- Up next on "Borealis".

Wabanaki youth leader Nyle Sockbeson takes on the Appalachian Trail, a personal journey to honor his community and his brother and in hopes of inspiring others.

A group of young people get a break from a challenging situation.

Young asylum seekers get to be kids on an outdoor adventure.

And field researchers discover an imperiled turtle in a place they didn't expect.

Stay with us.

- [Announcer] Production support for "Borealis" is provided by... - [Sponsor] The Nature Conservancy in Maine, joining science, action, and innovative partners to help connect communities and address the global climate crisis.

From our forests to our rivers to the Gulf of Maine, learn more at nature.org/joinmaine.

- [Sponsor] At Poland Spring, we've called Maine Home since 1845 and are proud to be part of the community.

Over the past two decades, investing more than $12 million in the place that we call home.

Poland Spring, 100% natural spring water.

- [Announcer] And by viewers like you, thank you.

- You guys ready to hike?

(upbeat music) ♪ I wanna get lost in the wilderness, darling ♪ ♪ I wanna get lost in the rivers and the woods ♪ ♪ Gear you up on the mountainside ♪ ♪ Into the sky ♪ - Hello, I'm Aislinn Sarnacki.

Welcome to "Borealis".

Right now I am standing on the Appalachian Trail in western Maine in the town of Andover.

It's a pretty long path.

It starts at the top of Springer Mountain in Georgia and ends atop Katahdin.

Each spring, about 3,000 people attempt to through-hike the AT.

The vast majority don't make it this far.

For those that do, it's been a grueling five to seven months on the trail.

And remember all that rain we had in June?

Well, hikers went for weeks without their boots being dry.

Every hiker has a story, including a young man from Indian Island, Nyle Sockbeson.

I caught up with him in Monson in early August.

(upbeat folk music) In the small town of Monson, Nyle Sockbeson is nearing the end of his long journey on the Appalachian Trail.

With a group of fellow hikers, he enjoys a breakfast of eggs, bacon, and all you can eat blueberry pancakes.

Hikers, drool over this famous breakfast for miles before reaching it at Shaw's Hiker Hostel.

- So this is my bunk right now.

We hiked in yesterday.

We did like 17 miles.

Today, we're only doing 15 miles.

- Yes.

- I have a 68 liter pack, gonna be one of my heaviest packs that I've had.

Six days of food.

Just gotta crush 'em down and then throw 'em in the bag.

(Nyle laughs) I eat chips with everything.

I actually eat 'em with a spoon.

It's pretty funny.

- It is.

- One of those hiker things that's just silly.

I'm hoping to be out of the a hundred mile on Tuesday morning of next week.

It's a long stretch right now, so that'll be good.

- [Aislinn] The Appalachian Trail is a footpath that spans more than 2,100 miles from Georgia to Maine.

Every hiker at this table is walking the trail for their own reasons.

- The life of a hostel dog is.

- [Aislinn] For Sockbeson, the adventure is both deeply personal and for his community.

- I have both Passamaquoddy and Penobscot blood.

I live on Indian Island, the home of the Penobscot Nation.

I'm a proud community member.

It's a community of about 500 people.

It's special, it's a special place.

- [Aislinn] When not on the trail, Sockbeson leads Project Venture, an outdoor program for Wabanaki middle schoolers.

He hopes his hike will inspire the children he works with.

He's also on a mission to raise awareness about Indigenous lands and cultures along the trail.

- [Nyle] There's 22 tribal lands that goes through the 14th states of the Appalachian Trail.

And there's not much recognition of those tribal lands.

- On biweekly blog and social media posts, he acknowledges these lands and shares knowledge with people he meets along the trail.

- It's, you know, been really empowering to see the kind of reception to those conversations, where people, they wanna help and they wanna educate themselves, but the education of Indigenous people in this country is limited and at times inaccurate, and it's kinda seen as something in the past.

So, to be an Indigenous person here, and have that presence and tell people, "I'm a part of a traditional drum group."

"I live on a reservation."

Educating them about our communities and about what it's like to be a Indigenous person in 2023 has been excellent.

It's been empowering.

- [Aislinn] At the hostel, he prepares for the final stretch of his journey, a week long trek through Maine's hundred mile wilderness, the most remote section of the entire trail.

