By Mary Fairchild Marquette’s ACA L5 trainer Sam Crowley. Here you will brush up on skills you should already know. “Mary, do you think you can do an expedition solo?” was the question. “No, I know I’m not ready yet. Don’t ask me to lead a group yet either,” I kept repeating when it came time to committing to the…
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Water Trails Reveal Rich Archaeological History in the Midwest
By Mary Fairchild Maquoketa River Trail; 6/15/14. In June my two daughters joined me for a river clean-up and local archaeology paddle on the Maquoketa River with Iowa archaeologist Elizabeth Reetz. There are two forks of the Maquoketa River that meander through Jackson County for about 50 miles and meet up just north of the…
Boat Registration in Illinois: Chicago Style
By Mary Fairchild At the CASKA gathering last night, held at Chicago’s Jackson Park Yacht Club, I had a chance to catch up with Gary Steinbauer. Gary and I attended some of our first kayaking with the club together in 201l. We’ve both paddled not only Lake Michigan, but the whitewater park in Yorkville which had just opened in 2011. Taking…
World Kayak Hometown Throwdown: Two Brothers, Three Floyds, Five Guys
By Mary Fairchild (Ryan M. Duffy, Adrian Oritz; Flickr Pictures here..) This past weekend my husband and I traveled to South Bend, Indiana for a little business and… whitewater. I took my first whitewater class in January with the Chicago Whitewater Association. Recently, a note on the club’s message board, “Paddle, Party, and Play,” announced that there was a World Kayak…
Boat Registration in Illinois: What’s Whitewater Got to do With It?
(Chicago Whitewater Association “Intro to Whitewater” at Harper College, February 2011 with Bob Menard; picture by Heidi Haas.) When it comes to non-motorized boats, only Illinois, Ohio, Oklahoma, Iowa (boats over 15′), Minnesota (boats over 9′), and Pennsylvania require registration fees. After non-motorized boat users complained in droves, the registration fees in Alaska were eventually dropped from…