Yesterday, the first morning of winter, I awoke to temperatures still above 40 degrees and decided to see just how much damage last week's flash freeze had done to my local rivers. After launching into the lower Sudbury River, I found open water to Egg Rock where ice has formed a tongue-like projection from its base where the Assabet and Sudbury rivers come together. The Concord River was seen to be open past the Lowell Rd. bridge. However, I decided to ascend the Assabet River where upriver progress quickly ended after going only 50 yards or so. The Leaning Hemlocks could be seen in the distance (photo above) but it would have taken considerable ice breaking to get there. Instead I retreated to Egg Rock and began ascending the Sudbury River while following these hooded mergansers...
Approaching the Route 2 bridge the masonry work was seen to be deteriorating...
As Heath's Bridge (aka Sudbury Rd.) came into view things started to get crunchy...
...and all forward progress came to a halt just upriver of the bridge. A fog-shrouded Fairhaven Hill loomed in the distance...
I returned downriver to my takeout location where this paddler's 2013 paddling season, more than likely, came to an end. The last trash haul was a very modest one....a lucky 7 and brought the year to date total to 6287. Of course, there's still a yearly report to work on and a hungry pellet-stove to feed.
2 comments:
Maybe this warm weather has opened things up again
Erik, Hopefully it has, but on Sunday the warmth retreated to the south leaving us near 40 degrees while 60 degrees was reported in Taunton. If we get another blast of cold this week the ice will be well established.
Must have been tough up north where they experienced an ice storm.
Post a Comment