Lake Erie

This is a more geographically general post than most, since my goal was simply to capture several shots taken as we traveled between the Cape Rondeau area and the western end of the lake. This shoreline consists mainly of bluffs, many of clay or silt, but there are also low beaches, including the large barriers that have formed at Point aux Pins and Point Pelee.

The geography of this shoreline appears to be controlled by larger glacial features and sediment variability, subsequently reshaped by Holocene coastal processes. Humans have left their mark, too, with jetties, lots of groins, and a mish mash of armoring, at least locally. Most of the shoreline development is on the low beaches, probably because the bluffs are eroding quickly enough to discourage building and because the demand for Lake Erie view property isn't the same as on Puget Sound.

The timber groins are at Erie Beach?, just west of Erieau (Aerial).
The bluffs are at Point Alma (Aerial).
The sheetpile groins are on the west side of Point Pelee, near Seacliffe. (Aerial)

Sandbanks

Sandbanks Provincial Park, on the northeastern shore of Lake Ontario, includes two large sandy swash-aligned barriers with their accompanying dunes. I had been curious to get here since my 2008 trip to Ontario, when these beaches were just too much to add to one trip. But our route from northern New England to Chicago took us along the northern edge of both Lake Ontario and Lake Erie and Sandbanks was a nice respite from the highway and the muggy, hot weather.

Westcott Beach

Westcott Beach is on the easternmost end of Lake Ontario, just around the corner from Sackets Harbor. This coast is completely new to me, so I don't have any sense whether this sand was brought in or not, although I don't see why this beach couldn't be natural. The aerial photos show plenty of sand in the area and the orientation of this shore to winds coming down the lake is favorable. Of course, in the winter those winds must blast this area, dumping tons of snow and piling slabs of ice up on the shoreline.

Reid State Park

Reid was not necessarily the ultimate destination of the road trip, but it was the most distant point we reached (well, technically the Five Island Lobster Pound, just down the road, was the farthest east point on our trip) and a symbolic turnaround for me. I explained my connection to Reid during my last visit in 2008 (Griffith Head) -- it's the first beach I have any memories of visiting.

The sand was sculpted into cusps stretching off down the mile-long beach. Long waves, intersecting waves, or just self-organization at work. As someone fond of small diverse beaches and sometimes bored by long, unchanging ones, I find it perfectly reasonable that the latter look for way to rearrange themselves into something a little more interesting.

Ogunquit

A long drive across North America ended today with two beaches on its far right edge. The coast of Maine, at least of southern Maine, has a rocky framework with beaches filling in the interstices. In some places, like Ogunquit and Old Orchard, the beaches are long strands and dominate the landscape, while on the midcoast, like at Reid and Popham, the rocky skeleton stands out and the beaches are small and isolated.

Our first view of the Atlantic was through an Independence Day weekend crowd of kites and balloons and sunbathers. The east end of Beach Street crosses to the southern tip of the spit and people covered the sand on both the ocean side and along the river on the inside. Farther south, across the small river, are the rocky headlands that extend south toward Cape Neddick.

The waves were gentle and the beach was flat, with a broad low trough (runnel?) separating the upper beach from an equally subdued bar at the water's edge.

Central Park

I had to include these pictures of The Lake in Central Park. These were some of my favorite shorelines on our road trip although none were actually beaches. I guess that context matters. There are bedrock ledges sloping into the water, marshy edges, forested banks, and of course, a wonderful variety of artificial shorelines and structures.

Hudson River

I don't think there are any beaches in these shots - although there is still a little bit of the original rocky shoreline just north of the Little Red Lighthouse at Jeffries Hook, beneath the George Washington Bridge.

It is hard to consider the shoreline of New York City without contemplating the west side of Manhattan and its long history of ships and railroads and highways and parks (and highways and parks that never were, too, which makes some of the most interesting stories). Although the west side is in much better shape - for both fish and roller skaters - than it was a few decades ago, it is still largely isolated from the rest of the city. Maybe some day they'll figure out a way (and more critically, agree on a way) to bring Manhattan and the River back together.

All of these shots are of the lower Hudson and Manhattan, except the last one from Storm King, 60 miles up stream, which I threw in just because I like the Hudson River.

Spuyten Duyvil

Spuyten Duyvil (remember, New York was settled by the Dutch) refers to the area at the west end of the Harlem River, where it converges with (or diverges from) the Hudson. The original channel looped around, but was later straightened with dynamite, shifting neighborhoods back and forth between Manhattan and the Bronx, sort of the way the meandering early Mississippi brokered land swaps between Mississippi and Arkansas.

The beach with the forest rising behind it is pretty remarkable. It is in Manhattan, albeit a remote corner of Manhattan, tucked in behind the railroad bridge at the north end of Inwood Hill Park. I suppose technically it isn't really a beach as much as it is a sand bar, since there can't be all that much wave action within the river here. If there had been some sort of spit at the mouth of Spuyten Duyvil before the railroad was built, this could be the remnant of something long lost beneath the tracks, but that's pure speculation. Whatever the case, I thought the idea of an isolated beach in the forests of Manhattan was neat.

Harlem River

I suppose even a New Yorker might not know much about the Harlem River, other than that it separates Manhattan from the Bronx. Both the Green and the Orange Lines to Yankee Stadium go under the river and the river is easily neglected (and has been neglected). I thought it was a neat industrial river (although like most industrial rivers, it is really more a canal than a river), with high arch bridges and lift bridges and swing bridges (no bascule bridges, our Seattle favorite) and all sorts of 19th and 20th century shoreline archaeology.

The bedrock road cuts along the Harlem River Drive were impressive and unexpected.The shorelines were a hodge podge of bulkheads of various sorts and vintages, riprap, collapsed piers, debris, railroad lines, and even some forest hanging over the bank up near the Columbia University sports facilities and Inwood Hill Park.

Brooklyn

Before the trip, I had been reading Phillip Lopate's Waterfront: A Walk around Manhattan, a wonderful essay on history, urban planning, environment, and New York City, and a great introduction to the waterfront of Manhattan. Unfortunately, three days with a family in toe and a poor practical knowledge of the city's geography meant that my shoreline exploration was largely limited to what you could see from a Circle Line Tour around Manhattan.

But even that was fascinating. I could picture the Hudson River side, having grown up with pictures of Cunard liners on the walls at home, but I had no idea what to expect of the Harlem River or even the East River bridges. More of my personal observations can be found across the way at hshipman, but I will include here a few shorelines, less for their geologic insight and more as an introduction to New York City and an exciting urban waterfront.

Brooklyn, for the geographically naive, is on Long Island, and is separated from Manhattan by the East River, a tidal strait connecting New York Harbor with Long Island Sound. Its industrial shoreline is gradually giving way to high end residential development and a restored waterfront - the wharves turning into parks and promenades and even a pocket beach (created or an accident?) under the Manhattan Bridge.