Readers get three mini-columns today, all for shelling out a hard-earned 60 cents ...

• I don't know if I would have it in me, so I've got to offer a tip of the cap to Lawrence High School students Tyler Hienrich and Bow Willoughby. The pair combined to finish fourth overall in the first annual East Grand Adventure Race last weekend in Danforth.

The race was run by East Grand High School's Dave Conley, who wanted to give students the opportunity to both compete in a race and hone their outdoor skills all at the same time.

The race course measured more than 16 miles in length and challenged the participants' various abilities as they bushwhacked, pedaled and paddled toward the finish line.

The race began with a 11/2-mile hike through ungroomed terrain, led by only a map and compass, and was followed by an eight-mile mountain bike ride through trails littered with mud, rocks, washed-out culverts and a variety of other obstacles.

Once racers ditched their bikes, this Bear Grylls-meets-the-Ironman Triathlon format wrapped up with a seven-mile canoe paddle down the icy Baskahegan Stream to the finish line.

Grylls is one of the youngest people ever to climb Mount Everest who now stars in the Discovery Channel's "Man vs. Wild," a hit television show in which Grylls survives in some dangerously remote locations across the globe. Grand Lake Stream may not hold a candle to, say, Everest, but it can still be a dicey proposition to maneuver through unfamiliar terrain covering both woods and water.

Conley is hoping that other high schools around the state will follow suit and help to make the event an annual happening, rotating from place to place.

"Not only did the event promote good physical exercise," Conley wrote in an e-mail, "(but) it was a fun way to get young people involved with the outdoors while improving on wilderness traveling skills."

Good for Hienrich and Willoughby, first for trying and then for wrapping things up in a strong 2 hours, 56 minutes in the first edition of the event. East Grand High School students Abe and Harvey Brittain won the race in 2:25.

• Dan Onion says it's modeled after the Kennebec Land Trust, and its goal sounds something like that of the Friends of the Cobbossee Watershed.

Either way, it sounds like a worthwhile cause to me.

The 30-Mile River Watershed Association has been anchored in Vienna for several years, though now the organization is trying to expand into surrounding communities to protect an historic piece of central Maine. The 30-Mile River was first named so by European explorers in the area in the 18th century. It includes the waterway from the Androscoggin River in Leeds and Monmouth, Androscoggin Lake, Pocahassett Lake, Lovejoy Pond and the head of Echo Lake.

Echo is well-known locally for the chimney that marks its north end, along state Route 41.

Taylor Pond, Parker Pond, Minnehonk Lake and Parker Pond above Echo are also part of the watershed area.

With the help of a $3,000 Department of Environmental Protection grant and eight towns on board, the 30 MRWA will start a program to educate inspectors and start volunteer boat checks for invasive aquatic plant species.

Mostly, though, in the big picture, this is about keeping one of central Maine's best areas for all things water -- paddling, boating and fishing -- just that into the future.

• Why is it that I seem to see turkeys everywhere, except when I'm actively trying to hunt them?

If there's any sight that's impressive, it's seeing a tom in full display standing on the edge of an open field.

It's remarkable to see how puffed up these big birds can be.

I was driving along one of Sidney's back roads, heading into Augusta on my way to the office earlier this week, when the sight struck me. The tom stood out in the bright mid-afternoon sun, feathers flared out in all different directions it seemed, and big, too -- two or three times it's usual size, I would venture to guess. From the road, some 50 yards away, I could still see the beard dangling off its chin.

I never saw the hen it was presumably displaying for, but it was no matter.

It's one of the great things about hunting, the part that's often overlooked. It's about getting deep into the woods, hunkering down and observing all that the great outdoors has to offer while right there in front of you.

It's not a groundbreaking thought on my part, not by any means, but it is worth reiterating.

Sometimes we've just got to slow down and see what happens out there. We won't see it in our living rooms, to be certain.

Travis Barrett -- 621-5648

tbarrett@centralmaine.com