90 Miles of History

The back of my newest T-shirt reads, “This 90 mile journey, from Old Forge to Saranac Lake, follows the same route traveled by the region’s settlers and guides.  The chain of lakes, rivers and portages is known as the original “Highway of the Adirondacks”.  Such are the adventures of the 32^nd 90 mile marathon canoe race representative of a culture clinging to its past.  The race takes place every year in late summer and is anticipated by hundreds of participants and enthusiastic spectators.  This year 256 boats, seven of which represented Hamilton, competed for three grueling days through lakes and winding rivers, as well as on foot with their boats hoisted on their shoulders.  This race can only be completed by sheer strength of body and spirit (and the help of a few snickers bars), and Hamilton powered through with aching muscles and huge grins.   

Schneider talks of the many waterways, lakes, ponds, swamps, bogs, rivers, streams, and brooks that make up the Adirondack Park, and the various native tribes that first used these waterways in this same fashion.  He even mentions the canoe carry to Saranac Lake, “worn deep from centuries of foot traffic” (18).  This path may be the exact one that was used this past weekend by the canoe racers.  So what does this say about the current state of the Adirondack Park?  Does this mean that we are still in touch with its true history?  Is a competition such as this working to preserve the park or is it exploiting it?  I would like to believe that this is an example of the parks “redemption” in the way that McKibben discusses it on page 120.  Perhaps the fact that the same paths used hundreds of years ago by the Indians to carry their “red elm bark” canoes are still being used today for the same purpose, is a sign that the park is being restored to its past glory.