The Sand Bar by Tidal Roots

I was paddling on a placid Royal River with my four-year-old son Noah kneeling in front of me on a wooden Tidal Roots stand-up-paddle (SUP) board. The water hissed quietly as it slipped under the bow. The peaceful scene was disrupted by a paddler yelling, “That is a gorgeous board!” While I’d heard praise like that more than once while using the Maine-built, bright-finished Tidal Roots board [The company is no longer in business.—Ed.] It’s not something I ever hear when I’m paddling my fiberglass-and-expanded-polystyrene-foam board made in China.

Tim Greenway

Bookmatching the northern white cedar turns the variations in the wood's grain and color into appealing patterns.

Kyle Schaefer and Kent Scovill of Tidal Roots make SUP boards in a weathered, three-bedroom house in Eliot, Maine. Both are avid fly fishermen, and four years ago, when a friend of Schaefer’s left a paddleboard with Kyle, they immediately used the board to give them a better way to find fish. A light went on: What if they designed an SUP board for stability rather than speed, one that was built in Maine out of local materials, and built it of wood? They set about designing their first standup paddleboard. Building it took “forever,” but paddling it for the first time, Kent recalls, “was the best day ever.” Kyle and Kent are now producing about 36 boards a year.