nature trips

We have gotten into a very wet weather pattern for August. We are having showers or thunderstorms on a regular basis. Not our usual bone dry August, in fact it seems amazing that only a month ago we were watering the garden almost every day and talking about how  dry it was getting.  This is after all New England and if you don’t like the weather just wait a minute and it will change.

As the water temperatures begin to gradually drop turtles spend more time sunning themselves on warm afternoons. On canoe trips and many freshwater fishing trips it Is not unusual to see many of them on various logs and rocks. We see mostly painted turtles which are small but once in a while a large snapping turtle is out where you can see it. I was guiding a couple of fishermen on Monday afternoon when we came on this good sized snapping turtle far up on a large rock.

The end of this week is marked by an unsettled weather pattern. The pattern can best be described as afternoon and evening thundershowers and morning fog that leaves the air feeling damp all day. Luckily it is not too hot. Yesterday I was able to get in my morning striper trip and even mow the lawn in the early afternoon, before the rain started. This morning I awoke to the sound of rain on the leaves of the trees outside my windows and even though the rain was over by 7AM my morning canoe trip called to cancel.

I like that in the summer I get to go on many family trips from nature exploration canoe trips to family fishing trips. It is great fun to share these moments with families from around the globe. Every trip brings all of that kid excitement and eager anticipation.

A press release from the Maine Eastern Railroad today.

The first week of July offered us great summer weather, foggy mornings, sunny breezy afternoons and warm summer temperatures. I have run a bunch of trips in the last ten days with a good variety. Family fishing trips, several striper trips and an afternoon nature exploration canoe trip thrown in for good measure.

I’ve been getting each dog out for a half an hour every afternoon. It is good for all of us to run around (in my case amble around) in the woods a little each day. The pointers are finding a few woodcock but not as many as we hear on our walk in the mornings.  Each day the snow goes a little more, on Sunday it was well over my knee boots in the woods and this afternoon there are patches of no snow and it is not over the tops of my boots anywhere.

Part of offering packages with the Samoset Resort is an annual review of what is and is not working. When we looked at the past two years the canoe trip packages were not performing. As I continued to review my own sales information I saw the same pattern. A declining number of canoe trips while family fishing and other fishing trips were on a steep upward curve. So I got the same message twice in less than a month, canoe trips are not performing well.