(upbeat music) - As an indigenous person, these lands, they have a deep sacred meaning.

It's an area where our ancestors traveled, our ancestors lived.

It's really an honor to set out in their footsteps and take on that journey with an open heart, learning the lessons that Mother Nature teaches us.

- [Aislinn] Only one in four hikers who set out to complete the Appalachian Trail are successful.

It's an arduous journey that taxes you physically and mentally.

On tough days, he thinks about his family, especially his brother.

- He passed away in 2020 and we had planned to do the Appalachian Trail together.

I carry his ashes with me since Georgia.

So, he's been with me and it's been something that has definitely been a motivator, 'cause I feel him with me and it's definitely what keeps me going.

- [Aislinn] Six days later on July 19th, he's climbing Katahdin along a dramatic rocky ridge.

After weeks of rain, the sun shines bright for his final day on the trail.

Rising over 5,000 feet, Katahdin is Maine's tallest mountain.

Its summit marks the north end of the Appalachian Trail.

- [Hiker] Congratulations.

- Oh yes, yes!

- Woo!

(hikers cheering) - Let's go!

- Yodelayhee.

- Congrats.

- Congrats, man.

- Awesome.

- Hell ya.

Just over five months it took me.

The trail is 2,198.4 miles.

Yeah, and it's tough.

- Nice dude.

- Woo!

(Indigenous drum music) - [Aislinn] It's also a sacred place for the Penobscot people.

- Let's go!

- [Aislinn] In the shadow of the mountain, a large group of family and friends gather to celebrate with a traditional drum ceremony.

A member of the Penobscot drum group, Sockbeson listened to recordings of these traditional songs while hiking the trail.

And he often shared the music with fellow hikers.

- Drumming is like a huge part of our culture.

So it was really nice that he had that powerful music on his journey.

- His cousins, Cree and Selena Neptune-Bear, were among the many family and friends who drove to Millinocket to celebrate.

- It's where we derive a lot of our strength from our community and our culture and our ancestors, so I think he knew and felt that we were all with him and supporting him.

- [Aislinn] Hiker friends join the celebration.

On the trail, it's tradition for hikers to adopt trail names.

Sockbeson goes by the trail name River because he kept introducing himself as Nile, like the river.

His closest trail companion goes by the name of Stickers.

- We just click.

I mean, we were fast friends.

I've been hiking with him for over 1,200 miles and we hike every day together.

- [Aislinn] Including their final day.

- Being able to talk to River about his culture and the way that it especially connects Katahdin to the trail, makes the whole experience bigger than a hike.

And especially makes my experience within it much larger than myself, because it kinda lets me step backwards and see it from a different perspective and to see it from a larger perspective.

- [Aislinn] What's next for Sockbeson?

The hike has served as a fundraiser and he wants to create an outdoor gear library that would serve Maine's tribal communities.

- Everyone deserves the right to be able to come enjoy the outdoors with the equipment that can at times be inaccessible to our tribal people.

So, to increase that accessibility is something that I'm very passionate about and I look forward to when I get back in the office and back to the real world as they say.

(laughs) - [Aislinn] His father couldn't be more proud.

- To Nyle, the beat of the drum is his heart.

Nyles hasn't completed a journey, he's completed a trail.

Nyle's journey may have just begun with his confidence.

There's a world out there for him to conquer.

- So, I think something I wanna do to follow up with this project that I've done through Wabanaki Public Health and Wellness is to reach out to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy and try to get more of those land acknowledgements put up.

And at the end of the day, it's 22 signs that could be made and put in 22 different tribal lands just as a recognition that people are on tribal lands and that we still exist.

You know, I think that's an important message to be said.

(drumming continues) - Congratulations Nyle.

What an accomplishment.

Appalachian Trail hikers are pros at pairing it down to the bare essentials so they're carrying the least amount of weight, especially by the time they get to Maine all the way from Georgia.

When we were in Monson, Nyle showed us how he packed for his final stretch into the 100 mile wilderness, which is about a week without any place to resupply.

That meant he had to carry a lot of food.

Curious about what went into his backpack?

Head on over to Maine Public's YouTube channel for a bonus video exploring what's in Nyle's bag, plus other content you won't see anywhere else.

(inspirational music) The Appalachian trail doesn't take care of itself.

A lot of the maintenance is done by volunteers.

