Alexandersmap

    Month: February 2018

    • Sea Glass

      Another offseason walk on the beach brought me to Salisbury Beach.  I walk for all the reasons you might expect, and I seek out open space to give my mind room to expand.  Salisbury in summer is a mess of arcades, pizza joints and go-carts.  It’s slowly gentrifying, but it’s no Rye.  Salisbury is a working class beach, and it offers no apologies.  While I turn my nose up at arcades in middle age, I acknowledge that Salisbury Beach has great sand, crashing waves and in February, elbow room.  A receding tide offers even more elbow room, and a chance to look for treasure.

      A beach walk generally doesn’t require you look at where you’re walking.   None of the tripping hazards that some of my more granite-forward paths take me on.  Just beach sand and the occasional sea gull or metal detector swinger.  Swingers always fit the same profile; early retirement years, male, work alone and wear a very serious expression on their face.  I’ve noted some similarities in my current beach walk and will strive to never purchase a metal detector.

      The treasure I seek on a beach is glass.  Sure, sea shells and smooth stones are great too, but seasoned beach glass is a rare find indeed.  Glass comes in different levels of maturity on a beach.  There’s the juvenile, hazardous freshly broken glass, which is every barefoot beach walkers worst nightmare.  When I come across this I curse the drinker who it originated from and do my best to safely remove it from the beach.  This glass almost always originated right on the beach.

      Lightly-seasoned sea glass is a bit more interesting.  It originated somewhere out at sea, as indicated by the light buffing that the surf and sand have done to it.  Lightly-seasoned glass has the sharpness removed, but it’s still rigid around those edges.  It’s also easy to see through.  It’s always a tough call whether to keep it, leave it for another stroller or dispose of it.  My answer is to pick it up and leave it on a railing near the entrance to the beach as an offering to the retirement gods.

      The class of the sea glass is well-seasoned glass.  Like a fine wine it’s been aged appropriately, and shows unique characteristics that make finding it special.  The edges are smooth and rounded, and the glass itself is opaque, so you can’t really see through it.  Well-seasoned glass is tough to find, an usually only available on special beaches.

      My favorite beach for finding well-seasoned sea glass is in the Hamptons on Long Island.  Millions of tons of trash was dumped in the ocean over the years, and this expensive real estate features some of the best sea glass I’ve come across.  Salisbury Beach beach glass is more of the lightly-seasoned variety.  Bottles floating down the Merrimack River or dumped in the ocean offshore eventually makes it’s way to the beaches.

      Sea glass is the beautiful byproduct of trash.  At some point in the not-too-distant past a trash barge or an ignorant boater dumped that bottle overboard.  Time battered it into pieces, and the surf action buffed it.  Given the appropriate amount of aging, beach glass is charmingly beautiful.  Something out of nothing.  The environmentalist in me cringes at the origin, but embraces the recycling of the glass into something more than it once was.

      Today there just aren’t as many glass bottles being dumped into the ocean.  Plastic bottles have taken over the trash, and it’s a horrible addition to the ocean.  Much more of an environmental tragedy than adding glass bottles.  Plastic is the real enemy on the beach and in the ocean.  Thankfully the ocean isn’t the dumping ground that it once was but it will take time to make the oceans clean.  I hope we’re up for the task.  And over time our friend sea glass will become an endangered species, which makes finding it a real treasure.

    • Dogtown

      New England is deeply rooted in its colonial past.  Walking through the woods in most towns in the area, you’ll come across miles of stone walls, old cellar holes and forgotten road beds.  But there is no walk in the woods quite like Dogtown Common.  I had an opportunity to take a walk through this abandoned village yesterday, a bright February Tuesday.  While it was a beautiful day for a walk in the woods, I didn’t see another soul in the two hours I spent there.

      Dogtown is located in Gloucester, Massachusetts, right on the edge of the town of Rockport, on Cape Anne.   It was once a small community of settlers who cleared and farmed the land as so many other communities did in New England.  Unfortunately, they chose a tough spot for this.  As the name Rockport indicates, this area is basically arid piles of loose granite sitting on top of ledge, sprinkled with some dirt.  Once the trees were cleared and the livestock grazed the remaining vegetation to the ground, there wasn’t much left to work with.  Compounding things, Dogtown was sited in an exposed area near the sea, making it an easy target for the British in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812.  So over time residents moved on, abandoning the area for easier living elsewhere.

