The Chapel

I put in on the Salmon River. The river is a tributary of the Connecticut and is inland a ways, so it forze over good and solid during the winter cold snap. I gave it some time to melt, and with other things going on, this is my first trip there this year.

I usually put in right where the two rivers meet, but taking in the wind forecast for the day, I decided to use a state park put in that is a few miles upstream.  The launch looks a bit like hell from the water, so I was surprised that I enjoyed a slow rotting road drive down from the hilltop, and it turned out to maybe be a better put-in, at least in the off season.  

I headed down river.  It was more or less calm and the air was fairly balmy. The wind came up once I entered the large cove that forms the bottom of the river. But, it was not bad at all.  I followed the river-right shore down to Dibble Creek.

The Dibble Creek Lodge, seen from the Dibble Creek Dam

I have been thinking about the spiritual places that I canoe, and what distinguishes those places from the general body of water.  The river is a very nice paddle, with forested hillsides in almost all places - forests that I can peer into as I travel. I am always on the alert for some previously unseen feature or artifact that has found a safe place in the forest.  But, Dibble Creek rates a little higher. To me, it's as if the river is a big cathedral, while the little nooks and inlets are the small and intimate chapels within the cathedral.  The creek itself is not anything anyone could paddle as it is far too small, and it is a no trespassing Federal reservation.  It is the little hidden bay that the creek tumbles into that is special.  Few people enter here. It is marshy and f course, it doesn't going anywhere, in a physical sense that is.  From the cove, one sees a shoreline that is not actually a shoreline. On a closer look, it is an old beaver dam, an apex beaver dam so to speak.  This dam is over 200 feet in length, but not much more than a foot tall when the water is low.  I call it an apex dam because it has been around long enough to grow a healthy stand of saplings and small trees. It is no longer just a beaver dam, but a land feature (and it can be seen in Google maps).

Dibble Creek

It takes a light push with foot to cross the dam, but with all of the tree roots threaded through the original structure, the footing is solid.  A beaver lodge is at one end of the dam on the upstream side.  It is a small lodge and I figure that the inhabitants have not yet started to breed.  They do harvest the saplings that grow on the dam.  The water inside the dam is shallow with many hummocks.  It is a quiet place and I can be sure that no one will be in here, or follow me.  Moving towards the creek, walls of gray rock form an enclosure.  The creek tumbles several feet to the pond.  

Old maps show a cabin on the hill overlooking this spot.  There are some stone walls, but no sign of that building.  There is an archaeological site about a 1/4 mile up the creek. It was a hunting camp and a cache of spear points were found there.  I remember it being dated to about 4000 years before present. 

I stay for a short time, before heading out into the cove.

The double lodge looks like it might be in use.  There is a new dam built 30 feet in front of the  original dam.  I don't find the very large lodge that was a 1/4 mile farther down.  It was abandoned when I last saw it and it may have collapsed.  Spot 2 Osprey, a small flock of Common Mergansers, and some Wood Ducks.

Moodus River

I head up the cove an into the Moodus River.  Beaver have been extremely active in here with recent gnawings all over the place. Really, it is about as much beaver feeding that I have ever seen in a small area.  Some of the branch cuts are 4 feet off the ground, showing the height of the snow in here during this winter.  It is rather startling to see those cuts up so high above the ground - almost looks like someone was in here cutting, except I can see the teeth marks clearly.

I head all the way up to the Leesville Dam.  A good amount of water coming over,  Then I head out.