Stories, Gear, and Outdoor Culture

Tourism businesses in the Lakes Region are hoping that a busy summer will snap them out of a year-plus skid they’ve been in since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Expressing that optimism were Governor Chris Sununu and other state officials, who visited Franklin to kick off the 2021 tourism season.

A new name for downtown? It won't be the first community to rename itself, and it probably won't be the last.

The free park, funded by $2.5 million in grant money and private donations, will offer kayaking, boogie boarding, whitewater rafting, and surfing on Winnipesaukee River year-round, as well as walking and biking trails, camping, water play areas for kids, and an amphitheater. The park will attract about 162,000 visitors who will spend about $7 million annually in the region, Parichand said.

I'm don't think I've ever told the whole whitewater park origin story here before, but there was a potential project before Franklin....

Before last year, the Boat Bash drew a lot of spectators. Two kayakers, poised side by side in half-pipes of snow, would hurtle themselves at reckless speeds down the slope, which began with a 230-foot vertical drop, said Jim Jones, co-president of the Franklin Outing Club, which operates the facility.

Meredith Village Savings Bank has purchased $25,000 in tax credits through the New Hampshire Community Development Finance Authority in support of the Mill City Park project in Franklin.

I had watched him and others race at the Merrimack River during the July 4th festivities. This was back when the river still had whitewater slalom gates at Arm's Park, where the Crack Pipe Wave still sits.

New Hampshire’s smallest city has big plans.

“As we were carrying our boat to put in, I saw someone in a white-water kayak doing tricks in the water right in front of me,” Parichand said. “And immediately, I said, ‘I want to do that.’”

Dominic here, I wanted to take a minute to shout at you about some of our upcoming winter programming opportunities and offer up a rare (but much needed) feel good story coming from our summer programs.

We’ve been all over..

Several years ago, when Marty Parichand first floated the idea of a downtown whitewater park, it sounded to many like a pipe dream. Earlier this month, the project cleared its final and largest hurdle, and it seems like only a matter of time before Franklin becomes home to an amenity unlike anything else in New England.