Cleaning Up on the Great Dismal Swamp By Bradd Wilson
The Great Dismal Swamp Canal was built a little over 200 years ago, making it the oldest man-made canal in the United States. It is a strikingly beautiful waterway with abundant wildlife along the shores. Branches, vines, kudzu, Spanish moss and fallen trees hang over the waters.
M
aeve and I are fortunate enough to be among a relatively small group of Canadians who live aboard and travel in their sailboats, plying the waters from Ontario or the Maritimes annually to the warmth and sunshine of Florida and the Caribbean. For most of us, this involves not only ocean passages under sail, but stints of motoring the Intracoastal Waterway to avoid the perilous waters of Cape Hatteras. The latter stretch from Norfolk to Elizabeth City can be made either via the high-speed route through Coinjock and Currituck Sound, or the “road less travelled”—where this story takes place—the Great Dismal Swamp. The Great Dismal Swamp canal was built a little over 200 years ago, making it the oldest man-made canal in the United States (Canada has some older). It was constructed by George Washington following his term as president to transport logs for shipbuilding from the inland cypress forests to the seaports of Norfolk, Beaufort, New Bern and the like. This is a strikingly beautiful waterway with abundant wildlife along the shores. Branches, vines, kudzu and fallen trees overhang the narrow ditch, and as night falls, the Spanish moss, swamp gas and ghostly shapes of ancient cypress trees give the swamp an eerie feel, which has given rise to numerous spooky tales of the Great Dismal. Here is our own modern tale. The depth of the canal and swamp is controlled by a lock at either end, and it has three scheduled openings per day. We left Elizabeth City in northern North Carolina early one April day headed for the Great Dismal Swamp, timing our departure to reach the South Mills control lock at 9:00 a.m. The Pasquatank River leading to the lock is fairly long and winding—longer, in fact, than I had estimated—and on this day, both fog and current conspired against us. Try as we might, we just couldn’t quite make the lock on time. We arrived at five after nine and the lockmaster advised us that we’d have to wait two hours for the 11 o’clock opening! We’re supposed to be cruising—taking it easy, smelling the roses along the way. My wife reminds me constantly that we’re NOT supposed to be rushing to meet schedules and arbitrary itineraries. But the old 9-to-5 “rat-racer” in me
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is hard to change. I’d planned our day, and now, for the sake of five minutes, all those plans went down the drain. So we picked a spot in the middle of the narrow canal where the trees didn’t overhang too much, the bottom didn’t rise too abruptly, the wind wouldn’t swing us around too much and anchored Sampatecho to wait out the two hours. Besides, I could work on some of the ongoing maintenance required in this sort of travel. Busy hands made the time fly by, and in no time, the lockmaster had opened the lock and was calling us to get in or we’d be waiting for another four hours for the next opening. I set aside my tools, started the engine and ran forward to weigh anchor while Maeve took the helm. The anchor chain sang through the gypsy as it came up through the murky Guinness-colored water, then suddenly stopped! The chain was guitar-string tight and NOT moving another inch—snagged! I eased the chain; Maeve swung the boat around, and we tried again to no avail. The lockmaster called again and we pleaded with him to hold the lock while we tried everything possible to free our anchor from the clutches of the swamp bottom. Maeve drove the boat forward, as I took up whatever slack was available. We gained inches at first, then feet and finally the anchor was visible! I couldn’t get it completely free of the water because of the weight of “something” suspended from its flukes. But we could turn and slowly make our way toward the lock! I stayed on the bow as the water ran past and rinsed the mud off the big mass hooked on our anchor and revealed a washing machine! Someone who couldn’t be bothered taking it out to the dump must have thrown it into the canal. Someone who didn’t care about pollution or littering or the boats that might get snagged on it. The square housing had rusted away, but the enameled drum, the aluminum drive pulley and stainless steel shaft remained and the point of our anchor was now tightly embedded between the drum and pulley swinging like a pendulum from the bow of our boat. “Hey, Captain” called the lockmaster in his Southern (take-all-day) drawl, “You’ve got a washin’ machine ahanging from yer bow.”
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