2022 BKL Festival
This past weekend, arguably the most anticipated and fun event of the year took place at the Quarry Road Trails in Waterville, Maine: the Bill Koch (BKL) Festival! This event brings together over five hundreds kids and their families together from all over New England for a weekend of fun adventures and ski racing. This year’s theme was Soar of Snow and entirely bird themed, featuring a bird oriented Opening Parade and Bird Education.
Opening parade squad: Wesley, Seville, Thomas, Effie, Phoebe, Sam
Live bird eduation with Chewonki!
Trying out biathlon
The focus of the Festival is fun rather than results, so we’ll share tidbits, stories, and photos from the weekend rather than regale you with results and numbers. Coach Jake explained that the only result you need to know is that “NEVT (Northeast Vermont) definitely consumed the most cheese.” Saturday was full of classic racing, terrain park jumping, biathlon, and biathlon. Parent of 8th grader Wesley Strong, Caitlin, shared that “on the beautiful sunny day that was Saturday, a Bald Eagle circled over the festival several times and lots of people were looking up in the sky in awe of how huge it was. The sun was shining right through its white tail feathers so it looked silvery, very beautiful!! That got people pumped.”
The following Craftsbury kids raced at the Festival:
3rd and 4th grade: Kaisa Weaver, Eliza Bakeman, Miles Brooks
5th and 6th grade: Gigi Graves, Effie Dunn, Phoebe Bakeman, James Kehler, Sylas Weaver, Isaac Nadzam
7th and 8th grade: Claire Serrano, Thomas Kehler, Sam Dunn, Wesley Strong, Seville Murphy.
Guest wax tech: recent BKL grad Charlie Kehler tech-ing for his brothers James and Thomas!
Eliza Bakeman striding it out in the relay
The fun continued on Sunday with freestyle individual start races, ranging from 1k to 4k, based on age. Caitlin said that “On Sunday it rained all day long but every time I paused to scan the grounds instead of complaining, all I heard were kids giggling and people cheering and it made me love the Nordic community so much for raising our kids to be resilient, adaptable, & supportive of each other!, so so sweet!” Coach Jake echoed this sentiment, saying that everyone “was super positive despite the pouring rain on day two.”
Sylas Weaver in the 3/4th grade boys freestyle race (Photo: Steve Fuller)
And the food! How could we not mention the food? Jake heard that the Craftsbury crew had “the best tent set up: included the grill on skis for sausages and melted Willoughby Jasper Hill cheese.” The ski grill comes from the Isselhardt family and has been a BKL Festival staple for years. Even a little (or a lot) rain can’t take away from the yumminess of hot food!
“Long live the Isselhardt’s grill-on-skis”
Toasted marshmallow time! No better post race treat.
Until next year!
A big thanks to parents Caitlin Strong, Jesse Dunn, and Gretchen Elias for sharing photos and words with us!