Vol. II, No. 79
An extreme low tide on January 10th left Seymour Rock accessible by foot instead of by boat. Photo by Matt Kanaga.
Yesterday while at my winter post at Longshore Sailing School I looked out on Long Island Sound and noticed things I had never seen before. The sand bars were much larger than ever and some new ones that I had never seen before were exposed. Abandoned lobster pots were visible in the Saugatuck River Mouth, mushroom anchor stems had popped up in the mooring field, a large school of fish was caught in a tidal pool, and Grays Creek was nearly empty.
When I looked out towards the islands I noticed a tombolo connecting Seymour Rock to Bluff Point. I’ve been boating Westport waters for over thirty years, but I have never witnessed Seymour Rock accessible by land.
At this point, there was still a half an hour until low tide, so I quickly got in my car and drove out to Cedar Point. Sure enough, when I got there I saw a sand bar that extended to the island. Seymour Rock is a small rocky island that is usually hundreds of yards off the coast of Saugatuck Shores. I was able to walk there without getting my feet wet!
It was a new moon, but the high tide was not unusual, there was no wind to speak of, so why the extreme low?
-Matt Kanaga
