The River

I loved the Connecticut River. On Friday afternoons it spread out like a flat mirror until Dad hit the throttle and the old boat carved a long, white stripe of foamy wake down the middle as we pulled away from the landing at Middle Haddam. Ten fathoms deep in the channel for the barges and freighters hauling oil and other industrial materials up to Hartford, it was half a mile wide where we began, twenty-five miles inland. As it approached Long Island Sound it stretched out on either side into broad marshes where herons stalked their prey and ducks paddled safely among the reeds.

Just Dad and I headed out for the weekend with a twenty-five pound block of ice in the cooler, breakfast, lunch and supper supplies stashed in the tiny galley. A carton of Old Golds, two rough decks of damp playing cards and our bathing suits were all we needed. The sun was hot overhead but the breeze from the WaWa's speed cooled us.

WaWa, the name for all Dad’s boats, I, II, III and WaWa IV, meant ‘flying duck’ in some Indian language. We laughed at calling the old cruiser ‘flying anything’ for she had only enough speed to get me up on waterskis. Dad couldn’t afford anything fancier and would have preferred a sailboat to a stinkpot but old WaWa’s were better than nothing. Born in Hartford to a boat-loving father, he had grown up on the river himself and knew every shallow, every sandbar and snag.

Yes, the WaWa was plenty good enough for getting out of town for the weekend. Fresh breezes in our hair, no phones, no putting up or taking down storm windows or painting that side of the barn, just the bow cutting into the smooth water, the trance-inducing roar of the engine and soon, salt water at Fenwick Point just past Saybrook.

Mom rarely came along. She preferred her garden, her library books and the Sunday Times crossword puzzle.


Once in quiet water behind the Fenwick breakwater I would throw the anchor over while Dad gently backed the WaWa to set it, just the way a roping horse backs to hold tension on the rope so the cowboy can pigtie the lassoed steer.

Then we dove overboard. Might scrub the waterline with Babo. Might swim ashore, careful to avoid the beach just in front of Katherine Hepburn’s rambling, dark house. Didn’t even put the binoculars on her to preserve her privacy. Being so close to such a celebrity was enough.

As WaWa rode the calm swells that broke their white teeth on the beach, we ate sardine sandwiches and watched the masts of sail boats and tall outriggers on fishing boats come and go in the choppy channel on the business side of the long stone breakwater. I might get a nibble on my fish hook but it would only be some small fry too bony to bother with. We’d eat well tonight in Hamburg Cove. And tomorrow at the Griswold Inn in Essex.

When we were bored with Fenwick, I hauled up the wet anchor line, coiled it perfectly on the foredeck, then planted the little Danforth on top to keep the loops from flying overboard. We headed back up into the rough water under the high Baldwin bridge among the other boats coming and going, some under sail, others speeding past with a wave. We always waved back.

When we saw someone we knew Dad rang the brass ship’s bell that hung beside the wheel. The river was an exciting turnpike, a splashing, slapping water playground. Just upriver of the arched Baldwin Bridge that carried Route 1 traffic from New York on up to Boston, we squeezed between the complicated steel trestles of a low, flat railroad bridge that crossed the river.

Ships too tall to pass under it had to signal with two loud horn blasts to ask the bridgemaster to raise a section like the jaw of a giant stapler. If a train was coming, those boats—we never used the word ‘yacht’ to describe anything less than luxurious and certainly not our own little 'boat'—might have to circle for half an hour.

The WaWa sped through alongside dozens of other small craft going in both directions. The bigger boats made huge waves that fought with other wakes to create a swirling boil. I liked to lie on the highest part of the WaWa, atop the deckhouse, as we passed through the churning waves of changing tides, looking up at the bottom of the train.

Flung from side to side by the boat’s roll, I forced myself NOT to hold on. The train might fall on me. Soomeone might flush a toilet- ugh! I might flip overboard and be run over by some drunken lout in a speedboat. These things could happen. But my father never said No to any of my shenanigans.

This was another wonderful part of the river. And what would come next.