      Sheep continued to graze in this area into the early 20th century, but as with so much of New England    the farmers and herders passed on, leaving the land to return to the woods.  Dogtown 100 years ago was a rocky land sprinkled with grass and shrubs.  Today it’s a forest with a bed of boulders, ledge, old stone walls and cellar holes, similar to what you’d see in forests throughout the region.  What makes Dogtown unique is the work of Roger Babson, who commissioned unemployed stonecutters to carve words and numbers into the granite boulders that litter Dogtown.  Babson was an interesting guy; he was a Prohibition Party member, he predicted the market crash that led to the Great Depression, and he founded Babson College.  As a tenth generation Babson from Gloucester Dogwood Common was figuratively in his blood.

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

      Walking through the woods of Dogtown on a bright winter day, the work of Babson resonated with me.  I chose a Tuesday when most people are working to visit, and had the place to myself.  Aside from seeing mountain bike tire prints, the sounds of commuter trains on the tracks that cut through Dogtown and the sounds of construction encroaching on the woods at the nearby office park betraying the current century, my visit was timeless.  The stonemasons and the settlers to this area have come and gone from this place and it was my turn, alone amongst the boulders.
      Babson spoke to me from the past with his choice of words and phrases carved into the boulders.  “Get A Job” is highly relevant for me as I leave the struggles of one job for the hope of another.  “Truth” challenges me to be honest with myself about where my own strengths and weaknesses lie.  “Courage” shoves me in the chest and knocks me back a step, urging me to be bold today.  And “Prosperity Follows Service” reminds me that to earn anything worthwhile you’ve got to give much more of yourself.  While some view the messages as a strange curiosity, Babson’s boulders for me are a humbling reminder of what I can be.
      I came to the woods knowing of this place.  Perhaps because I was alone on this brilliant winter day, or maybe because of the place I’m at in my own life, but Dogtown resonated as I walked its quiet paths.  They say that when the student is ready the teacher will appear.  Maybe it was the woods, with voices of the past whispering in my ear as I walked.  Maybe it was me moving on from one job to the next and working that through in my mind.  Or maybe it was a message from a tenth generation Gloucester Babson who died a year after I was born.

       

    • Ambient Light

      Last night was one of those nights you hope for when you’re a stargazer.  Brilliantly clear skies, with cold air providing sharp focus.  Just a quick glance at the sky showed old friends Orion, Ursa Major and Ursa Minor, and down low in the southern sky, Canis Major with the brilliant Sirius a beacon on the constellation.  Sadly, the neighborhood was lit up like a prison yard as several of the neighbors chose to leave their outdoor lights on.  Another celestial show foiled again by the neighbors…

      I seek out the sky, and often walk looking up, sometimes started when I step off the pavement onto the shoulder of the road.  I once sailed from Norfolk, Virginia to Newburyport, Massachusetts, and eagerly watched the night sky when we were well offshore.  Cape Cod in winter offers some good viewing.  Any large body of water serves to subtract ambient light, simply because there usually aren’t lights shining there.  A favorite place in southern New Hampshire is Big Island Pond, where many a late night boat ride was spent marveling at the night sky.  Another spot I have fond memories of is the Robert Frost Farm in Derry.  Back in the late 1990’s I joined a couple of friends for a late night viewing of the Hale-Bopp comet in these Frost fields.  I think old Bob would have approved and joined us for a turn at the telescope had he been alive.  The next comet will be Halley’s Comet in 2062.  I would be 96 in 2062.  I hope I’m around to see it, and have my wits about me to recognize it.

      In search of dark skies, I came across The International Dark Sky Association, which lists Mont-Mégantic (Québec) as the closest, and first-in-the-world, International Dark Sky Reserve.  I’ll confess I wasn’t aware of this distinction prior to today.  Mont-Mégantic is roughly a four hour drive, directly through the White Mountains of New Hampshire, past the Connecticut Lakes region and into Quebec.  This region is familiar country for me.  I’ve visited the area to see moose, canoe on First Connecticut Lake and see and hear loons.  It’s an area that stays in my memory even after a quarter century.  If I was going to pick a part of New England that would have the darkest skies, this corridor between Franconia Notch and Pittsburgh would be on the short list.  Shifting northeast into Maine, I’d pick the Hundred Mile Wilderness along the Appalachian Trail as a likely dark sky candidate, and of course the unnamed wilderness to the north.

