Friday, November 2, 2012, at 8:40 PM
When Ema and I plotted to move south, one of my 'come on' calls was over a tourist office map that showed the Neuse River around Goldsboro. It looked like a wonderful water play area. My proposed scheme was to get a little (12 ft or so) boat with an outboard and fit it with a large cooler and get onto the river and cruise down - down - down. I said that eventually we would get to New Bern and there we would "turn right" and follow the intracoastal waterway to the Bay Shore Marina and from the docks we would call Kaarin on the cell phone and ask her to come pick us up. On the way down the river we would follow all those meandering loops and see the Cliffs of the Neuse and the towns along the river shore and the roads and the farms and the practically untouched wilderness of the river valley. And the cruise would be so soothing and comfortable, since we would let the river do the work of carrying us down on its back and we could lounge and watch the shore and the fish and the turtles and the birds and . . .
Just now I did the next best thing: I started Google World and put my little boat into the Little River near Riverbend and followed the contorted line of our 'little creek in front of the house'. I passed the seed beds of the Forestry Service and crossed under 70 at the Little River Plaza and passed the old Cherry Creek Hospital and eventually came down to the Neuse, just above the old Waynesboro settlement where the riverboats used to land before the railroad was built and took the town away from the river up to where the crossing steel roads prompted Goldsboro to spring out of the ground. That happened a bit before the civil war. The line from Williamstown through Goldsboro and up towards Richmond was the last straw to break Lee's back when the battle at Goldsboro bridge destroyed the bridge and deprived the souther army of the needed supplies. That's when Lee offered to shake hands with Grant at Appomattox. The aficionados of Civil War Lore will lynch me for abbreviating history like this.
Forgive? Sure! Forget? Never
So I followed the river past the battlefield down by the new bridge and passed the Goldsboro water treatment plants at the end of the main runway of the Seymour Johnston Airforce Base and followed a stretch of 581, crossed it and then crossed 111 several times. There is some really torturous meandering going on just after I passed the Cliffs of the Neuse, which look like nothing exciting even by the view of Google, which is way more impressive than the view you get from the public parking area above. I followed that river turn by turn and was really impressed by the topographical contours which show that this river has held its present course no since a very long time. The old loops from earlier limes are clearly visible in the dark woods left and right of the water way and one gets the impression that down there, on the land, one would find what the early explorers found after they left their ship way down in the mouth of the river and began to explore the new world on foot.
I always thought that rivers meander because the land is flat, and if I go by this rule the the land up-river from Kinston is flatter than the land downriver to New Bern. Whether I'm right or wrong, the fact is that google shows very convoluted lines above Kinston, and lets the river straighten out considerably below that town, until one reaches New Bern itself, and the wide open space of the river and the first view of the barrier islands, where I found the intracoastal waterway and headed straight down to Bay shore. One day, perhaps, large scale topographical maps will be easily available and this question of where the real flat land lies can be answered.
Now that I've done that trip, I think I will reconsider the 12' flat bottom. I think I want something longer and wider, with a bent wood frame for a comfortable mosquito netted room, and perhaps enough floor space for an air mattress for one night out; and a place for a cooler plus a gas stove to have a couple of warm meals on the way down. The Neuse looks brown and silty. But we've stopped often along her shores and noticed that it is the bottom of the slow flowing river that you see. The water itself appears to be clear. Considering the number of towns along its course, and how many times the water has been used and cleaned, it should be quite pure, wouldn't you think?
Opa, the waterman
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Saturday, November 3, 2012, at 8:03 AM
When Ema and I plotted to move south, one of my 'come on' calls was over a tourist office map that showed the Neuse River around Goldsboro. It looked like a wonderful water play area. My proposed scheme was to get a little (12 ft or so) boat with an outboard and fit it with a large cooler and get onto the river and cruise down - down - down. I said that eventually we would get to New Bern and there we would "turn right" and follow the intracoastal waterway to the Bay Shore Marina and from the docks we would call Kaarin on the cell phone and ask her to come pick us up. On the way down the river we would follow all those meandering loops and see the Cliffs of the Neuse and the towns along the river shore and the roads and the farms and the practically untouched wilderness of the river valley. And the cruise would be so soothing and comfortable, since we would let the river do the work of carrying us down on its back and we could lounge and watch the shore and the fish and the turtles and the birds and . . .
Just now I did the next best thing: I started Google World and put my little boat into the Little River near Riverbend and followed the contorted line of our 'little creek in front of the house'. I passed the seed beds of the Forestry Service and crossed under 70 at the Little River Plaza and passed the old Cherry Creek Hospital and eventually came down to the Neuse, just above the old Waynesboro settlement where the riverboats used to land before the railroad was built and took the town away from the river up to where the crossing steel roads prompted Goldsboro to spring out of the ground. That happened a bit before the civil war. The line from Williamstown through Goldsboro and up towards Richmond was the last straw to break Lee's back when the battle at Goldsboro bridge destroyed the bridge and deprived the souther army of the needed supplies. That's when Lee offered to shake hands with Grant at Appomattox. The aficionados of Civil War Lore will lynch me for abbreviating history like this.
Forgive? Sure! Forget? Never
So I followed the river past the battlefield down by the new bridge and passed the Goldsboro water treatment plants at the end of the main runway of the Seymour Johnston Airforce Base and followed a stretch of 581, crossed it and then crossed 111 several times. There is some really torturous meandering going on just after I passed the Cliffs of the Neuse, which look like nothing exciting even by the view of Google, which is way more impressive than the view you get from the public parking area above. I followed that river turn by turn and was really impressed by the topographical contours which show that this river has held its present course no since a very long time. The old loops from earlier limes are clearly visible in the dark woods left and right of the water way and one gets the impression that down there, on the land, one would find what the early explorers found after they left their ship way down in the mouth of the river and began to explore the new world on foot.
I always thought that rivers meander because the land is flat, and if I go by this rule the the land up-river from Kinston is flatter than the land downriver to New Bern. Whether I'm right or wrong, the fact is that google shows very convoluted lines above Kinston, and lets the river straighten out considerably below that town, until one reaches New Bern itself, and the wide open space of the river and the first view of the barrier islands, where I found the intracoastal waterway and headed straight down to Bay shore. One day, perhaps, large scale topographical maps will be easily available and this question of where the real flat land lies can be answered.
Now that I've done that trip, I think I will reconsider the 12' flat bottom. I think I want something longer and wider, with a bent wood frame for a comfortable mosquito netted room, and perhaps enough floor space for an air mattress for one night out; and a place for a cooler plus a gas stove to have a couple of warm meals on the way down. The Neuse looks brown and silty. But we've stopped often along her shores and noticed that it is the bottom of the slow flowing river that you see. The water itself appears to be clear. Considering the number of towns along its course, and how many times the water has been used and cleaned, it should be quite pure, wouldn't you think?
Opa, the waterman
********************************************************************************
Saturday, November 3, 2012, at 8:03 AM
OK waterman (at your age this usually refers to some
physical problems), so you googled the meanderings of a river. Did you
also find navigation charts to give you channel depths? Food and drink
are to be accommodated, but how about firefighting equipment, flares,
extra cell phone batteries, rain gear, etc. etc. How about a marine
weather radio?
I admire your tenacity. You know you could probably get to the Mississippi, then the Potomac, then the Hudson, then the St Laurence
waterway, then the Atlantic, down to Boston Harbor...
Riina
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