The Center for Land Use Interpretation [CLUI] looks down as it looks into the center, the very source of life and death, the main thing that drives every society on Earth: Land. Its ownership, stewardship, use, and destruction is questioned through CLUI's physical, historical, and data examinations, which are conducted in places you previously might not have even thought about. 

The Winter 2015 online exhibition is United Divide: A Linear Portrait of the USA/Canada Border. For those new to CLUI, this is a great introduction to different ways of thinking about, and experiencing, our surroundings. Here is an unguided tour inland from the American  finisterre of the Northeast: The State of Maine. [Visit the entire exhibition, which examines the world's longest international border, here] 

The eastern end of the international boundary between the USA and Canada begins with uncertainty, ten miles off the coast, at Machais Seal Island, a 20-acre treeless outcrop which is still claimed by both nations.

The British built a lighthouse on the island in 1832, claiming it for Nova Scotia, and the Canadian government, which has since automated all the other lighthouses along their coast, keeps this one staffed for the purpose of making a claim for continuous occupation and sovereignty.

The USA also claims the island, and a commercial tour operator brings birdwatchers to the island from the coast of Maine. For the moment, without any resources other than the lobsters in the fishery “grey zone” around the island, there has not been any reason to fight over the island. Both nations think of it as theirs.

Though there are a few other remaining boundary disputes between the USA and Canada, concerning coastal waters and their respective Exclusive Economic Zones on the west coast, this is the only remaining unsettled boundary dispute over dry land. The island, at the gateway to the longest international boundary in the world, is a borderless space.

From the east, the International Boundary comes towards the shore, passes by West Quoddy Head, the easternmost point of land in the USA, and enters the interior waters of the continent at Lubec Channel and Passamaquoddy Bay. 

The first physical structure encountered by the boundary is the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Bridge, which connects the town of Lubec, Maine, and Campobello Island, part of New Brunswick, Canada.

Campobello is a kind of an exclave of Canada, an island connected by land only to the USA, by this bridge. There is a customs and immigration port of entry building on either side of the bridge, the easternmost of the 24 official border crossing points in the state, and the 115 along the line between the east and west coasts.

 From the east, the International Boundary comes towards the shore, passes by West Quoddy Head, the easternmost point of land in the USA, and enters the interior waters of the continent at Lubec Channel and Passamaquoddy Bay.

North of Mars Hill is another formerly manned border crossing, on East Ridge Road. The US Port of Entry, operated out of a trailer before it closed in 1976.

The Canadian Port of Entry is still there, now a private home. The road is blocked with a barricade.

The next open crossing on the North Line is the Easton/River de Chute crossing, on Smugglers Road, which is open every day, but has limited hours. Gates block the road when it is closed.

It has round 4,000 crossing a year, an average of less than 11 per day.

A few miles further up the North Line is the busier Fort Fairfield/Perth-Andover crossing, which is open continuously, and is a rare example of a crossing where the Canadian Port of Entry building is larger than the US one.

There is a road that heads south, between the Ports of Entry, on the US side, with some homes on the Canadian side, which are only accessible by the road on the US side of the line.

Leaving the driveway, or coming home, is thus an international trip. Since they have to pass through either of the Ports of Entry to get anywhere else though, they are not too inconvenienced (unless there is a line at the Port).

And since the access road is between the ports, they don’t have to pass the Port of Entry when returning home, from either direction, even though, technically, they might have goods to declare, such as groceries. 

North of Fairfield the boundary line passes through the Aroostook River.

On the north side of the river is the Aroostook Valley Country Club, with a golf course on the New Brunswick side, mostly - a truly international “country club.”

The North Line continues northward from the Pedersen’s house, cutting its swath across farmland, woods, and streams for another eight miles, to the next official crossing, Limestone/Gillespie-Portage, a small crossing on Highway 229.

The North Line continues north for another ten miles. From here, it heads west along the center of the channel of the St. John River. The boundary is, again, a water boundary, at least for the next 100 miles.