August Update – 50th Semester Starts In Two Days

It’s been a long, hot summer, as well as a while since I’ve published anything on the web. Lots of changes have happened, and life looks a bit different than it did before starting the spring semester in early May.

We had a busy summer of programs, running a Summer Woodsman, Advanced Boreal Summer Survival, and 2-week Riverman programs back to back. This kept me off the grid non-stop, which is one reason why I haven’t posted anything here. All in all it was a great summer – met a bunch of great people and enjoyed working with them.

While the covid has raged in other parts of the USA, it hasn’t been much of an issue in northern Maine. We still take the recommended precautions, but it seems that social distancing and outdoor living as a way of life has so far kept infections at a minimum. Of course all that could change in a few days, but for now life goes on much as it had before.

We’re three days out from the start of the fall Wilderness Bushcraft Semester. It will be our 50th long-term program. It’s taken a bit for that to sink in with me. I recall our first semester course, then called the Earth Skills Semester Program, like it was last week. Dan Fisher and I just jumped right into it. I recall not being prepared for how much work and how rewarding it was. Now all these years later, I’m still doing it, but am a little more prepared for what it entails.

A few of the big changes include the end of my 48-year stint in New Hampshire and the field school growing from 61 to 82 acres, as well as the addition of a new on-grid headquarters at the field school. I’ll be writing about these in the coming days.