“The 90 Miler”
or – how 4 old ladies got their “90 Miler” pins
Eagle Bay, in New York state’s Adirondack Mountains, has always been a magical place for my family. I vacationed there as a child and brought my children there for vacation. To this day we still vacation with my childhood friends. Our vacations are not the “sit still on the beach” type of vacations. No one really sits still on Eagle Bay beach. People bike, hike, swim, play paddle ball, volleyball and cornhole. It’s usually a pretty active vacation and my favorite two activities are biking the beautiful (and mostly flat) snowmobile trails and getting out on Fourth Lake in a kayak. Being on the water, early in the morning is truly a life experience that should not be missed. God’s beauty abounds with the mountains in the distance, the call of loons and the ever changing flora and fauna.
In the summer of 2018 an Eagle Bay friend of mine, Mary Beth, shared that she always wanted to race in the Adirondack Canoe Classic (the “90 Miler”). We all laughed and grabbed another drink from the cooler as she shared with us that she had been training with a 90 Miler veteran. Later that fall the idea of 4 us “old ladies” racing in the Canoe Classic began to take shape and by the summer of 2019, we were out on 4th lake in a 4 man canoe paddling as far as we could go in one day: 14 miles – which was nowhere near the approximately 35 miles we would need to finish on DAY 1 of the 3-DAY 90 Miler. We were so exhausted that we had to come to decision about whether we could do it or not. I’ll be honest – we were pretty cranky.
In the end, we decided we would attempt the 90 miler and go as far as we could in the race. We all agreed we wouldn’t berate ourselves if we didn’t finish it or if we didn’t meet the end times every day. We formally set our positions in the boat and I was chosen for the stern (the steering person), Christine and Nancy were in the middle (the engine house) and Mary Beth (who convinced us to race) was at the bow. Our coach, Ken, helped us prepare and gave us tips for equipping the canoe with food, water, advil (very important), biofreeze (also important), and gummy energy chews. On a beautiful day in September we set out for the race of our lifetimes, the “90 Miler” – in the “Open Touring class.” We were not as prepared as we would have liked for the 3 days of paddling, but we were committed. Even though we were in the open touring class group, we still had to make it to the drop off points daily by a certain time or we would be DQ’d.
Did I mention that not only is the race 90 miles of paddling, it also includes 8 carries totally around 5 1/2 miles. During the “portages” we had to carry a 4 man canoe along with all our gear and not piss off the real racers who run with their boats on their shoulders through rocky terrain – yikes. That was scary.
Day 1 was by far the hardest day of all 3. We not only paddled 35 miles from Old Forge to Blue Mountain Lake, we also had four carries at 3.5 miles total – where we were literally running with our canoe and gear – and we’re not runners – at all. But we were the best middle aged lady runners that day! Also included in that day was the dreaded Brown’s Tract – a serpentine river of intense steering while attempting to stay out of the way of the racing class boats. The good news is, we made the cutoff time that day and did not DQ. We had a good night’s rest in Eagle Bay and were at the next starting place (Bissell’s on Long Lake) bright and early the next day.
Day 2 was a 30 mile paddle with only one carry of 1.25 miles. We were all lubed up with Biofreeze and advil as we started the day. Let me tell you – Long Lake is LONG, especially with a head wind. But, we were rewarded with a beautiful paddle on the Raquette River after the monotony of Long Lake.
That night we stayed in Tupper Lake with Mary Beth and Christine’s relative who happened to have a hot tub! We soothed our muscles in the hot tub with glasses of wine and talked about how sorry we felt for all the paddlers who were overnighting in campgrounds.
By Day 3 we were sore, and tired, and it was raining. We arrived at the Fish Creek campground, loaded our boat with extra advil, water, energy gummies and biofreeze and prepared mentally for the last day of paddling. That day we only had to paddle 25 miles and had three short carries totaling about a half mile. The second and third carries were around locks over rocky terrain where canoe wheels didn’t work well so they were literally “carries”. I’ll let you in on a little secret, as we approached the third carry, we saw the rocky terrain and a kayaker with a pirate flag on his boat befriended us and pointed us toward the lock instead of the carry. We followed him into the lock and within 10 minutes we and about 10 other boats were lowered by the lockmaster thus avoiding the last carry. Our pirate friend stayed with us until the end of the race and was a huge boost to our spirits.
The End of the Race
There is nothing like the experience of finishing the 90 miler in Saranac Lake Village. The crowd cheering us on was phenomenal. Throughout the race we had met so many people who encouraged us and kept our spirits up. The people who we paced with were such an inspiration to us and after we came into the final port, we were able to celebrate with them. The 90 miler pin that we each received at the end of the race is one of my greatest treasures.