Conewago Dreamin'
Near where I live runs a creek called the Conewago. Many names in the area are either English (York, Dover), German (East Berlin, Hanover) or Native (Conewago, Susquehanna, Conestoga).
Not sure of the precise etomology of the creek's name, but an Onondaga friend once pronounced the name of a reservation in New York (Kanewake) as "conewaguh"... hmmmmm. That means "at the rapids".
The creek is what westerners would call a river, maybe, a wide, mostly gently flowing swath maybe a hundred feet across, with rocky places and riffles and low head dams. It is mostly surrounded by farmland and woods, inhabited by egrets, herons and eagles, bluegills and bass and carp. And one Northern Water Snake who fled when we bumped the kayaks around too close.
I generally launch in big water, open water, the bay and wide rivers like the Susquehanna and Sassafras. So a paddle up the creek and back with my cousin and her kids was a new thing. The put-in was a pull over along a back road, a washed out drive down to the creek (no fun heaving boats down there, even with kayak wheels), and there were no bathrooms. Ugh. But the amount of wildlife we saw was worth the effort.
We counted numerous great egrets (white, tall), blue herons, green herons (crow sized, you can get fairly close to them), one northern water snake, turtles (hopefully painted and not the invasive red eared sliders), a mystery blue flower, tracks on the riverbank, swallows diving over the water in search of bugs (cliff or bank?... using a wire as a hunting perch). And one adult bald eagle which I did not get a picture of.
Here are some stills from the trip. Video on my youtube channel.
Not sure of the precise etomology of the creek's name, but an Onondaga friend once pronounced the name of a reservation in New York (Kanewake) as "conewaguh"... hmmmmm. That means "at the rapids".
The creek is what westerners would call a river, maybe, a wide, mostly gently flowing swath maybe a hundred feet across, with rocky places and riffles and low head dams. It is mostly surrounded by farmland and woods, inhabited by egrets, herons and eagles, bluegills and bass and carp. And one Northern Water Snake who fled when we bumped the kayaks around too close.
I generally launch in big water, open water, the bay and wide rivers like the Susquehanna and Sassafras. So a paddle up the creek and back with my cousin and her kids was a new thing. The put-in was a pull over along a back road, a washed out drive down to the creek (no fun heaving boats down there, even with kayak wheels), and there were no bathrooms. Ugh. But the amount of wildlife we saw was worth the effort.
We counted numerous great egrets (white, tall), blue herons, green herons (crow sized, you can get fairly close to them), one northern water snake, turtles (hopefully painted and not the invasive red eared sliders), a mystery blue flower, tracks on the riverbank, swallows diving over the water in search of bugs (cliff or bank?... using a wire as a hunting perch). And one adult bald eagle which I did not get a picture of.
Here are some stills from the trip. Video on my youtube channel.
