Nukes

I picked M up in the morning, "The Farmington, Eagles or Nukes?"
"Eagles or Nukes, I don't know."
"Don't worry, you don't have to decide until we get to the Connecticut River."

Nukes it was.


We put in at a state launch directly under the interstate bridge, about 75 ft under that tall bridge.
The air was near calm, the day cool for July. We set out upriver following the west bank.  This section of the river is post industrial or remnants of industrial with buildings of various states being used or not for things that work in dilapidated structures.   But a short span of that brings us to the United States Coast Guard Academy.  They have a good fleet of sailboats and medium sized industrial work boats and there were cadets in training on many of them.  Across the river at the lower end of the Navy sub base is the USS Nautilus, a nuclear powered submarine famous for passing submerged under the polar icecap about 60 years ago. 

We continue up passing close by the Coast Guard boat s and under one of the docks.  You can not paddle close to shore on the east side as there are active submarines with nuclear weapons and the Navy absolutely will not let you near.  There is one submarine in a drydock and the size is impressive considering how minimal they appear when they are floating.

There is an active boat yard upstream of the Academy and today they are sliding one of the large catamaran Block Island ferries into a dry dock, which is submerged as we pass by.

Beyond that is an area with a couple of rotting and partially submerged shipwrecks - wood hull vessels.  They form interesting sculptural islands.

We paddle up and cross over to the town of Gales Ferry where we sneak through a narrow railroad bridge and take a break at a surprisingly large marina that is quite hidden from the river.

The wind has come up and we make a direct crossing and head downstream against a stiff headwind.

The catamaran has been lifted clear of the water when we pass by.

The Edges

I put in at Ely's Ferry and headed upstream along what might be, inch for inch, the best bit of paddling on the lower Connecticut River.  The deep forested hillside seems to always provide shade and cool drifts down from the damp forest floor while the shoreline alternates between bedrock slabs and gravel beaches.  I have seven Bald Eagle sightings in the short stretch.  It is probably five individual birds - 2 mature, 2 yearlings and one small recent fledgling. At the point where I turn to enter Hamburg Cove I add three Kingfishers and a Great Blue Heron.

 I decide to follow the shoreline, keeping it close on my right and weaving in and out of the shallow coves.  I always tell people that all the good stuff happens at the edges, no matter what the subject.

I spot two Osprey in the cove and several more Kingfishers.

I turn up Falls Brook.  Two low bridges seal the upstream marsh off from anything large enough to carry a motor, not that they would last long in the shallows anyway.  I've been in here before but turned back where the pond becomes brook.  I imagine that trip must have been near low tide because today the brook is deep enough to paddle.  I continue on for a a few hundred yards before turning back knowing that I am on the wrong side of a falling tide.  I will return here as it seems to go quite a bit further.

Falls Brook

A whole herd of plein air artists are painting from the dock of the Hamburg boatyard.  Good day for it.

I take a brief rest in the bottom of Eight Mile River before turning and following the other shore out.  Just before the last meander short of the mouth of the cove I spot a red fox ambling along the shore.  Well deserving of its folklore traits, it is cocky and self assured, but not because it is the biggest bad ass in town.  No, the look of a fox is one that says, "I am smarter than you."  Maybe.

Red Fox in center

I spot a white tail deer grazing near the deepest point of that meander.

The final half mile back gives me three more Bald Eagle sightings.

Tempted by the Hidden People

I follow the railroad bed that is somewhere below in the depths next to the original path of the brook that has become this quiet cove.  The sky is well gray with a light pleasant wind that one moment carries the cool of the water I am paddling on, and then for a few seconds it is a warm humid marshmallow.  The faintest of sprinkles occasionally drift out of the sky coming as invisible specks of wet.

I spot three Turkey Vultures on the shoreline under an overhang of tree branches.  They are picking at some small dead thing, probably a fish.  One spooks and starts to fly, desperate not to get its feet wet.  It thinks twice about it and settles a few feet from where it started.

I cross the main stem of the river to follow the submerged rail line down to a point where it wraps around and follows the shore north.  Somewhere below are the remains of a 400 ft train trestle.