      Curious about where the darkest places in New England actually are, I came across this helpful site called Dark Sky Finder, (http://www.jshine.net/astronomy/dark_sky/index.php?lat=40.384212768155045&lng=-74.300537109375&zoom=8).  As this image shows, the darkest areas are in the north-easternmost corner of New Hampshire northeastward through a large swath of remote wilderness in Maine between Baxter State Park and the Allagash Wilderness Waterway that runs along the Canadian border.

      It was an easy guess picking the wilderness of Maine as the darkest skies in the northeast.  My memories of hiking the Hundred Mile Wilderness aren’t filled with a lot of ambient light.  Another memory comes to me.  The first time I hiked the Appalachian Trail through Mahoosuc Notch I was in my early 20’s.  A bunch of us set up camp at the Speck Pond Campsite, had dinner and swapped stories from our day through the Notch.  After dinner we hiked halfway up the trail to Old Speck Mountain and settled in for star gazing.  There was a meteor shower that night and the clear dark skies gave us the perfect canvas for a stunning show.  That night is what I think about when I look to the skies.  I guess I’m still chasing stars.

    • Population Growth and Conservation

      This morning there were six to eight deer in the woods behind my home.  It was hard to tell exactly how many since they blend into the woods so well.  That camouflage helps with survival in a harsh world full of predators.  The wild turkeys that make an appearance almost daily around the area sport similar camouflage.  It’s no coincidence that both are rebounding in record numbers in New England. While there’s some irony that this is happening while development encroaches on more and more of the undeveloped areas that they live in, wild animals enjoy the relative security that comes with fewer predators.

      I know a few hunters, but I know a lot more people who don’t hunt.  According to the Quality Deer Management Association, there are 5-8 hunters per square mile in New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts, 9-12 hunters per square mile in Connecticut and Vermont, and 13-16 per square mile in New York and Rhode Island.  Pennsylvania leads the way with more than 20 hunters per square mile.  Of course, when you factor in the length of hunting season, and restrictions in where hunters can hunt, you see why deer and turkey populations continue to increase.

      I’m not a fan of urban sprawl, and I hate to see new developments pop up in the town where I live.  I recognize that the very neighborhood I live in was once woods that someone else valued for it’s pristine condition.  Being a preservationist or a conservationist is tricky business.  Ultimately, the market determines real estate values and the appeal of new developments.  Towns determine zoning restrictions, size of lots, and how many building permits are issued annually.  Towns like Carlisle, Massachusetts have a lot of conservation land, mixed with unbuildable wetlands.  Real estate prices escalate as a result of supply versus demand.  Carlisle happens to be in a desirable part of the state and shares a school system with another desirable town (Concord), so those two factors combine for one of the more expensive towns to live in.

      Contrast that with neighboring towns Billerica or Chelmsford.  Each of these towns have conservation land, but they’ve also allowed significant development as residential and commercial development has snatched up much of the available land in these towns.  The train has left the station for large tracts of conservation land.  What they have is largely what they’ll have going forward.  Even in neighboring Concord, which has large tracts of conservation land and significant cultural and historical value, the fight to save Waldon Woods from developers has taken decades and millions of dollars to secure, and that fight is long from over.

      Perhaps the future of development will be Serenbe, the “progressive community connected to nature on the edge of Atlanta” that blends large tracts of preserved natural areas with properties for sale or rent, restaurants and recreational facilities.  As rural areas become increasingly developed, this may be one way to stem the tide of urban sprawl.  As we’ve seen with the current President, designating lands as public doesn’t necessarily protect them from those who would profit from them.

      My own development was built when there was a four acre minimum for each house.  This restriction created a natural buffer that theoretically limited development.  My neighborhood utilized a loophole where the lots could be smaller – my lot is 3/4 of an acre – while still preserving large tracts of the land as natural buffers.  So the land behind my home is preserved for wildlife and for us all to enjoy.  Sadly this hasn’t been the norm, and many of the developments that have popped up in this and surrounding towns are designed to maximize the profits of the developer versus ensuring open space.

      While cities seem to be gaining more popularity, there seems to be a parallel explosion in 55+ and condo/townhouse developments spreading into previously rural towns.  Hunters and conservationists can work with developers to protect large tracts of land for future generations, but the time to do it is now.  Ultimately money and political will drive much of what will happen.  Time will tell who wins.

