the squibix family blog

We could tell it was an appropriate way to observe the day because hundreds of other people had the same idea; it was easily the busiest day I've ever seen on the river. Cars were parked up and down the road by the ramp where we put in, and there were streams of boats coming from the rental place a little further on too. We had debated between putting in there versus the boat launch in Bedford, and I'm really glad we chose the upstream spot: the river in Concord is too shallow for powerboats, and I sure they were swarming downstream in Bedford and Billerica. Even a crowd of canoes and kayaks leaves plenty of space for other river users!

We were only out for about an hour and a half. We headed downstream first and stopped by at the Old North Bridge, which was crowded with a mix of boaters, cyclists, and people who just had to drive there (poor things). We walked around a bit but were disappointed to find the boathouse dock had been taken up—probably because the water was so low it would have been completely aground. So we reembarked and continued downstream, noting wildlife as we went. We tried to find exemplars of each type of animal, and were successful for most: insects (dragonflies were our favorite), amphibians (a frog), reptiles (many turtles), fish (um... fish), and birds (a great blue heron who was much less shy than we're used to). Unfortunately we didn't spot any muskrats, so our mammals category had to be filled by a gray squirrel.

Then we went back upstream with the intention of visiting our secret harbor at the confluence on the Sudbury and Assabet Rivers. Of course, with the water level so low the cleft in a rock that we had poked the boat into many times before was about three feet above the surface of the water, so that didn't work. Of course, that also meant that anyone who wanted to could just get out and walk, which was kind of fun.

We had thought of going up the Assabet a little ways too, but given that it didn't look to be deeper than 18 inches at any point we gave up that idea. Plus, Lijah was hungry. So we came home. We may not have had a cookout (that's on the schedule for tomorrow) but I think it's safe to say that Labor Day has been properly celebrated.

Well, almost everyone: it took the dogs a little while to get used to the idea of waves, even the little waves on the bay side beach that we could walk to from where we were staying at Leah's parents' house. They had it figured out by the end of the day when we took an evening walk on the beach, as pictured at the end of this post. It was hard for everyone to go to sleep in a new place, but eventually we managed it; one of the boys even fell asleep in the bed assigned to him!

The next day dawned cooler and overcast, and with rain forecast for the afternoon we scheduled some essential outdoor activities for the morning hours. The boys went to play tennis with Leah and Grandpa—he's an skilled player, and provided both slightly-larger kid model tennis balls and mostly patient expert instruction. I took a bike ride.

In the afternoon the rain seemed to be holding off, so everybody except me went out for a walk on the beach. Of course, it started raining mere moments after they left, but that didn't faze them. In fact, Harvey and Zion took the opportunity for a rainy day dip in the ocean, never mind that they were wearing their clothes. One advantage of this sort of vacation over camping is that laundry facilities are easily accessible! When they got back (and put their clothes in the dryer) we settled down to some card-playing and reading.

The next day was warmer but just as overcast, with the addition of fog and possible thunderstorms. Leah and I are limited in our ability to sit still in a place where we don't have chores to do, so soon after breakfast we packed the boys up for a hike. We went to Great Island in Welfleet, which, as the most promising hike within range of Truro, we've attempted before. The last two times we defeated—or at least kept from doing any "hiking"—by hot sun, gnats, and sandy trails that are just about like walking on a beach, so we figured a day where the fog was coming in ever-thicker would be perfect for another try.

We did get farther than we ever have, but once again detoured to the beach before we reached Great Island proper. It's just as well; not only do I learn that dogs aren't allowed on the island, the beach was empty and beautiful. The humans collected lots of rocks and shells, the dogs collected gross dead birds, and the boys and dogs enjoyed the water (one of those groups wished they had brought their swimsuits).

After we had enough (and conveniently just as other people started to fill in) we headed just down the road to Welfleet Harbor. Leah and the dogs took a rest in the car while the boys and I played on the playground, walked on the town beach, and ordered some take-out fried food for lunch, which we brought back to the house. We were disappointed of our thunderstorms, but it did start raining right on time just after noon, so we settled in for another round of games. "Code Names" was very engaging for everyone but Elijah.

We originally planned to stay through Saturday morning, but we missed our house and decided to leave Friday evening. Before we took off, though, the boys and I needed to do the most important adventure of the vacation: the bike ride to the ocean beach with the big waves! They did not disappoint.

