Short Trip

I set out from under the highway bridge and head down to the Wheeler Marsh.  The tide is all the way out, the temperature is in the 70's, the sky is sunny, and the wind is almost nothing.

The plan is a short trip. With the tide out, it is impossible to circle the marsh or cut through most any of the interior channels.  The main river, Nell's Channel, and the bottom of Beaver Brook are the only places with enough water to float a canoe.  

The cut banks of Nell's Channel are fully exposed at this tide. The height varies but the maximum is about 5 feet, and it dwindles to maybe 2 feet at the lower end of the channel.  This means, with my current estimate of 50 years/foot for soil build-up, that the bottom of the cut bank might be in the early 1800's, but my oldest datable bottles are from about 2 feet of depth.  Today, the only thing of real interest that I find on that theme is a cut tree, and it is right at the lowest level of a 5 foot cut bank.  Firmly in place, it does seem to be protruding from the bank as if it was buried there. The cut was at a 45 degree angle and may have been done with either an axe or a saw.  I wish I had access to a dendrochronology analysis.

At the end of the channel, I squeeze through an inner channel close to Milford Point, round that small island and return back via Nell's Channel.