    • Salt

      I came back from a trip to Upstate New York to find a skating rink for a driveway.  It’s a northeast thing.  February snow quickly turns to concrete when you add freezing rain on top of it and give it a night to set in.  The key is to be diligent about cleaning the driveway, deck or other surfaces that you actually want to use.  But when you travel sometimes the weather gets ahead of you.  So when you’re greeted by ice, you turn to rock salt.  Salt changes the melting point of ice in ways I’ve chosen not to be qualified to answer.

      Bags of rock salt are a must when you have constant freeze/thaw conditions.  With a driveway completely coated in ice, I had to bring in the heavy artillery and sprinkled 120 pounds of salt on the driveway.  Salt, scrape off what you can, repeat.  Salt is tough on the pavement and nearby plants, and it’s equally tough on any metal it contacts.  It’s not optimal for maintaining a pristine environment.  But it’s a necessary evil in the northeast, especially at times like these.  That I had to use three bags of salt is insane, but it’s indicative of just how much ice was on the driveway.

      Much of the rock salt used on roads and driveways like mine comes from Upstate New York.  Syracuse is nicknamed the salt city, and there are salt mines all through the area.  It’s an industry that took off in the 1800’s, and remains one of the largest exports from Upstate New York.  People that live in that area know all about it, and I’d heard about one of the salt mines from a local who told me about the Cargill Mine that run underneath Cayuga Lake in Lansing, NY.  This and other mines were highlighted a couple of years ago when 17 miners had to be rescued when an elevator failed.

      Salt mines tap into the ancient salt deposits left from Ohio to New York.  To think of Upstate New York or Ohio as the bottom of the ocean 450 million years ago shrinks the ego down to size.  Our world is both much smaller and much larger than we believe.  But our lifetimes on this earth is infinitesimal when you think about the time it took for these salt deposits to form.  So I confess I don’t generally think about salt, but I’ve come to appreciate it for more than the job it does on my driveway.  The humble rock salt in turn has humbled me.

    • Playlist: Beach Music, February Edition

      My musical tastes are pretty eclectic and diverse.  I run from classical to heavy metal, with long stops in alternative and classic rock.  But beach music is what I come back to time and again.  It’s a year-long soundtrack, whether I’m on a beach or thawing out inside after shoveling the driveway.  Beach music isn’t meant to challenge you or pump you up.  It’s not getting critical acclaim.  Beach music enhances your good mood or helps get you there.  Beach music is about celebrating life, or reflecting on it with a cocktail and a setting sun.

      Reggae, Calypso and Latin music are all great, and I play a fair amount of each.  But to me beach music means the blend of 70’s singer/songwriter with a dash of pop and country crooner.  Jimmy Buffett, Kenny Chesney, Jason Mraz, Zac Brown, Jack Johnson, and The Eagles are the most common contributors.  Sprinkle in a few other gems and you’ve got a 40 song playlist that pairs well with rum.  As with any playlist you could go on forever adding songs.  This is a good starter kit.

      A Pirate Looks at 40 – Jimmy Buffett
      Nautical Wheelers – Jimmy Buffett
      Havana Daydreamin’ – Jimmy Buffett
      Blue Island Rendezvous – Jimmy Buffett
      Barometer Soup – Jimmy Buffett
      That Luck Old Sun (Just Rolls Around Heaven All Day) – Kenny Chesney & Willie Nelson
      Soul of a Sailor – Kenny Chesney
      Somewhere in the Sun – Kenny Chesney
      Boston – Kenny Chesney
      The Life – Kenny Chesney
      Three Little Birds – Bob Marley
      One Love – Bob Marley
      Slip Away – John Frinzi
      Do You Remember – Jack Johnson
      Better Together – Jack Johnson
      Constellations – Jack Johnson
      Island Song – Zac Brown Band
      Loving You Easy – Zac Brown Band
      Tequila Sunrise – Eagles
      Peaceful Easy Feeling – Eagles
      Best of My Love – Eagles
      Ol’ 55 – Eagles
      I’m Yours – Jason Mraz
      Live High (From an Avacado Salad Session) – Jason Mraz
      Come Away With Me – Norah Jones
      Find It – Bankie Banx
      Sitting Here in Limbo – Jimmy Cliff
      Secret O’ Life – James Taylor
      Sweet Baby James – James Taylor
      Don’t Worry Baby – Beach Boys
      Good to be Alive – Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
      Just Another Sundown – Toby Keith
      At Last – Etta James
      The Summer Wind – Frank Sinatra
      Carey – Joni Mitchell
      Lovely Day – Bill Withers
      The Rainbow Connection – Willie Nelson
      Smile – Uncle Cracker
      Summer Side of Life – Gordon Lightfoot
      Vienna – Billy Joel

