I was middle-aged before I ever rowed a boat, but since moving to the Olympic Peninsula, I’ve made up for lost time.

In this magnificent region, there really is water, water everywhere—and most of it is safe to row in during the warmer/calmer months of the year. Most people up here paddle around in kayaks, but I wanted to be able to take my dog with me, and I needed a boat I could manage all by myself. So I got an inflatable boat, which tucks into the trunk of my car and allows me to explore some wonderful places. All I have to do is hook up the pump to my car’s lighter and voilà—in 15 minutes I have a boat.

For our first foray of the summer–and to celebrate the Summer Solstice–we paddled up Chimacum Creek, a restored Coho salmon run surrounded by land trust protected woods near Port Hadlock, Washington. (Don’t know why I wrote “we paddled”—the dog just lazed around in her fetching Float Coat and Doggles, left). It’s an easy trip—as long as you’re not working against the tide, which flows up the creek from Port Townsend Bay.

I’m always the only one on the creek when I go there, which makes for a perfect experience. There are no houses or other buildings visible from the creek, so it’s a relatively pristine location. The water amplifies the bird songs and calls, and it’s easy to imagine that it’s hundreds or even thousands of years ago. Eagles monitor our progress from fir trees along the bank and a heron calls up ahead in her deep throaty voice. Kingfishers perch low above the creek waiting for lunch to appear.

Where the creek enters Port Townsend Bay extensive eel grass beds surround the mouth, providing habitat for young salmon as they adapt to living in saltwater before they begin their long migration. This exceptionally pristine estuary is one of the only Puget Sound estuaries without extensive development. It has a gorge-like section with 100-foot high, wooded banks, 200-300 feet apart, which enhances the sensation of being quite apart from the rest of the world.

I sing a song of thanks and it echoes back to me on a faint breeze.

I also love my boat because it puts me very low in the water, and since I sit directly on the bottom of the boat and lean back against its side, I can feel the creek’s movement and energy communicating directly with my body. It’s almost like floating in my back. I close my eyes and absorb the filtered sunshine and allow the holiness of this place to permeate my skin.

CONTEMPLATIONS

• How do you find sacred space in nature?
• Can you give yourself the gift of time in a pristine environment, if only for a brief visit?
• Have you taken time lately to slow way down, to match your heartbeat to a duck drifting downstream?
• Have you made a positive difference in the life of some land or water near you?
• How do you celebrate the beginning of summer?

Take another rowing trip here.