An adult Bald Eagle drops from its perch in a snag, feet extended, a controlled glide toward a fish in the water.  The fish evades and the Eagle aborts the attack with just a few inches to go.

A half mile down is a man fishing from a rowboat.  When he is a quarter mile away he becomes a drifting deadfall tree.  He finally becomes what he is, a man fishing from a kayak.  I have crossed to the far side of the river so that neither one of us needs to acknowledge the other.

I find myself wishing for a narrow river surrounded by the big forests that are on either side.  If the Farmington ran through woods like these I would spend most of my time there.  Unfortunately, it is bounded by narrow strips of trees with golf courses, farms or towns almost hidden from view, but not hidden from effect.

I guide myself close to shore to peer into the dark forest.  Deadfall branches reach out, the disguised fingers and arms of the forest spirits, they have forever drawn men deeper and deeper into the world that the hidden people inhabit.  It is good to know they are there.

On my return I here non rhythmic hammering on the far side of the river.  Sounds like a Pileated Woodpecker.  I listen a few times and it still sounds like a Woodpecker.  I paddle the hundred yards across.  As I near I can tell that the hammering is on the near slope.  I spot one on the ground, only seeing the just enough black and white in the right proportions.  A second one flushes from a few feet up a tree, a little red with the black and white, but a quick flash of the spread wings.  It's an unmistakable wing shape, perfectly adapted for flying though forests and flaring to land on the side of a tree.  They move a short distance back.  I turn and paddle off.

Boulder Swamp

It was a faiely calm and warm day and still sunny when we set out although the weather prediction was for rain storms later in the day. Other people were about at the launch site, so we stashed our gear as quickly as we could and paddled straight away up river.

The phragmites and cattails that line the river were well filled with calls from Red Wing Blackbirds and Marsh Wrens.  I never really thought about it but there is a similarity in the birds call, perhaps just enough that a predator might confuse the calls at a distance or on a windy day.  Every so often I spotted a Marsh Wren nest in the reeds.  Osprey were about and no busier than usual.  We saw one carry a quite large fish up to a perch where it wasted no time in beginning dinner.

In Boulder Swamp

Boulder Swamp was living up to its name, especially with low tide.  At any tide level one has to pick their way through an obstacle course of ice age left behinds.  Today, most of them were two to five feet out of the water.  This gave S some practice at steering the canoe from the bow.  She had the best view of submerged boulders and shallow spots and while we bumped and dragged on a few I let her be to figure it out.  As we headed in toward Mill Brook we spotted a large immature Bald Eagle.  There is a nest on this point although today it was hidden behind the foliage.  A small mature Eagle flushed from a lower branch.  The mature Eagle was surprisingly petite and is the male to be sure, the males of the species being about 20 percent smaller than the females.  In fact, it looked no bigger than the immature that we'd seen a few yards earlier.

Small male Bald Eagle

The low water prevented us from getting up around the first bend on Mill Brook.  I knew from past trips that a line of boulders across the brook required a carry that would only extend the trip by about 75 yards.  So, we turned back from there.  There is a fair amount of beaver activity in this area although with our low water vantage point we were unable to see any signs.

S picked our way back through the boulders by a somewhat better route.  There, we picked up a fresh head wind as the sky started to cloud over.  We took out just as a sparse sprinkle of rain began.

Paddling Away from the Mad World

I set out from the Feral Cat Park early enough to take advantage of the cool morning on what will be a warm and sunny day.  The tide is low and still dropping as I skim over the broad sandbank that guards this side of the river.  I head upstream.  All canoe trips at this time seem to be trips into a sane world.

The big river is 200 yards or wider up to the first dam, maybe 10 miles.  It can have some motorboat traffic, but the deep channel is narrow and is often quite near one shore or the other leaving most of the river to my canoe.  Osprey are active right now and I see a few flying by with fish in their talons.  There is a new (to me) nest in a power line tower a 1/4 mile inland from the bank.  I flush one Black Crowned Night Heron from the spartina marsh and see several Great Egrets wading on the far side of the river.

