Unlike many families in the North Shore, mine often chooses the mountains over the beach as a place to spend time in the summer. Climbing Monadnock is in our annual repertoire, as well as some other favorites in the southwest corner of New Hampshire – Skatutakee and Thumb, Gap, Pack Monadnock, and more. With my husband a teacher who is “off” in the summers, our two boys get to do a lot of whatever they want with Dad.
However, since I am here at work at the watershed office for most of the summer, one of my favorite things to do is to have the boys come here for some paddling. This summer, it wasn’t an especially hard sell, once I had introduced them to a locals’ favorite thing about this stretch of the Ipswich River: the rope swing!
Late afternoons, at the end of my work day, my husband would bring the boys and their friends over and off we’d head, downstream to cool shady waters and the exhilaration of climbing to the high rungs, gripping the rope as high as possible, and flinging oneself across the river to a cool, wet splash. I know these boys would highly recommend it to other families as their favorite “staycation” activity of the summer – and they have high hopes that September will bring suitable weather for just a few more jumps…