You walk through Ashuelot Park with your bag of gear, smiling at a mother pushing a
stroller and a jogger and his dog as you pass by. You walk past the bridge and work your
way down to the small beach by the river. You nod to the elderly couple sitting on a
bench. They nod back, but their smiles become fixed and nervous as you start to remove
your clothes.
You strip down to your swimsuit, then open your bag and take out your gear. You do an
awkward sort of a dance as you stand on one foot at a time, brushing sand and dirt from
each of your feet and putting on a pair of waterproof, thermal booties. The couple on the
bench continue to stare, less apprehensive, but still wary.
You step into your flippers and tighten the straps to keep your feet firmly in place. You
pick up your mask and snorkel and walk the few feet to the water, flopping your feet like
some sort of demented cartoon character. From off to your left, over by the bridge, you
hear some kids giggling at you. You ignore them - you are used to the mocking voice of
skeptics. Being a visionary isn't easy.
****
"You're going snorkeling in the Ashuelot River?!! But the water is so
polluted! I won't even let my dog swim there." At least half a dozen people
have said this to you. The perceived wisdom seems to be that the water in the Ashuelot is
unutterably filthy - a cross between a cesspool and an acid bath. The tone of people's
voices when you talk with them about the river suggest the presence of 3-eyed fish and
flesh-eating bacteria.
The water seems safe enough. Water Lilies dot the surface, fish jump for
flies and the kids jumping off the bridge haven't been skeletonized by piranha yet. It's
always a good idea to make sure of these things, though. So you call an expert for an
opinion.
Bo Hoppin is an Adjunct Instructor at Antioch College's Center for Environmental
Education in Keene. Aside from his expertise in issues of water quality and pollution, each
year, he leads a 3-week summer program exploring the Ashuelot from its head waters at
Pillsbury State Park in Lemster to Hinsdale, where it joins the Connecticut River. He and
his students spend almost all that time immersed in the water. If anybody knows if it's safe,
it would be him.
According to Hoppin, the water is fine. The perception of the Ashuelot being polluted
goes back 50 years or more. "We've done a lot of historical interviews with the older
residents in Keene," he says, "and it seems that the pollution level really was
high in the 1940's or so. You hear old stories about the water flowing different colors, etc,
but when the mills closed down in the 50's and the Clean Water Act passed in the 70's, the
river started cleaning itself up."
"No, the park is a pretty good place to snorkel," Hoppin continues. "There's a lot of good
wildlife in the river there - crayfish, sunfish, turtles, frogs and American Toads and some
really great snails." (Great snails? What? - like with garlic and butter?) "There are a lot of
shellfish - probably 5 different types of mussels. That may be one reason
why the water is so clear; mussels do a great job of filtering the water. There are some
really cool spots in the river - when you swim through a patch of Water Lilies, it feels like
you are working your way through a jungle."
****
So you feel safe and assured now as you flop your way to the river. You step into the
water, your feet dry in their insulating booties. You bend down and rinse out your mask.
You pour the water out of it, then spit onto the glass and smear your saliva around. You
aren't really sure why you are supposed to do this, but you seem to remember somebody
telling you when you were a kid that this will keep the glass from fogging up. Besides - it
looks cool. It makes you feel like you are in one of those old Jacques Cousteau specials.
You can almost hear the nasal, emphatic voice of Rod Serling narrating your actions - "The
diver knows he will only have a short time in the water, so his equipment has to be in
perfect working order"
You fit your mask to your face, nod to the couple on the bench and throw yourself into the
water. What you would really like to do, is roll backwards out of a boat like
a real diver, but you realize that you are working within certain limitations here, so you sort
of fling yourself sideways into what looks like the deepest spot. This works well enough -
you do get into the river - but you hit the water with all the grace of a side of beef and
come to the surface gasping at the shock of the cold water and making little kitten-like
mewing noises, rather than manly grunts you had intended. "Zee Ashuelot, she 'eez a 'arsh
mistress...," Cousteau says inside your head.
It only takes you a few seconds to realize that the water is actually pretty warm and to get
used to it. You readjust your mask, which has been knocked askew by your
hippopotamus-like entry and head beneath the water.
Things don't look quite like you thought they would. That's inevitable - just the act of
putting on swim-fins inspires visions of coral reefs, angelfish and Moray Eels. Obviously,
you aren't going to find those here. You have to wait a minute or two to let your
perception shift. There is a school of thought among rock climbers called "bouldering",
which holds that it is just as challenging and fun to work your way horizontally across a
small, difficult expanse of rock as it is to scale high, dangerous peaks. That is the sort of
attitude that you need to take with fresh-water snorkeling. There are just as many
interesting things to see as in the ocean, but on a smaller and quieter scale.
You work your way upstream, along the riverbank, pushing your way through thick
patches of seaweed. The sun shines through the water, dancing here and there across the
river bottom. You kick your way slowly upstream taking everything in.
Suddenly, a flash of movement in the weeds catches your eye. You kick your way forward
and see that it is a small perch, maybe 4 inches long. This pleases you enormously. "A
fish! A fish!" you say to yourself, as if this was some sort of major achievement. "I saw a
FISH!" The perch gives you a scornful look, as if to say, "Yeah? So what? What'r
you lookin' at, Bub?" It looks a lot different swimming around on its home
turf than it does flopping around on the end of a hook - self assured and tough - and you
realize that if you were 2 inches long, this fish would be a force to be reckoned with. "Zee
perch - he eez the wolf of zee shallows," Cousteau agrees as you
swim on.
You round a bend in the river and find yourself surrounded by shellfish. You count at
least 3 different types of mussels; some of them are surprisingly large - as big as a deck of
cards. They too, look much different in their own environment - they have their shells
partially open, sifting water in and out and you can see something inside that looks like
gills. It is very cool. Even cooler though, are the snails that Hoppin had told you about.
They too, are bigger than you had anticipated, looking more like the snail shells you
normally find at the beach. They pull into their shells as you approach, but when you stay
still for a few moments, they cautiously come out of their shells and go about their
business. You watch with interest for a few moments, until you think about what your
family and friends will have to say when you tell them that you spent your noon-hour snail-
watching.
You come to a tree that has fallen into the river and spend half an hour exploring this, the
closest thing you are going to find to a reef. If you come very close to the surface of the
wood, you see hundreds of tiny fish swarming around the algae-covered bark. They
sparkle silver in the sunlight. You scare up an Eastern Painted Turtle, who looks you over
and goes about his business, totally unimpressed. You decide to pick him up and examine
him but discover that like the perch, he is a tough customer on his own turf.
It is getting late and your lunch hour is almost over, so you swim back to the beach, happy
except for your throbbing, turtle-bitten finger. You flop your way out of the water, stow
your gear and head back to your car, whistling the song from the Old Spice commercial.
The couple on the bench watches you pass and just shake their heads.
