Paddle Connecticut

Spent Saturday at a family picnic in Monroe, NY. Thanks, B&D, for all the good eats. We will be in touch about a (short, promise!) hike in the fall. After the BBQ, we drove up to Cornwall, CT, so we'd be in place to wake up a few miles from Clarke Outdoors, the outfitter for kayaking on the Housatonic River. Despite my fears that the flimsy bedroom-door quality lock on our room's door at the Hitching Post Motel would not withstand being kicked in by The Killer, we awoke Sunday, and soon were off to find a quick breakfast before our 9:30 a.m. check-in time at the outfitter. We grabbed some good, hot egg sandwiches at a general store-type place, which was probably the only store for miles. Who knew Connecticut was so rural? Not us. Sadly, we didn't have enough time to sit down at a place called The Wandering Moose Cafe, which was packed. We made our way to the outfitter and found out that construction on a dam caused a redirectiong of the regular kayak and canoe route. Okay. We were then asked if we wanted to go on the long or short ride. Given the drive home we faced later that afternoon, we opted for the short ride. Good thing we did (more on this later).

We sat outside while the crew loaded up the transport vans and boat wagons, and slowly became more and more terrified that we'd be kayaking near, behind, or with a group of 15 people, some of whom had come up from Jersey like us (but whose license plate holder said Freehold; yeesh). The highlight of waiting for the crew to be ready to drive to the put-in spot was the following interaction between a mother and her son. The father and another middle-aged guy hopped into a car to go pick up lunch for their combined 9 kids, seemingly because the redirection of the boat route prevented all boaters from being able to put-out near the aforementioned general store, which apparently is usually a popular midway stopping point on this route. Soooo, as the two guys from the pack of 15 get ready to drive off, the father sort of asks the wife what kind of sandwiches to get for the kids. "Turkey? Ham?" The mother replied, "Ham's good." Van speeds off, kicking up dust on us as we long for the crew to say they're finally ready to shove off. The mother walks back to the pack of kids, who are throwing rocks out onto the windy road in front of the outfitter's parking lot, almost hitting a Harley chain gang and assorted automobiles as they pass by. "Joey (or whatver stupid name the kid had), do you want a turkey sandwich, or will you eat ham?" "I HATE HAM! I don't eat HAM!" the kid yelps back. "Oh, well, oh, well, if Dad brings back a ham for you, I'll eat it and you can have turkey." We tried our best to contain our laughter after watching this ridiculous picture of familial bliss play out.

After what seemed like the longest wait on Earth, we finally followed the shuttle van in our car to the car-drop-off spot, at the take-out spot. At least these folks knew their organization was a little off and thought we all might like to leave our cars at the take-out spot so we wouldn't be stranded there waiting for the shuttle to come fetch us, especially after it took a good 20 minutes to get there. So everyone somehow managed to squeeze their cars (about 5 vehicles) onto the slim shoulder at the take-out spot--the regular parking area was closed as part of that dam(n) construction. We noticed that the AT crossed the street right in front of were we parked George. Awesome. We'd read that the AT followed the H. River up here. Too bad we weren't able to kayak along that part because of the rerouting. So we all piled into the big van, but it turned out that we were one person too many, and M., as the last person to get into the van, was screwed out of a seat. Thanks, Mr. and Mrs. Nashville for letting him sit with one cheek on the bench seat and the other on a wheelwell instead of thinking to put their daughter on one of their laps for the ride. THANKS!

M. somehow managed not to die on the long ride to the first put-in spot. Luckily, because we'd picked the short ride, we were able to escape the terrible van here. The driver literally chucked our yaks and the few canoes getting in here down a steep slope to the water's edge. Guess those boats are stronger than they look, given the beating they get from their own people. Soon the three or four canoes were out on the river, and we decided to hang back so we weren't in a pack all day. M. dawdled to take some photos, and then we were on our way. The scenery wasn't as nice as along Cedar Creek, although there was about 95 percent less garbage in it. There wasn't much of a current, so we were able to get a real feel for the work involved (unlike the fast current of the CC last week) in kayaking. This time we'd selected sit-in kayaks, and by trip's end, we decided we did prefer them over the ocean sit-on-tops. Highlights of the ride included several stinky cow pastures, a few beacy areas created by the dam project, and some small rapids. We went over three or four. The last one, about 100 yards from the take-out, completely soaked both of us, but it was great fun. A little scary to see the front of your yak completely submurged under water, but we made out okay. I can now see the appeal of boating on real rapids! Given the lack of a current and the headwind that we faced when coming around a few corners, we were glad we'd chosen the short trip, which we were told was about 6 miles, but which M.'s GPS said was only 4.6.

Oh, and lest I forget: Is there a law against towing an actively smoking pig smoker, let along a pair of them, on a medium-sized highway? If not, there should be. However we found ourselves behind this catastrophe-in-the-making, I don't know, but I do know that we had to drive a good five miles with the windows cranked down to get that meat smell out of the car. Smelling smoked meat from afar while driving through Tennessee is one thing. Driving behind a smoking smoker being towed by an SUV in Connecticut is something else entirely!

(written by H.)