There are trail angels who bring hikers into town and offer them food.

There are also people who maintain certain sections of the trail.

So I'm here with Tom Gorrill, the President of the main Appalachian Trail Club, who manages pretty distance of the trail right here.

- Just a small distance in terms of maintaining, I maintain just from the East B Hill Road on up to Surplus Ponds.

That's a distance of about 1.8 miles or so.

- And how big are the sections that usually are broken up for volunteers to maintain?

- We typically, well first of all, we have about 150 maintainers in the club.

And our population, our membership's about 800.

And each one of those either has a trail section or they have a boundary section or they maintain a campsite.

The trail sections are anywhere from just over a mile.

That's fairly short, but up to about five miles.

So it's a bunch of people doing all these little sections and when they're done, the whole trail's cleared and able to kinda like holding hands all the way to Georgia.

So it's pretty cool.

- [Aislinn] It's a pretty heavily used trail, especially this time of year.

So when you're out and about, what's it like to run into a hiker and talk to them?

What is that interaction like?

- Oh, it's a lot of fun.

We just ran into this morning, a group from Harvard University actually, that was out for, I think they said five days.

And it was wonderful to talk to them all.

They all had smiles on their faces.

They were still really happy to be out there and they had a great experience.

- That must be rewarding to talk with hikers and have them express how much they're enjoying the trail.

So what do you get out of this yourself?

- I get out of it a lot of... And I think all our maintainers do.

I mean we all love being outdoors.

It's a great experience, but it's good for us to know that, particularly with this group that just came through, they're all younger people.

They're having maybe their first experience with the Appalachian Trail.

And they're really enjoying it a lot.

So we get that out of that.

We have a lot of people that come through that say it's a really well-maintained trail.

And so that's really rewarding for our maintainers.

And people seem to say it's one of the better sections.

So, we take some pride in that.

- How do you convince people, so many people to volunteer to do challenging work like this?

- That is a real challenge.

And I think a lot of organizations like ours face that.

The best way I think, is to bring groups or people out, like we saw this morning.

And they see what goes on.

I got involved initially because a friend of mine said, "Hey Tom, let's go out and maintain."

There was another three or four people.

We went out to breakfast, we had a great time, then we went out and did the section and I think we went out for a few beers afterwards and it was a lot of fun.

- And I'm assuming that there's always room for more volunteers?

- Oh, plenty of room for volunteers.

Most for all those things I just talked about.

Right now, we have about 800 members and we have about maybe 160 that do some of this maintenance work.

- So why are you so passionate about the Appalachian Trail?

- I love being outdoors and the concept that we have a trail that goes from Katahdin down to Springer Mountain in Georgia through 14 states has always just fascinated me.

So, I'm still fascinated by that and I love the people that we meet out here.

I have great friends that I've made through the Appalachian Trail.

And meeting these folks, for instance, this school group today, that's just a lot of fun.

Very rewarding.

So it's basically, I get involved because of the people and the reward that it gives.

(uplifting music) - Maine is known for its summer camps, but it's an experience that's out of reach for some kids.

One new program is offering young asylum seekers the chance to explore the Maine outdoors and have some adventures.

Ari Snider has the story.

(upbeat music) - Today we're gonna go canoeing.

You learn how to put on a life jacket and make sure it's nice and safe.

- [Ari] It's a picture perfect summer's day in the Rangeley Lakes region of Western Maine.

A group of about a dozen teenagers are learning the basics of canoeing before setting out on what for most, will be their first ever canoe trip.

12 year old Isabel Muaka originally from Angola says getting out into nature is a welcome break from day-to-day life at a crowded emergency homeless shelter where she lives with her family.

- [Translator] It's really cool to come here.

It's more fun than staying there.

- [Ari] It's part of a new program called #WEOUTSIDE, launched this summer to introduce Muaka and other asylum seeker teenagers to the Maine outdoors.

- We are taking groups of new Mainers out into the beautiful nature in Maine to help them be able to experience and find home in spaces where predominantly people of color aren't really utilizing or don't feel welcomed.

- Moon Machar, Wellness Coordinator at the Maine Association for New Americans is the driving force behind the program.

Machar, who grew up in Maine in an immigrant family herself, says the state's outdoor culture didn't feel accessible to her.

