Samuel Hallett Photography: Kenduskeag Stream Canoe Race 2011

Last weekend was the Kenduskeag Stream Canoe Race, and I had to head down to the stream to snap a few photos. This race has been run since 1967 and every year is just as exciting as the last. The reason I like to shoot this particular race is because I was actually a participant in the 2007 canoe race.

Me, Greg Parker, Nate Roberts at the finish with no canoe!

Continued after the break!

A buddy of mine decided that before we graduated college that we needed to do the race, so we grabbed another friend and borrowed an instructors canoe and off to the race we went. Just so you know not one of us had ever been in a canoe with one another before until the day of the race. Needless to say we found ourselves in the water a half a mile from the start and the water temp was in the low 30's for the race. We swam the boat to shore and dried off, asked each other what we were thinking, then jumped back in the canoe and continued on. We were moving along pretty good, then we reached six mile falls. We really didn't want to go back in the water, but this was the focal point of the race and we had to go for it. The second we hit the falls in we went for another swim. Not only did we go for a swim, but our instructors canoe got stuck in the middle of the stream on a log and no one could free it. We decided we would leave it until the next day and come back and get it when it wasn't so busy. We arrive back the next day and the canoe is no where to be seen, we thought we wouldn't get it back, but a week later the Game Warden service located it and returned it.

We never finished the race, but I had a blast doing it and that's why I like to go back and shoot some photos of the race. This year I was asked to shoot a video segment for the Late Show with Dan Cashman, I didn't shoot as many photos as I would have liked too, but I had a great time shooting the piece with Dan. Here are a few of the photos I took from this year!