The Chipuxet River

I have something like two dozen routes that I paddle regularly. I paddle many of them several times each year. Some get visited a couple times each month. I get to see week to week changes throughout the year. I get to see birds come and go, plants bloom, go to seed and die back, and sometimes I get to see snow on the marshes and ice in the channels. But sometimes I just have to go to someplace new.

I put in on the Chipuxet River for the first time. The start is easy to find, a state launch for canoes in the Great Swamp Wildlife Management Area. The river here is not much more than a canoe length in width, and it is going to stay that way for most of the trip. I head downstream towards Worden Pond. The Chipuxet will end there. The water that continues out of the lake is the Pawcatuck River. Name changes like that are an oddity of New England.

The first half hour is nothing but turning. The current is mild, but the open channel narrow. It is a good place to perfect ones draw and sweep strokes, but it is a lot better if you have that down already. Although the rumors of poison ivy are exaggerated, anyone that comes in here without some ability to turn a canoe is going to be well scrubbed with overhanging poison ivy branches. I don't have any problem as it is easy to spot and the river is always wide enough to avoid it.

Pickerel Weed

There are several Kingfishers in the area.

The wildflowers are in bloom. Pickerel Weed is still out, as is marsh marigold, pond lilies and some arrowhead (wapato). There is a grassy plant with a lot of tiny white or purple flowers that I am unfamiliar with. It grows is dense patches that can be several hundred square feet. The bees and other flying insects definitely like it as when I pause my paddling for a second, the air buzzes.

I flush a young Bald Eagle. It is an adolescent with a white head, a patchy body and a dark tail. It flies off towards the lake.

Snapping turtle - look close

Arrowhead - arrow shaped leaf and flower stalk

I'd heard that there were several beaver dams in this section. The first was not far in, but it was long out of use and submerged with a sand bar forming over it. The next two were just below the surface and the canoe slid over with ease. Only the last one required a step out, and it was only a few inches high. The scent of castoreum was around at this last dam, the beaver are near.

And then, the lake appeared, all of a sudden. Worden lake is about 1-1/2 miles across. It is shallow and exposed to wind off of Long Island Sound, the south end being forested, but low flat land. The north end, where I came from, is mostly swamp. I paddled a circle out into the lake, mostly so I could remember where the entrance is. As the entire shoreline is swamp, I needed to fix either some landmarks or an approximate location for the entrance. It turned out that if one just paddles up into the NE corner, it will be the first open channel as one turns west - easy. As I was doing that, I got to watch an Osprey and that adolescent Eagle settle a dispute. The Eagle started by taking several swoops at the Osprey, which was perched in a tree. I'm guessing that the Osprey had a fish, but it was too far off to see. After the Eagle retreated to a soaring altitude over the lake, the Osprey flew up and began to take some harassing swoops at the Eagle. After a couple minutes of settling the score, they went their separate ways.

I headed back up the Chipuxet. The only difference was that after all of that narrow twisting paddling, the beginning looked much wider that when I started. I continued up past the put-in just to see if it would be worthwhile on a future trip. It was quite nice, and with ten minutes of paddling I came to a very solid and very well built 30 inch high beaver dam. So, there is some exploring to do next time.