After the beach we stopped for ice cream on the way back to the house. Now that's vacation! Grandpa very kindly prepared us a take-out order of hamburgers and hot dogs on the grill, so as we made our weary way home even our dinner on the road was still vacationy. It was all lovely. We'll be ready to do it again in a year or so.

For dessert we had smores, as I like to do when we have a fire going. The meat cooks so quickly and the fire is so lovely, it seems a shame not to do something with it! Especially when I haven't made anything else. This batch of smores was notable for Elijah's first unqualified success at making his own—and his second, too, because once he figured it out he went right in to making another one! His problem in the past has been with holding the marshmallow steady over the fire, where it needs to be; between heat, smoke, and boredom or distractedness he usually gives up before his marshmallow is much more than gently warmed. He doesn't actually mind raw marshmallows (ew) but they do tend to break the graham cracker when you try and squash them. There's been some shouting over that in the past, but no more! He's figured it out. It must be because he's a first grader now.

Then I had a Zoom meeting for work to attend, and the boys did a little writing and drawing. Bedford schools aren't in session yet so before long a friend stopped by, and they went out to play for a while. After lunch we did a little cleaning, then we headed of for our first homeschool co-op outing of the fall: a hike at the October Farm Riverfront (I wanted to do something with people today, since yesterday marked six months since Covid shut down our co-op in the spring). Not everybody is ready to do that sort of thing yet, though, and even those who are aren't really organized yet. So only one other family joined us. Never mind, we had a great time playing in the river and the mud and on the hills, and noticing grasshoppers, stick insects, poison ivy, frogs, and oak galls (and collecting, temporarily, examples of all of those except poison ivy). We also brought home rocks, sticks, mussel shells, and broken glass; we saw racoon tracks, but couldn't think how to collect them short of photographing them. Oh, and we also saw herons and egrets. No attempt was made at capturing either.

Nowhere in there did we do any math, despite it being the top-listed attraction of school at home for two of the three boys (Harvey said he was most interested in music learning). So there's still plenty to look forward to for tomorrow!

Of course, I can't put all the blame for our slipshod schedule on outside forces. We're not the best at making plans and sticking to them. Unless, of course, you're talking about plans for outings: those continue to occur regularly. It's so much more fun to go where interest takes us! Before breakfast Elijah was wondering about a pennyfarthing bicycle in the picture book we were reading, so our morning lesson was all about bike history and mechanical advantage. There's now some desire among the children to build a period-accurate dandy horse—or at least to take the cranks off an old bike so they can run it around. That all took an hour or so, then we did some math, and then Bedford school was over for the day and so was ours. That's fine.. it's going to be a long year!

Then yesterday we traveled to Lincoln with the intention of exploring the Adams Woods Conservation Land. At the suggestion of the Lincoln Conservation website we parked at the Mount Misery parking lot on Route 117, which meant of course that we had to climb it before we left that bit of land! It was appropriately steep, at least the way we chose to ascend, and there was a delightful shelter of sticks on the summit.

Besides the Mount, the woods there also had their own delightful streams (dry) and bridges, along with a few ponds and some steep ridges (all apparently part of the glacier-created kettle landscape, which we learned some about this morning). Half of the woods was remarkably open, with nothing but white pines every 20 feet or so but with canopies big enough to touch and leave the pine needly forest floor in shadow. It made us want to build some bike trails in there.

Like I said, my hope was to walk through the Mount Misery area to access Adams Woods, but that turns out to have been overly ambitious. It's actually kind of a trek. Even worse, the dogs had to be leashed for lots of the way, and that's no fun for anyone. So we turned back short of the goal. That was ok, because on the way back we went a different way that passed by the biggest kettle hole, and we also had time for a short detour to the Sudbury River. Three of us were too tired to engage much with it, but the dogs are always game for a swim; their example encouraged Zion to take off enough clothes to really get in and enjoy the water.

Then on the short walk back to the car we talked about what, besides towels, would be useful to include in an emergency pack that we could bring everywhere with us. It was an exciting enough discussion that we're all ready to tackle another new woods soon... with better supplies!

