To the editor:
I am interested in producing a mile-marker tourism guide for our huge region in northern Maine that would be invaluable to economic development in the largest county east of the Mississippi where signage is ever so limited and verbal direction delivery is so time consuming. I have thought of this often throughout my 19 years in The County and especially since becoming a board/committee member of Aroostook County Tourism over 10 years ago.
It was especially in my face last month when out of the blue, there was a knock at the front door of my bed & breakfast, and there stood a retired medical doctor/psychiatrist from Milano, Italy on her first visit to the U.S.A.! Imagine my shock … she had landed in Boston and rented a car and made her way to Aroostook to specifically see the Amish, some alpaca and a native American reservation as these do not exist in Italy!
I opened the B&B just for her as I am in the middle of doing the tourism business survey work for ACT and had closed for the month. Dr. Lichino’s English was certainly better than my Italian but she could only understand if I spoke very, very slowly (hard for me to do for sure) and no full sentences but rather short phrases only.
I stopped what I was doing for two days and became her “Volunteer Aroostook Ambassa-tour Guide.” After two nights she left for the coast and I booked her into B&Bs in Eastport and Trenton as she wanted to see Acadia National Park but also travel where it was quiet and not the typical tourist areas so she could experience how the people “truly lived.”
This European woman traveler would have not been able to follow written or spoken directions without some good signage out there or a mile-marker book of all our routes in the region. During our tour, it was actually my first time on the Houlton Maliseet reservation. On the way there, we “discovered” Aroostook’s only wooden covered bridge when I made a wrong turn after departing Route 1.
It is typical in The County to call ahead and county folks will extend hospitality at a drop of a hat if they know you are coming as they are often open by appointment only. This personal “by appointment” touch is good and also bad. We need a mile-marker guide book with all the contact details in a very big way. (Alaska has had one for dozens of years!) We also need a large volunteer force of retirees to be trained as volunteers and bilingual guides in their respective towns to be available when needed to act as Aroostook County Ambassa-tour Guides!
We need to know who out there is multi- or bilingual to call upon when needed to enhance the European/international traveler’s visit to Aroostook! For instance, a number of years ago I heard about an Italian speaking couple in Houlton that wanted to give Italian lessons but, regrettably, I could not remember who had told me about them.
I’d love to hear about your experiences and tourism-related needs. My number is 757-8797 and my e-mail address is gclark@letstravelagain.com.
Gina Clark, Oakfield
