us, but we didn’t know it yet. Oops on all the Allens. And because our whole crew has an unhealthy amount of FOMO (fear of missing out), we knew we needed to now wait a little longer so we could all go together. 

First, let’s acknowledge not only the State of Maine for the superb management of this bucket list location for many, but we also need to thank the ones who saved it, the Natural Resources Council of Maine. As always, we don’t copy and paste, so do your own research and when you spend two minutes on the waterway and you’ll be forever indebted to all these folks, like our family is. While we are at it, check out our friends over at the Allagash Wilderness Waterway Foundation for all they do to get young folks here to see what they deserve to see.

Back to our most recent canoe trip as a young family, the biggest priority was that it needed to be “winnable.” What does this term mean? It is something we often tell others, try and stack the deck as much as possible and make the experience as positive as possible. Make it winnable! So with littles in tow, we shaved down our normal miles on the river but kept the same amount of hours. We gave ourselves the same amount of time to cover less distance. Why? Because everything with kids takes longer so we try to manage expectations. We also brought along Memere & Pepere. Looking back this all worked out perfectly and we wouldn’t change a thing in planning.

Sure we could have done more miles but we didn’t need to, the kiddos certainly didn’t need to. We didn’t come out here to try and impress anyone. That being said, the look of the faces of folks who rounded a bend or portaged by and saw the smiling faces of our girls was pretty priceless. 

The whole reason we started this blog was to try and assist anyone who was doing a little homework. Maybe help give folks a nudge to places they might be hesitant to visit or worried about dragging their loved ones to. The truth is though, the further you go into the sticks, the more homework you should do. If there has been anything that covid has taught about the great outdoors was that people are now jumping in blindfolded at times, and that can set everyone up for failure. Even with several trips to this region we were still close to pulling the plug on this one that was years in the making. Why? Mother Nature is ALWAYS the alpha in the room and if you don’t accept that and respect her, she will humble you at some point. Like most weather related things these days, we were dealing with unprecedented conditions, for the end of August when the water levels are often too low to canoe on, we were dealing with levels so high that they were borderline unsafe with the kids. Even with very experienced paddlers, it doesn’t matter, because you will be reminded who is the boss very quickly. The state often preaches having a plan B and we had one ready but luckily, a dry week leading up allowed us to pretty much set the canoes to cruise control. The best spot to check water levels is here.

Attention! This is a public service announcement! Most of us own canoes here in Maine, but if you are planning an AWW trip, we think you should look into a guide service from the region. This is their livelihood and it will also make your experience 100x times better. I’m not saying you necessarily need someone to take you up river (yes the Allagash flows northward), but maybe rent canoes from them or definitely tap into them for transportation. If anything, make sure you use someone to get you in and/or out of these areas. They live it everyday, so you are in good hands. Who do we work with? Norman L’Talian from Pelletier Campground is pretty much a 3rd cousin at this point. We highly recommend him and his crew.

There is a feeling we often talk about in our house. You get dropped off, you pack up your canoe just right, take a group photo, and then you push off. That push leaves quite a bit behind. Often when you take vacation, it takes a few days to finally let the weight of the world off your back. That’s not the case here, it’s all instantly left behind on the shore. It’s because you can’t reconnect until you reach your final destination. There is no process of letting go, it’s immediately gone. Though this is a feeling we selfishly relish on each trip, there is no better joy than watching others experience it for the first time. 

So the cliff notes of this specific trip is that it was so much better than we could have imagined. Watching the girls here is like watching someone eat your favorite dessert and they somehow like it more than you. Was it homerun? No of course not, nothing with youngsters is, but it was a stand up triple. When you live in a place with four real seasons, there is a time come late March when you start to reach back in that short term memory for those special moments to relive and think back on. This was a trip that will keep us all warm until the snow melts. 

We made tie dye shirts for this “vacation” and Eloise was wearing hers out recently and when getting a compliment, it was brought up that she wore it on the Allagash. The couple seemed puzzled at first and they said, “the brewery?” We laughed and said sorry, no, on the waterway and they looked twice as puzzled because they never heard of it. More than 150,000 people visit the brewery in Portland every year, but less than 5% of that visit its namesake each year. Let that set in for a moment. Fun fact, the town of Allagash was a dry town until a couple years ago. In fact, there is only one restaurant in town, Two Rivers Lunch, and they don’t even serve beer. What they do serve is one of the best burgers in the state of Maine and service nothing short of your Memere’s kitchen. 

It’s quite clear we have a bias to this area of Maine, but we’ve never met someone coming off this river who wasn’t already planning a return trip. We’ve been steering folks to the state parks and public lands for many years now, but there isn’t another place in Maine we love more than the Allagash Wilderness Waterway. If you’ve been following along over the years, then that statement has some real weight to it. Our family owes more to this place than we could ever repay.  

Please know that we didn’t pull into our driveway refreshed, bright eyed and bushy tailed. I don’t think we’ve ever been more exhausted, wet, bug bitten and spent from a trip than this one. It was a lot of prep, packing, driving, lack of sleep…just name it, BUT it in the end it was all worth it. Even this post, which is almost 6 months in the making at this point, but the kids talk about it like we just got off the river yesterday. 

If you want to try and pull some of this off, you are welcome to reach out to us and we would be more than happy to share more ins and outs of what we have for information. Just know we are one of many resources of what should be required homework. If you want to do some extra credit work, then definitely buy Pepere’s book, Allagash Origins. Oh and having experienced and active grandparents tag along certainly made the trip more winnable and FUN!

Just like that time we didn’t want that canoe to land, we’ve definitely dragged our feet on this post. I guess when it was written it would be more in the past and we aren’t quite ready for that. Sometimes you’re just setting off seeking an adventure but without trying you get something we are in need of. And just like when you thought that dessert couldn’t get any better, try watching your kids take their first big bite.