On our recent trip to Maine, I had the pleasure of enjoying another trip around Derry with the excellent SK Tours of Maine, which is run by Jamie Tinker and his wife Jennifer Millar. It was great to be back, to reconnect, and to see the new things going on in and around the shop. I’m already looking forward to next time! 

A lot of the locations were familiar from the tour I took in 2023, like Mount Hope Cemetery, the Standpipe, and the former King home on West Broadway. These return spots felt cozy and comforting, a return to places and moments that have been living in my memory for these last few years. But there were also some new elements and updated perspectives, highlighting the ways in which King’s work and influence continue to evolve. King sold his radio station, which was a location highlighted on the 2023 tour, a change that had a kind of ripple effect on the larger tour route. This changed route resulted in a new (to me, anyway) stop: The Oriental Jade, the restaurant that served as inspiration for the site of the Losers Club’s reunion in IT (1986) and was memorably adapted in both the 1990 miniseries and Andy Mushietti’s IT Chapter Two (2019). (It’s also where we had my birthday dinner while we were in Bangor—this is going to be a tough birthday to top!). The HBO Max series Welcome to Derry premiered in 2025 between my last visit and this one, with the central role of the Standpipe in that series offering a new perspective on the familiar edifice. 

One of the most impactful experiences I had on my previous trip to Maine was having the opportunity to sit on King’s bench near the Standpipe, a site of inspiration for Stan Uris’s terrifying encounter for the drowned children who lure him inside. However, the bench is no longer in its previous spot: parks personnel were preparing to remove it, but thankfully it was seen and claimed by SK Tours, who now have King’s bench on site at their tour company location. I’m incredibly grateful that they saved the bench and was thrilled to see it again, but I’m afraid it loses something of its spatial significance and its grounding in that moment of artistic inspiration now that it has been removed from its original spot. But anything is better than losing it altogether—I continue to cherish the memory of sitting on that bench in the park in 2023 and I’m happy to see it safe and sound in its new home with SK Tours, where it will no doubt be loved, appreciated, and protected. 

SK Tours had also acquired Gina, “the screen-used 1960 Cadillac Fleetwood 75 from the movie Thinner, bullet holes and all” (“Meet Gina”), who is parked behind the tour company building. Gina is a beautiful car, though the poor girl needs a LOT of restoration, with SK Tours working to fund these efforts through a Gina-themed line of merchandise. 

Another exciting new development on our recent visit with SK Tours is their recently released coffee table book, Welcome to Derry, which showcases a handful of key tour locations, with brief text and beautiful photographs by Paul Michael Kane of 19th Edition Press. The book was set for release the week after we were in Bangor, so I ordered one for shipping, which was a wonderful post-vacation treat to look forward to, and when it arrived, it absolutely did not disappoint. As someone who has enjoyed the tour, the images and text serve as reminders of that unforgettable experience, but for those who haven’t taken the tour yet or find themselves unable to travel to Bangor, Welcome to Derry provides a glimpse of some of those locations and Tinker and Millar’s expertise. You can have a look at and order the book here!