I mess around with my camera.  I drowned my good camera on my last trip, but I had a good although smaller camera stashed away.  It takes a few moments to remember the workings.
My drowned camera had become a little bit buggy recently and when I opened it I noticed right away some corrosion on metal parts.  Ten years of wet environment use seems like a good deal if it is dead for good.

I round Great Flat by following the east bank and decide to make this a short trip.  I stop myself from saying that I have something better to do because while I have other things to do I cannot thing of a better thing to do than paddle a canoe. It is a full day up to the dam and back, and worth doing sometimes but today the heat and sun would catch me before finishing.  I paddle into the shade when I get to the bottom of the Dragonfly Factory.  I look ahead and see deep cool shade for the next 1/2 mile.

There was a Seagull eating a dead fish when I paddled up.  On my return I see another Gull come in and make an excellent steal.  They squabble behind me as I continue.

I turn when I run out of shade and ride a decent current back following my route except to round Great Flat on the west side.

From the Forks

June 21, 2010

We put in at the forks.  The Shetucket comes in from the east, the Yantic from the west, and magically they become the Thames that leads down to the sea.  That the largest river, the Thames, doesn't keep a name all the way to one source is a geographical mystery to me.

We started up the Shetucket.  The northern bank of this river is populated with a large number of mill remains that have long since been abandoned, burned or demolished.  Brick foundation walls and outflow tunnels from the water driven factories are the main markers.

Within a 1/2 mile the river starts to become shallow and boulders start to appear just below the surface.  We weave through a rock garden against easy swift water and wade one bank to bank gravel bar.  Even though I timed the trip for high tide, this spot is just a bit short of floating a loaded canoe.  Some open water leads to another rock garden that requires a bit more detailed route finding to avoid grounding out or being pushed back by fast water.  And with that we come to the impressive ruins of the Capeheart Mill.

Capeheart Mill ruins

The textile mill remains stands on a man made island with the back channel being the water power feed from the Greenville Dam that lies another half mile upriver.  After going upriver a couple hundred yards to where it becomes wading depth, we return to explore the banks and outflow tunnels.

M collects a mud filled clock radio.  The mill was burned in 2010 most likely by an arsonist.  So, the radio is possibly something that washed out of the mill as the fire department hosed the flames.  Two years ago I found a rusty mechanical check writing machine near this spot.  We also find some 1 inch wide drive chain.  Unfortunately, the water is too low to get the canoe into the tunnels, so we go in a ways on foot in until the mud becomes shoe-sucking.  There are some recent raccoon or opossum tracks.  As we load up to leave, I manage to tip the canoe over and drown my camera.  Hopefully, it will recover, but if not it is 10 years old with 20,000 photographs on its resume.

We pick and drift our way back down through the boulders and pass our put in to head up the Yantic.  Once past the marinas, which are on a long island in the river, the Yantic becomes quiet surround by lush forested hillsides.  Then, one more old mill, this one converted with a good deal of care into condominiums.  Just upstream of the mill is the former power source, a fifty foot cascade that tumbles down through a narrow break in the cliffs.  We make a few meanders and around islands and return.

East River

Morning comes calm and sunny and far too nice to not take advantage of.  When I put in the tide is still coming in but at a high enough level that I just might get through the Sneak.  I head up the Neck River.

The Willets are particularly active this morning.  Warning and complaints come from the banks and every so often one of them will fly near and past letting out a piercing call that warns all of the other Willets that a threat is near.  Sometimes a few others will rise up to see what the fuss is about. 

Willet

The Sneak is passable although about a half hour earlier it might have been a bit dodgy.

The Sneak

There are quite a few Marsh Wrens in the lower marsh.  This is well away from their nests as almost all of the potential nesting spots in the lower marsh flood with very high tides.

A single Glossy Ibis passes by when I get to the Big Bends.  It lands and I lose sight of it.

The tide is high when I get to Foote Bridge so I continue on another half mile to the first full span deadfall.  There I turn back.

I spot a flock of eighteen Glossy Ibises in the middle of the Big Bends.  I get a good count when they flush and move 200 yards to another feeding spot.

Glossy Ibises

I return back through the Sneak paddling against a mild headwind and with the aid of a steadily increasing ebb current.