Sideline Stories: FitMaine Shannon Bryan

Ropes courses, railbikes, and alpaca yoga. There’s no shortage of adventure around here, and it’s been my goal to discover and write about all of it on fitmaine.com. From challenging hikes and spectacular summits to easy-going sunset paddles followed by a brewery stop, I want to try all of it.

But I wasn’t always so head-over-heels for the outdoors. Frankly, there was a long stretch of time when I wasn’t all that into physical activity of any kind. I didn’t grow up hiking in the White Mountains or kayaking in Casco Bay. I didn’t learn how to ski until I was 30-something. And on the occasions I did exercise, it took the form of short, panting stints on the treadmill at the gym while watching reruns of Unsolved Mysteries.

I’ll spare you the details of how I ended up in a half-marathon training group in Chicago. Suffice to say the experience – run-walking along the lakefront every week with a fabulous and supportive group of people – altered the trajectory of my life. No big deal.

I ended up moving from Illinois to Maine a month after crossing that half marathon finish line, still partly shocked that I’d done such a thing. You can guess what happened next.

Maine has a way of luring out our inner adventurer. It also helps to have a friend who invites you snowshoeing or hiking or who lends you a surfboard and a wetsuit and gets you to try surfing for the first time in the middle of November. That’s pretty much what happened to me.

What started as an occasional weekend jaunt to a destination randomly chosen from my Maine Gazetteer eventually turned into weeklong camping trips, morning workouts on the beach, and a basement packed with paddleboards, bicycles, skis, snowshoes, a kayak, no less than three toboggans and a newly acquired unicycle. I became outdoorsy. Active. The kind of person who delights in bungee trapeze, island camping, and cross-country skiing in costume. And I do that kind of stuff all the time because, years ago, I met people who were kind enough to say, “Hey, we’re going to do something cool this weekend. Come along.”

I started Fit Maine as a place to record those adventures and encourage everyone else to throw caution to the wind and try them, too. Because these are the things that fond weekend memories are made of. It also happens that doing lively, active stuff is an excellent way to exercise. (But I don’t usually call it “exercise.” I call it “doing fun stuff that also happens to be good for our bods.”)

Things really came full circle last year with the start of the Fit Maine Social Club. (I call it a “fit casual” social club, which to me means “let’s cross-country ski through an apple orchard and then go eat nachos after.”) We explore new places and try new things—and make new friends along the way. It’s my way of saying, “We’re going to do something awesome this weekend. Come along.”

++ While our grand adventures are on hold right now and we’re sticking close to home, we can still plot out all the adventures we’re going to have in the future. Find loads of ideas on fitmaine.com ++