- And I wanted to try to break that stigma and give these young people a bridge where they feel that they can also come out and enjoy the outdoors.

- [Ari] With support from a grant from the Nature Based Education Consortium and a partnership with the Maine Appalachian Trail Land Trust, she takes a group of about a dozen campers on a new adventure each week.

She says being outdoors with friends is especially important for these teenagers who have been living in a crowded emergency shelter.

After a brief intro to canoeing lesson, the group hits the water and immediately runs into some literal headwinds.

Amanda LaLiberte with the Rangeley Lakes Heritage Trust is leading the trip.

- This could be interesting and I didn't think that the current was that strong right there, but it was just enough with that wind to really keep giving them a challenge.

(laughs) - [Ari] Eventually the campers get a handle on their canoes and cut a winding path up river.

After about a mile, the fleet comes ashore at a shady campsite and stops for lunch.

And then, it's time to head back.

The return trip proves easier and faster aided by the wind at their backs and the downstream current.

For some though, getting the boats to stay on course is easier said than done.

In the end, everyone makes it back to shore.

LaLiberte says, even though the kids in her canoe struggled to move in a straight line, they put the hammer down when other groups threatened to overtake them.

- It was so much fun.

I speak very little Portuguese, so I was trying, and they were giggling the entire time and every now and again when they would see another boat paddle up to us, they would hammer, hammer, hammer and then go all giggly.

And I mean obviously it was a race back, we won.

- [Ari] And she says she'd be happy to do it again next year.

But Isabel Muaka says she's not sold on the whole canoeing thing.

- [Translator] Because we were out there in the middle and we were thinking the boat could flip upside down.

- [Ari] Still, she says she enjoyed the day overall.

As did 13 year old Esther Raul of Angola who says she followed some of her friends into the program.

- [Translator] Everyone was signing up so I wanted to sign up as well.

Then I heard they wanted to teach us some things, like what we saw here, paddling, hiking in the forest.

And I liked it a lot.

- [Ari] Raul is taking part in multiple #WEOUTSIDE activities this summer.

She says it's been transformative.

- [Translator] I feel alive.

- [Ari] Machar says this is exactly what she wanted the program to be, a chance for young people living through extremely difficult circumstances to relax and have fun.

- I want them to enjoy being a kid again.

It was a big thing for me 'cause I know a lot of them have a lot of big responsibilities with siblings and things that have been placed on them because of the housing crisis, because of that desperation and that laughter that I hear in the background is absolutely incredible and that's really been my goal.

- [Ari] Given how much interest there was in the summer program, Machar says she's considering extending it into the fall and winter.

For Maine Public, I'm Ari Snider.

- The Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge, which is on the site of the former Loring Air Force Base in Limestone, turned 25 this year.

And it continues to surprise and delight nature lovers and biologists who do research there.

Tim Goff takes us on a field survey.

(inspirational music) - Today, we'll check water temp and air temp and it's likely they're gonna be on land given that it's nice and sunny out.

But they can also be in the water, so your polarized glasses are perfect for that.

- [Tim] This team of biologists is about to go hunting for a prehistoric reptile, the Wood turtle.

- Hopefully most of them will be on land and it'll make it easier on us.

And since our vegetation hasn't grown up that far, we should be able to see them.

And if we can't see them, she'll smell 'em hopefully.

But it never goes to plan.

- [Tim] They're armed with a special weapon.

- This is June, and she's been working all week, so she's a bit tired here.

(whistles) Here.

Good, hey, here.

All the way here.

(whistles) Here.

Good.

Sit.

- [Tim] June, a yellow lab, loves tracking down turtles.

- Mouse or turtle, huh?

I'm gonna say mouse.

Come on, find turtle.

- [Tim] Okay, like any three year old, June can get distracted.

- (whistles) Up.

Come on.

- [Tim] But her sense of smell is second to none.

- Oh yeah.

- There's a turtle right here.

- You got a turtle?

- Yeah.

- Nice.

- It doesn't take long for her to find the turtle.

Wood turtles are not endangered, at least not yet, but they are at risk and people are partially to blame.

- One of the big problems is the pet trade people will pick 'em for pets.

And also with our development of big tracks of land, there's fragmentation of areas, so they get hit by cars occasionally too.

- [Tim] Making matters worse, the turtles are slow to reproduce.

- They have a very low reproductive rate.

