BOUCHARD'S COUNTRY STORE: VISITORS CHOICE 2025
No visit to the Greater Fort Kent Area is complete without a stop at Bouchard's Country Store on Caribou Road in Fort Kent. This beloved local institution was voted the Greater Fort Kent Area Chamber of Commerce Visitors Choice Award for Best Local Experience in 2025, winning with an overwhelming 66.3% of the vote.
Bouchard's is the kind of place that tells you everything you need to know about northern Maine. As a multi-generational local farm, Bouchard's offers fresh local produce, natural beef and pork raised right on the farm, their famous Bouchard Ploye mix, local crafts and specialty foods, ice cream, and the warm welcome of a family that has been rooted in this community for generations. It is authentic, it is local, and it is exactly what a great country store should be.
FRENCH-SPEAKING ACADIAN HERITAGE AND CULTURE
The Greater Fort Kent Area is one of the most culturally distinctive regions in all of New England. Long before Fort Kent was Fort Kent, this stretch of the upper St. John River Valley was home to Acadian settlers who brought with them a language, a faith, a cuisine, and a way of life that has survived and thrived for more than 400 years. Today that heritage is not a museum piece. It is alive in the conversations you hear on the street, the food on the table, the music at the festivals, and the pride that people here carry in knowing exactly who they are and where they come from.
French and English are both spoken throughout the St. John Valley, and that bilingual character gives the region a warmth and texture that is unlike anything else in Maine.
The Acadian Archives at the University of Maine at Fort Kent is one of the most remarkable institutions in New England, recognized as New England's premier center for the study of Acadian life. The Archives documents, preserves, and celebrates the culture, way of life, and history of the Franco-American and Acadian people of the Upper St. John River Valley. Its collections include more than 20,000 photographs, rare 19th-century maps, French-language newspapers, diaries, songbooks, scrapbooks, and audio-visual recordings that capture the voices and stories of generations of Valley families. The oldest item in the collection is a 17th-century commission awarded by Louis XIV for the colonization of Acadia, a document that connects this small corner of Maine to the very origins of French presence in North America. The Archives are open to the public and staff are happy to assist visitors with tours, genealogical research, and guidance through the collections.
Acadian Archives at UMFK | 23 University Drive, Fort Kent, ME 04743 | (207) 834-7535 | umfk.edu/offices/archives
The Greater Fort Kent Area is also home to a network of local historical societies that work tirelessly to preserve the stories, artifacts, and records of the communities that make up the St. John Valley, keeping local memory alive for future generations.
THE FORT KENT BLOCKHOUSE: A NATIONAL HISTORIC LANDMARK
Standing at the confluence of the Fish River and the St. John River in downtown Fort Kent is one of the most historically significant structures in Maine: the Fort Kent Blockhouse. Built in 1838 during the border dispute between the United States and Great Britain known as the Aroostook War, the blockhouse is the only surviving American fortification from that era. The two-story structure is built of hand-hewn cedar timbers, some measuring over 19 inches wide, and is a remarkably well-preserved example of early 19th-century American military architecture.
The Fort Kent Blockhouse was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1969 and declared a National Historic Landmark in 1973. It is maintained as a museum by the Fort Kent Historical Society and is open to visitors in the summer months. Admission is free, though donations are gratefully accepted. Standing at the blockhouse, looking out over the St. John River toward Canada, you get a powerful sense of just how far this region has come. From a contested borderland to a community where two countries, two languages, and two cultures meet as neighbors and friends.
THE UNIVERSITY OF MAINE AT FORT KENT: ALMOST 150 YEARS OF EDUCATION AND COMMUNITY
Few institutions have shaped the Greater Fort Kent Area as deeply and as consistently as the University of Maine at Fort Kent. As the northernmost campus in the University of Maine System, UMFK has been educating students, supporting the regional workforce, celebrating Acadian culture, and anchoring the community for nearly 150 years.
UMFK's story begins on February 21, 1878, when Governor Selden Connor signed an act establishing a teachers' school in the northern border region of Maine. Known first as the Madawaska Training School, the institution held its very first classes on September 30, 1878. Over the decades it evolved and grew, becoming the University of Maine at Fort Kent in 1970. In 2028, UMFK will celebrate its Sesquicentennial: 150 years of education, community service, and cultural preservation in the St. John Valley. It is a milestone the entire region will celebrate with pride.
One of UMFK's greatest strengths is its willingness to evolve. Rather than standing still, the university has consistently adapted its academic programs to meet the real and changing needs of the northern Maine workforce. Today UMFK offers a range of Associate of Science, Bachelor of Arts, and Bachelor of Science programs spanning nursing, environmental studies, business, education, computer applications, and more, recognized as one of the most affordable universities in the nation.
UMFK's relationship with the sport of biathlon has put Fort Kent on the map internationally. In 2002 the university signed a landmark agreement with the United States Biathlon Association, allowing the USBA to nominate elite athletes for a scholarship program that gives them access to Maine in-state tuition rates and the world-class training facilities at the Fort Kent Outdoor Center. UMFK has hosted major international competitions including the IBU Biathlon World Cup, bringing the world's top athletes and a global audience to northern Maine.
On the athletic field, UMFK's teams, the Bengals, have built a record of excellence. The Lady Bengals women's soccer team won national championships in 2010, 2011, and then every single year from 2013 through 2017, plus again in 2019, one of the most dominant runs in collegiate athletics at any level.
The UMFK campus sits on the banks of the St. John River in the heart of Fort Kent, one of the most beautiful university settings in New England.
University of Maine at Fort Kent | 23 University Drive, Fort Kent, ME 04743 | 1-888-879-8635 | umfk.edu
You can describe the Greater Fort Kent Area by its geography, its rivers, its forests, and its festivals. But none of that tells the real story. The real story is the people.
There is a quality to life in the St. John Valley that is difficult to put into words if you have not experienced it, and impossible to forget once you have. It is resilience. It is the kind of deep, unspoken understanding that comes from generations of families who have built their lives in a place that demands hard work, creativity, and an unshakeable commitment to one another. These are people who do not wait for someone else to solve a problem. They get together, roll up their sleeves, and get it done.
Every major event and achievement in the Greater Fort Kent Area happens because of volunteers. Hundreds of them. Quietly, consistently, year after year. The Can-Am Crown International Sled Dog Races would not happen without an army of dedicated local volunteers who give their time, their energy, and their passion to make it work. The IBU Biathlon World Cup competitions that put the St. John Valley on the international sporting map were organized and supported by a community that stepped up to host world-class athletes from across the globe in northern Maine, in the middle of winter, and did it with the kind of warmth and competence that left a lasting impression on everyone who came.
Logger Fest, the International Muskie Derby, the Long Lake Fishing Derby, the Can-Am Crown: every one of these events is powered by local people who believe in their community and give freely of themselves to make it great. They are not paid to do it. They do it because this place matters to them and they want it to matter to others too.
What makes the Greater Fort Kent Area remarkable as a tourism destination is not just what it has to offer, though it has an extraordinary amount. It is the fact that the people here have worked deliberately and collectively to share what they love with the world. Visitors do not find a polished, packaged tourist experience here. They find something rarer and more valuable: a genuine place, full of genuine people, who are genuinely glad you came.
That spirit of welcome is not an accident. It is who these people are. It has been passed down through generations of Acadian families, through the traditions of the logging camps, through the culture of a border community that has always understood that neighbors, whether across the street or across the river into Canada, matter.
