AMC Paddle - Mystic River

It's been a long time since I was able to join in  a group paddling adventure.  As it happens, I did this same route 4 years ago.  That experience was enjoyable, so I figured, let's do it again. 

Our put-in is just north of the I-95 overpass.
The river is fairly wide at this point. 

Heading north, the river narrows quickly then passes some old factory buildings.
A little further on, it narrows to about 6'.  With all the recent rains, the current is pretty strong.

Here is an osprey nest atop these power poles.  One of the leaders mentioned that she has seen eagles in the area as well and apparently it is not uncommon for them to take over used nests of other birds.

Next we head south under the bridges of I-95.

We make a stop at the Mystic Seaport Museum to see all the tourists.  
My kayak looks pretty small next to the Charles W. Morgan.

Our turnaround point is the Mason Island Yacht club (where they let us land and also use the restrooms).  No super-yachts here, just locals and kids learning to sail.  We did we some big yachts back in the marina, but I missed getting photos.

When we came under this bridge earlier it was pretty easy.  But now we're half way between and high and low tide, so there's a lot of water moving.  My fellow paddlers are having a bit more challenging time getting back through with all that water rushing back out to sea.

Lastly, I wanted to include this video clip of the Mystic River road bridge going into the "up" position.  In the summertime it happen at 45 minutes past the hour, so if you can't fit through at the other times you just have to wait.

Stats for today's paddle:

Distance 10.7 miles;  average speed 2.12 mph;  total time: 5:02.