[Paddlewise] Aldrich Point. Woody Island. Connections to the Past.

Pink.  Fiberglass.  Insulation.  What's this stuff doing inside the
cockpit of my main machine kayak?  Oh, yeah, that big storm back in
December with all the high winds.  Must have released a bunch through
the access panel to the attic, above the boat.  Vacuum.  Vacuum.  Gotta
be clean for the first paddle in ... ahhhh ... five months??!!  Ooof.
Those kayaks I saw yesterday on the float when I returned Surf Scoter to
her trailer got me thinking about paddling.  So, today I went.  Aldrich
Point, my fave launch spot hereabouts.  Entry to the islands, to the
main channel of the Columbia, twenty miles from the mouth.

Stretch, reach, hump that boat over to the water.  What's this funny
bump under the neoprene?  Must be too much pizza and beer.  Oh, well, it
all floats, no?  A little breeze down the river as I slide the drytop
on.  At least that still fits.  Slick, slick, slide, slide into the
water.  Move those muscles.  Woof, this feels good!  More fun than
riding the random orbital sander express, or hooting along the epoxy
wagon.  Boat building is fun, sometimes mental work, but paddling is
holistic food, for the mind, the body, the senses, and the fingers.

Across the channel to Tronsen, around its top, stroking down with the
tail of the ebb, chasing scaup off the water, eyeballing herons on
stumps. Nobody but me.  All the duck hunters are gone, and it is
freaking, stuff-busting, beautiful out here!  Clear, open water, easy
paddling, a few mild eddies to bridge, coasting along and checking out
the inbound freighter and downbound tug, nattering at each other, "port
to port, cap!" as they pass head to head, the odd small open skiff
skittering like a water bug along the Washington shore, making that gnat
noise.

I ease ashore on Woody, my summer beach for noshing and sunning.  In
winter, it is a view spot for the other side, a mile distant, across
calm, almost glassy water, windshields winking in the sun as fishers
hunt ironheads over there.  It is all in alders and second growth,
concealing a hundred years of history, canneries gone, fish wheels
disappeared, an entire small village bulldozed and burnt to make way for
a log dump.  One red-roofed set of old buildings a mile or two
downstream still shines in the sun, where Chinese filleters, Slav gill
netters, and Scandinavian oarsmen worked salmon runs in the early part
of the twentieth century, a hit or miss way of life, with mortality an
everyday reality.

On my side, horses hauled seine nets onto the sands, so burly armed guys
could toss big hogs (Chinook salmon) into hoppers for the same canneries.

This stuff is all gone, gone, gone, replaced by chi-chi float houses,
decked out in fresh siding and blue-fluided Marine Sanitation Devices
... heaven forfend any human poop add to the huge volumes of otter,
fish, nutria, and duck poop already here.  A long-sunk ferry which used
to ply the route from Astoria to Washington is under me as I glide by
the float houses, each permitted and now a high value item for yuppies
and the odd crawdad gatherer.

The twigs quiver in the tide, and part when I move through them, geese
scattering before me, swans and scaup and mallards making quiet noises
in the distance, a panoply of satisfying, healing sounds.  Better than
any therapy at the hands of man.

Kids toss rocks at pilings, squirting back and forth on their bikes
along the dike on my return, to a deserted ramp, empty parking lot, bare
beach, all slightly dented and scratched by the day's visitors, one
intermittent mole route at tide's edge.  Hope that guy can swim in there
-- here comes the water!

I'm done here, put back together, quieter, calmer, ready for rest.

[Note to moderator:  did not see this pop off the list server into my In 
Box.  Changed one word.  Maybe that will make a difference.]

-- 
Dave Kruger
Astoria, OR
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