    • What’s in a Name, Part II

      Driving through the Southern Tier in Upstate New York is like time travel in slow motion.  You can see the change that time brings.  The wooded hills aren’t as tall as they were when the Oneida and Mohawk tribes ruled this land, but the woods have re-established themselves in many areas.  And with the trees the whispers of the mighty Iroquois Confederacy float through the valley.  The  Mohawk, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga, Seneca and Delaware tribes that populated Upstate New York will never return, but in some ways they’ve never left.  Their names live on as counties, towns, rivers and other place names like monuments to the tragic past of disease and violent displacement that stole them from these lands.  The remnants of the Seneca Nation reside mostly in three reservations in the area.

      Place names may honor our own past or be borrowed from those who came before us.  Towns and villages are often named for the settlers who first cleared and farmed the land, or to honor a notable person from the time, like Washington, Franklin, or Madison.  Upstate New York was settled at a time when names pointed towards Greek or Roman culture or mythology.  Ithaca, Greece, Rome, Ulysses, Syracuse all point to this practice from the 1800’s.  Perhaps the best story of the randomness of naming a town comes from Utica, where the name was literally pulled out of a hat.

      Today’s rural Upstate New York is dominated by corn and dairy farms, but the life of a farmer is difficult, and many of the old farms are returning to the land.  Rotted and falling barns and silos dot the land.  Farmhouses advertise the poverty level of the region with flaking paint, sagging porches and and blue tarp roofs.  Villages along Route 206 like Whitney Point, Triangle, Greene, Coventry and Bainbridge proudly point to their roots between the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 while looking towards an uncertain future.  Technology or population growth may one day bring growth and prosperity to this region, but I hope the land returns to nature and the names fade like whispers on the wind.

       

    • Chasing Waterfalls

      I seek out waterfalls.  And sunrises… and sunsets… and just about anything else that makes magic out of the ordinary.  If I’m in a place with something to see then, well, I’m going to try to see it.  I’ve chased down steamed cheeseburgers in Connecticut, lighthouses in Maine, Heady Topper in Vermont and driven halfway across Portugal to see the end of the world. Like Thoreau, I want to live deep and suck the marrow out of life.

      Today I found myself hunkered down in a hotel in Ithaca, NY.  For a snow town they do a lousy job plowing this city during a storm.  Ithaca is known for its hard winters, its hills, and its gorges.  And of course the gorges are where you’ll find the waterfalls.  Like this one, Cascadilla Falls, from the creek that bears the same name.

      It’s no wonder Cornell chose this location for his land grant college.  Ithaca is unique and interesting, and largely undiscovered for me.  Driving around gives you a sense of this, but there’s no substitute for walking.  Even if walking today meant shuffling through eight inches of snow on uncleared sidewalks.  Sometimes living deeply is more work than at other times.

      There’s never enough time for these detours from the routine.  But I manage to squeeze in a few memorable moments each week.  I’ve grown to love Upstate New York over the years.  It’s more than cows and corn at 70 MPH on I-90.  I hope to convey that in future posts.

       

    • A Walk With Bodhi

      Walks with my dog Bodhi are getting shorter as he gets older.  Winter walks around the neighborhood have always been a part of our time together.  Generally around 10 PM I’ll go find him, or more often he’ll find me and we’ll start our routine.  I dress for the weather du jour, he wears his usual ensemble.  Bodhi takes a big drink from his bowl, sometimes lasting up to a minute, and we head out.  The ritual is time-tested and only interrupted by work travel or other such distractions.

      In his younger days Bodhi would be beside himself with anticipation as we walked out of the garage and down the driveway.  He’d look eagerly left and right to see if any of his neighborhood friends were out, or if there were any rabbits or skunks to chase down.  Many times in his adolescence Bodhi would be several steps into a sprint before I could stop the rapidly unspooling retractable leash.  There were a few times when he’d cut behind me and I’d be spun around by his power.  Discipline was never his strength.  Did I mention Bodhi is a puppy kindergarten graduate?