Ordinarily that wouldn't put his bike out of commission for long; after all, derailleur hangers are meant to break and be replaceable. In order to make it happen quickly we brought it in to the bike shop to ask them to do the repairs (he also needed new shift cable housings). Sadly, the bike shop was not at all helpful. Since the bike is so old (2005, actually; see above) they suggested that the part needed would not be able to be located; and they further suggested that a bike of this vintage would be better scrapped and replaced entirely. That may work for the rich folks who come in to look at the four-figure road bikes they stock, but not so much for us. We're savers, and repairers! We don't need new bikes! Except for the one we had ordered for Zion. But then, after some discussion, we decided that since Harvey is the one who's already been putting in hours riding he deserved a new bike of his own. Extra-small adult bikes are much less scarce than kids' bikes (at least to someone with Leah's exceptional online shopping skills) so we no sooner made the decision than the order was placed.

It was exciting. We kept looking at the pictures of the bikes. And waiting. All this happened twelve to eight days ago, and we still have no new bicycles. It turns out "in stock" means that the pieces of the machine exist in a warehouse somewhere in the United States, but we find it takes some time for said pieces to be shipped to a store and put together into something a person could ride. The anticipation is hard, and even harder is not riding all this time; this must be the first time Harvey's gone a week without getting on a bike since he first learned to ride, about half his lifetime ago. And the weather's been so perfect! The worst part is, neither company gave us anything like a firm date that we could expect the bike to be available, so there's a new disappointment every day. But it can't be long now!

During the waiting period—and technically we're also still waiting for the bike shop to call with a quote for fixing Harvey's older bike, which they said they would do if they could locate the part—I did some research online into bike maintenance and repairs that we could do at home. And it didn't take long for me to locate the amazing resource that is derailleurhanger.com, and once there to locate the part we need. So now the plan is to fix the old bike ourselves. Then we'll have a backup, which is comforting: I don't ever want Harvey to be bikeless like this again!

In our excitement to get going we forgot both masks and helmets, so we took things a little easier that we might have otherwise. But that was fine, since Zion's new ride is like twice as big as the one he was on before, so that took some getting used to. Also the brake levers are on the very edge of too far away for his little hands. There were no disasters, though, and the only time he fell he very cleverly landed on his belly and chin, so no brain damage. We stayed out for about an hour, then came back to a breakfast of pancakes: as Harvey described it, "if I can't ride with you than at least I want to cook!" I think I'm doing something right as a parent...

Harvey was rewarded for his generous nature by the arrival of his own new bike this evening. He and I drove to Newton to pick it up at dinner time, and then he and Zion were both so excited they rode for about an hour in the gathering dusk, including a 20-minute loop around our local woods (I think lights will need to be our next purchase...). Not to be left out, Elijah got his own bike out and rode with me as I walked the dogs through the woods after supper. He's been hesitant to ride off-road in the past with his little wheels, but with the motivation of trying to keep up with big brothers he did great! Both of them getting new bikes within the space of two days has been a little tough for him: while we were picking up Zion's yesterday and looking around at the other things at the store he was heard to remark, "I want something new!"

Now tomorrow we have a date to meet friends at Russell Mill Pond to really take the new bikes through their paces—pump track and trails both (Lijah will have to be left behind, sadly; but his time will come!). Expect to hear more on the subject of mountain bicycling in coming weeks.

Well, almost ride it. Lijah did need to walk up some of the steeper hills; but he pushed on like a trooper, and I guess he thought it was worth it when we reached the end of the path (how is it riding to the ocean ends with a steep uphill?!) and heard the sound of the waves. We've been to the real ocean before, but somehow every year the boys' expectations are reset by the mild waves of Rockport harbor and Cape Cod Bay so they're able to be delighted anew by the real swells of the Atlantic Ocean as they crash into the Outer Cape.

Delighted, and unnerved too—at least at first. The camera can't really capture how big the waves looked that day when you were actually down there in the water, but suffice it to say that you needed to keep an eye on them at all times if you were anywhere near the waterline. Zion was the first one to venture in wholeheartedly.

It was fun challenging ourselves to stand up to the breakers, but before long I needed to get in a little deeper. As steep as the shore is there you can get past the break only ten or fifteen feet out, and then you can float easily if thrillingly over the waves just as they rise. Harvey and Zion were a little unsure at first, but they joined me before too long. All that swimming practice this winter really paid off! Seeing the fun we were having, Lijah wanted to join in, so I held him where I could jump to keep our heads about the water.

