• Tide and Current Taxi: 2007

Adam and I have been planning on going out in the boat for 2 years.

So we finally set a date and I picked him up from the shop where we both work.

The other thing that I have been saying I want to do for years is go all the way up the Newtown Creek to where it ends in Bushwick. Adam and I work a few blocks from the creek, but neither of us have even seen the end of it.

We found a place to put the boat in the water at the end of Meeker.

There appeared to be some type of continuous gurgle coming up from the creek.

We lowered the boat down the embankment.

And set off past the gurgle.

Adam wanted to go under as many bridges as possible. “There’s the Kosciuszko.” he said.

We headed south under the bridge.

I was a little worried about my most recent patch. We were taking water steadily.

The Creek gets very wide south of the bridge.

And once again I was struck by how alone we seem to be out on the water.

The Newtown Creek is lined with mostly gas companies and parking lots.

We slipped under another bridge to admire a pretty yellow factory.

And then we saw that we weren’t the only ones after all…

There was someone painting the factory!

We paddled down about as far as we could go.

“Someone should really come get all this recycling.” said Adam

Then we turned around to head home.

I guess we expected to find out that the Newtown Creek was polluted.

And it really is.

And I knew from looking at the map that there were lots of gas companies and parking lots.

But there are other things about it too.

Like these pretty old warehouses.

You can’t see it from the picture,

But this one seems to be filled with old junk.

“If we lived here we could row to work every day!” We said.

This was Adam’s favorite building: an old oil tank or train car turned into a house.

It was getting late so we decided to head in.

The tide had gone out, so the gurgle was even bigger.

Some type of foam coming out of a drain.

We pulled the boat up the bank.

This is the very end of Meeker Street. We work just a few blocks away.

Goodbye Newtown Creek.

Goodbye Gurgle.

-Marie Lorenz