      As we learned each others habits, I’d come to anticipate these moments.  Combined with the use of a harness when walking him, we soon dropped the tug-a-human habit.  Walking Bodhi at night is always interesting, as he’ll see animals in the dark that I can’t possibly see.  Whether it’s a raccoon, rabbit, skunk or something more ominous, it’s a game of squint in the direction he’s pulling in.  I rarely carry a flashlight with me, as I prefer to have my eyes adjust to the darkness.  So outside of the occasional sniff of a skunk or flash of white on black fur, I’ll never know what animals triggered most of these moments of excitement.  In summer we’d hear the distant sound of coyotes, or the too-close sound of fisher cats in the woods between our house and the horse farm.  Living in Southern New Hampshire near a stream, woods and farms is like Wild Kingdom.

      Our walks on the dark street awaken the senses in other ways.  Every night is different, and often there are dramatic changes in the sky during our time outside.  Many times we’d start a walk with cloud cover and end it with clear starry skies.  Or start clear and end with raindrops or snow pelting us.  Clouds, planes, and satellites cut across the terrestrial backdrop.  Familiar friends Orion, Ursa Major, Ursa Minor, the moon and the planets greet us as we walk,  Some days we’ll be lucky to see a meteor shower, a solitary shooting star or the International Space Station streak across the sky.  Other nights when the moon is full and there’s snow on the ground it feels like we’re under a spotlight.  I’ve grown to love the night sky and its ever-changing magic.  I often resent my otherwise lovely neighbors for leaving their outdoor spotlights on, as it encroaches on the darkness and impacts my night vision.

      Back at dog-level, Bodhi has a different sensory experience than I do.  Aside from his interactions with the creatures of the night, he’s also taking stock of what’s changed during the day since he last visited the street.  He has his usual sniffing spots, to see what the other dogs in the neighborhood have been up to.  Bodhi contributes significantly to the sniff telegraph himself, marking his turf, and opening the floodgates several times on the walk.  All that binge water drinking for a cause.

      Besides peeing and sniffing, Bodhi’s favorite activity on walks is snacking.  In winter he munches on snow.  In summer it may be road kill.  Trying to keep him away from these things in the dark is a constant challenge.  Squeezing his jaw to free the crushed remains of a flattened frog is a skill I’ve used many times over the years.  Bodhi has never been squeamish about what he eats.

      Stairs are tough now.  So are snow banks.  Our walks are getting shorter, even if they take the same amount of time.  My step counts used to be easy to maintain with Bodhi, but the days of us doing three or four laps up and down the street are over now.  So I accept the long pauses he takes to sniff and catch his breath.  The walks are at his pace now, and I’ll miss these nights when they’re gone.

       

       

       

    • The Merrimack River

      The Merrimack River runs from the Lakes Region in New Hampshire to the Atlantic Ocean.   Source to Sea it’s roughly 117 miles long from the confluence of the Pemigewasset and Winnipesaukee rivers at Franklin, NH to the mouth at Newburyport, Massachusetts.  This stretch of river has served as a source of food, commerce and transportation for thousands of years.  Depending on who you believe, the name is derived from Native American words merruh and auke, which together mean “the place of strong current”.  The Merrimack lives up to that name.

      The powerful current of the Merrimack drew the attention of the Boston Associates, who expanded their manufacturing operations from Waltham to the Pawtucket Falls in what was East Chelmsford, and soon would be known as Lowell (named after the founder of Boston Associates, John Cabot Lowell).  The massive success of the textile mills in Lowell was quickly duplicated in other locations along the Merrimack, sprouting the cities of Lawrence and Haverhill in Massachusetts, and Manchester and Concord in New Hampshire.

      The explosive growth of colonial expansion and then the textile industry transformed the Merrimack River from sleepy Native American fishing villages to massive red brick cities connected by an increasing network of roads.  Dams and canals have changed the flow of the river and impacted the migration of salmon.  In many ways the river has changed forever from what it was in the early 17th century, but much of the river looks essentially the same as it did 400 years ago.

      If 60% of an adult man’s body is made of water, then much of mine is Merrimack.  I’ve lived most of my life in the Merrimack Valley, spent my college years rowing between Lowell and Nashua, visiting my father’s home along the river in Franklin, hiking the old Native American trail network from Lowell to Andover and now sailing out of Newburyport.  The brook in my backyard flows into the Spicket River, which in turn flows into the Merrimack River in Lawrence.  The Merrimack River continues to shape me, as it shapes the eastern border between New Hampshire and Massachusetts.