Of course, the day wasn't totally without mishaps. We weren't just floating; some of the waves we tried to body-surf, and while it mostly went fine there were times we messed up and got tumbled. And some waves got us even when we weren't trying to ride them! Both me and Zion were bloodied—his was worse—and all of us had water and sand driven into our nose and ears. One wave in particular caused chaos, and not just for us. It was so big that I couldn't jump above it, but with Lijah in my arms I couldn't swim either. So I threw him over the worst of it, and mostly caught him when he came down... but I was also being tumbled head over heels along with everyone else. Then I couldn't rescue him right away because the violence of the wave had pulled my shorts down; that took a moment to fix.

I don't think anyone noticed though, since the whole beach had been pretty smashed: the wave overran lots of chairs and blankets and knocked over kids and old people. One little girl lost her glasses. Lots of people tried to help her find them, but they were gone for good. Her family stayed at the beach for a while, but I don't think she had any more fun. We had an easier time recovering—all of us except for Zion, at least. He held a grudge against the waves for the rest of the afternoon, especially when the drawing he was trying to make in the smooth sand kept getting washed out. Still, he let the other three of us play for a while more.

The problem with the beach is that when you're done having a great time you find yourself filled with sand and encrusted with salt, and changing into clothes and getting onto the bike again doesn't seem like the most fun. Especially since fifty percent of our towels had been soaked by waves. But we made it happen, and some of us even enjoyed the bike ride back. We all enjoyed the post-beach ice cream. That was a summer day.

It's kind of empowering. I mean, I've always been able to replace a tube or brake pads, and in later life I've moved on to changing worn out brake cables and cassettes, but I've never taken the time to figure out how derailleurs are supposed to go, or how brake or shift levers do their thing. Yesterday's work definitely felt like a step up. And now that we've got new bikes, I guess I should be learning how to keep them in good shape! I'm not saying I want a cable to fail on one of the other bikes soon, but if it does I now have the thirty-dollar cable cutters/crimpers to get everything back the way it should be! (speaking of which, crimping the little metal dealy on the end of the shift cable yesterday was about the most satisfying thing I've experienced all month). I'm already inviting folks to bring their bikes over for tune-ups! All I need now is one of those clampy work stands...

One highlight was Fairhaven Bay, and the old boathouse looking out over this unexpected stretch of open water in the middle of the Sudbury River. The path went by an old boathouse, which was a lovely place to stop for a snack; we only we could have found some way to get into it! We also enjoyed climbing on an old ruined chimney (pictured here) and scrambling on some rocky cliffs above the river.

Writing on the internet suggested there were some cliffy trails to explore, but even though we walked for a while we didn't find them. A long while, actually: doing a loop all around Fairhaven Hill was maybe a bit much. We've been doing lots of hiking lately, though, so we all survived.

A couple days later we revisited the woods, this time by water. We put the canoe in at a launch near Mount Misery (which required paddling through a very shallow, algae-infested channel) and headed downstream into Fairhaven Bay. On the way we passed by the beach where Zion swam on our first visit; it was even more fun reaching it by boat. Even though the weather was sunnier we were all happy enough to be on the water that nobody felt like it was necessary to go in it.

There was enough breeze to make paddling across the middle of Fairhaven Bay exciting; you don't expect waves like that on a river trip! It was a beautiful sparkling day though, and it felt absolutely delightful to be out on the water. We saw just one other group paddling, in a pair of canoes, and we greeted each other enthusiastically—just knowing we were both doing the loveliest possible thing at that particular moment.

At the other side of the bay we reached the boathouse. I only wish there was a little more water, though, since right now the river is too low to get into it. The little streams coming out of the Adams woods were also impassible due to low water, but around them we saw lots of interesting birds.

But while the boating was fun, it didn't get us any nearer to finding the big cliffs. And nobody wanted to walk all that way again. So this past Sunday we went back with bikes. And it turns out that the Wright Woods is great for cycling, with trails that are smooth enough for even Lijah's 16-inch wheels (though his fearlessness in attacking obstacles did lead to some nervous moments for me!) and plenty of fun downhill segments. And the cliffs! Approaching them we were forced off the bikes in short order.

That may not look all that steep in the picture, but I assure you that even at that point it was just about unrideable. And it got crazier! The scramble up the last bit was a challenge even on foot!

Disappointingly, the top was a rich person's yard. They did have a very cool boat-shaped observation platform and a nice firepit, but it wasn't really a place for us to linger (though of course we did pause for water and snacks just below the top). Still, we felt like we had conquered a real climb!

After all those trips, we now feel like those woods have been pretty comprehensively explored. But that doesn't mean that we're done there: now that we know the place, we're ready to go back and have some fun!