In May, the Waterdown high school teacher launched Beyond Mainland. Self-published, it was 10 years in the making.

It all started with regular trips to the family’s cottage on Buck Lake. The cottage and his canoe trips became his sanctuary, his escape from the reality of having made a grisly discovery at his Waterdown home when he was just 15. Tidridge discovered the body of his stepfather, killed by an accidental gunshot that occurred while he was cleaning a firearm.

Trips to the cottage became a kind of therapy after that. Tidridge spent hours in the canoe, exploring the local lakes, drawing his own maps and making entries into a journal filled with stories of his journeys as well as several samples of leaves taken from different trees on the many islands that dotted the lakes.

In his book, he tells about a “unique tradition” that evolved from his leaf collecting days. During one adventure to Big Island on Lake Vernon, he and some friends decided to do something extraordinary. They took a maple leaf from the island and mailed it to Queen Elizabeth II who was visiting Canada at the time.

The Queen sent a “thank you” letter for the gift and, from that point, “the tradition” of sending leaves to famous people was born. They were sent to the queen of Denmark and the king of Spain; one even went to Pope John Paul II who obliged the sender’s request by blessing the leaf and the island from which it originated.

It wasn’t until he was a university student that Tidridge began to think that his childhood memories of the area and knowledge of its rich history would best be preserved in a book. He acknowledges the help he got from a number of people, including his mentor, Susan Scott, a professor at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo; local historians, Fred Hopcraft, Allan Trussler and Scott Shipman and award-winning American author Kathy Eldon whose son, Dan, a Reuters photojournalist stoned to death by an angry mob in Somalia in 1993, was a childhood hero of Tidridge’s.

In his book, Tidridge looks at the contributions made by the First Nations, French, English and Canadians in the shaping of the Muskokas, while also exploring his own intimate connections with the area.

Beyond Mainland is dedicated to the author’s grandfather, Ray Charron, who “like me, is terrified of water,” Tidridge confided. Despite his fear, he could not be deterred from spending countless hours in the canoe, exploring the islands and lakes around his family’s cottage

Now aged 30, and soon to be a father for the first time, Tidridge can hardly wait to recapture the excitement of his boyhood trips when he and his wife, Christine, travel to Buck Lake with their newborn.

“I look forward to going up (to the cottage) quite regularly,” he said.

The Waterdown District High School (WDHS) teacher feels privileged to have played a role in preserving local Canadian history through the publication of his book. It can be purchased at Pickwick Books in Waterdown, Bryan Prince in Westdale, Different Drummer Books in Burlington and The Bookcase in Huntsville.