They don't reproduce 'til they're between 15 and 18 years of age.

And when the female lays only about eight eggs a season, and they don't necessarily produce every season, so it's really important to maintain every adult, so they can sustain the population.

- [Tim] That's why finding these Wood turtles here in Aroostook County is exciting news.

- [Sequoia] The carapace length, I got 183.79.

- We just wanna see how many are here and doing what we can to protect them.

- [Tim] Even more exciting is where the turtles have been found, a former military installation that once housed nuclear weapons.

- This road used to go right up in the weapon storage area, there you can see the gate.

- [Tim] Wayne Selfridge was stationed at Loring Air Force Base.

- That is the very first nuclear weapon storage area in the United States.

You're on the very first Air Force base in the United States.

- [Tim] He serves here in a different capacity now as a volunteer.

- There's a lot of history here and we didn't wanna lose a lot of it.

But the real historical stuff, we've kept.

- [Tim] Loring was massive, more than 9,000 acres in size.

- It's a very productive wildlife area in here.

I had some game cameras set up in here and got all kinds of deer, bear and moose.

- [Tim] Thousands of service members, civilians and their families shared Loring with the local wildlife from the late '40s until it closed in 1994.

Much of the forest here was never altered to help hide the base from enemy observation.

- It's kind of an oasis.

You look at it down from the top, there's a lot of agricultural land around it.

So it's kind of an oasis for the wildlife, with the trees and in the contrast to the agricultural landscape all surrounding it too.

- Soon after Loring was decommissioned, more than half of those 9,000 acres were transferred from the Department of Defense to the US Fish and Wildlife Service and transformed into Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge.

- Believe it or not, some of the Department of Defense sites actually make really good national wildlife refuges because the quality of the habitat had, in some areas have been preserved, since going back to before World War II.

Whereas outside of those areas, there might have been development, agricultural or commercial or residential.

- [Tim] The old base continues to surprise with its unique mix of history and habitat.

- And you know when the people come here, especially when you give tours, they can understand what's here then and now.

They don't just leave in amazement of the nuclear power that was once here, but how it can be reused the way it is.

- Ready?

Ready?

Ready.

You gonna find it?

You gonna find turtles?

Ready?

Find it, go on, go on.

Find it.

- [Tim] Loring continues to play a crucial role in our nation's defense by providing protection for at-risk species in their struggle to survive.

- They are kind of a canary in the coal mine type thing where if they've got a good habitat, they want cool, clear, clean waters to use for their habitat or hibernation and like we saw today, they kind of feed in vernal pools and go into the forest, forage during the most of the summer.

- [Tim] The discovery of these wood turtles gives biologists hope that there are even more in the area.

- Yeah, I'm excited to see what we have here, 'cause this is like my first Wood turtle site ever.

So like, I hope we find the one Stubby Stella, we nicknamed her.

It was our first ever Wood turtle.

- They will continue to conduct surveys here to gather data on the turtles and the impacts of climate change on their habitat.

- Three surveys in the spring and three in the fall is what we consider a long-term survey.

So that gives us enough data to make an estimate of the population in that site.

- [Tim] Helping them understand how land that was once used for war is evolving back into a place where even the most vulnerable species can live in peace.

- He'll probably just slide it into the water.

- Yeah just... - [Sequoia] June, leave it.

All done.

She's like, "But you're not telling me to go find more?"

Come on June, with me.

Good.

Come on.

Let's go find more.

Come on.

Leave it.

Good.

Come on.

Let's go find more.

Good dog, good girl.

- [Tim] In the Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge, I'm Tim Goff for "Borealis".

- [Sequoia] Good girl, come here.

- On the next episode of "Borealis"... (seal calls) (upbeat music) How to bring a sick and abandoned baby seal back to health.

We head over to Marine Mammals of Maine as they care for, then release young Harbor seals.

We ride along with a multi-generational family of citizen scientists who every year, (Loon calls) go looking for loons.

And I grab a bag of dirt and hike to the top of a mountain in Acadia National Park as a part of an effort to restore native plants.

As we say goodbye, we leave you in the skies over the Deer Isle Stonington region.

Thank you for joining us for "Borealis".

We hope you'll come back.

(lively music) (music continues) (music continues) (music continues) (music continues) (music fades) (upbeat music)