How to Canoe to the World Cup in New Jersey

With fresh supplies, we set off again, marching in our canoe hat past warehouses, over overpasses, on tiny sidewalks. Cars gave us narrow berth. One guy remarked, “That’s a big boat!” A few truckers blew their horns. The wind picked up. When it caught the canoe broadside, the stern tended to swing out over the roadway. This wasn’t ideal. It was tough on the shoulders. Also, it risked collision with the semis rumbling by. I was glad we enlisted Brent, who is six feet two, and strong.

A sign announced that we’d crossed into Secaucus. Underneath, it said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” I felt that we were. As we walked past industrial parks and waste-management lots, a man called out, “I’ve got a canoe just like this!” His name was Gregory. He was a welder. He takes his craft on the Hackensack once a week, to go crabbing. “I cook them up, make some gravy,” he said. “Some nice fucking Italian shit.” (On account of the river’s elevated levels of cadmium, a carcinogenic heavy metal, and high levels of polychlorinated biphenyls from industrial waste, the N.J. Department of Environmental Protection strongly recommends against this.) But Gregory had recently grown tired of life on the sea. “I’m trying to sell it,” he said, of the canoe. “You want it?” As we chatted, I’d been holding our canoe above my head, bracing it against the wind. I told him that we were good on canoes for the moment.

We portaged on, over the New Jersey Turnpike, through downtown Secaucus, over a narrow pedestrian bridge above Route 3. We made it to the motel in less than two hours. The Hackensack appeared behind the parking lot, surprisingly broad and sparkly. Phragmites reeds lined the water, and the American Dream mall loomed over the far bank. It didn’t smell too bad. Except for the cars roaring overhead on a nearby bridge, a continuation of Route 3, it was pretty peaceful.

As the captain, I took the front. Brent steered in the back. Diego navigated, and provided ballast, in the middle. We were heading north, but Brent had us haul due west, so the vegetation on the far bank would provide a windbreak. We had the river to ourselves. One concern of mine was corpses. Bob Sullivan has found that bodies have been dumped in the Meadowlands since at least the Revolutionary War. People think Jimmy Hoffa is there. But we didn’t see any. Brent took us on a scenic detour of an inlet. We saw a beautiful white egret. There were ospreys, hawks, and a lot of tree swallows. The view was uncommonly broad, and the city skyline poked out of the eastern sky. I’d never experienced a more pleasant commute, though it wasn’t perfect. When we lifted our paddles from the water, the wind sent it spraying back at us. It was surprisingly warm. Some of it splashed in my mouth.

The trip took fifteen minutes, plus the detour. When we landed, Brent pulled out a camping stove and made coffee. The crew stayed with the canoe, and I finished the trek solo, navigating down a sparsely travelled access road. I knew these parts. I’m from New Jersey, and I grew up with season tickets to the Jets. Back then, similarly frustrated with the difficulties of the commute, my dad would park off the shoulder of the Route 3 off-ramp, in the mud next to a thicket of phragmites. The parking ticket was cheaper than a parking pass, and there were enough gaps in the cars whizzing by that we could scamper across. The authorities are stricter now. I strolled up Outwater Lane and turned north. I crossed the Turnpike for the second time. (Around the Meadowlands, the Turnpike turns confusingly fractal.) I turned onto something called Road D. It wasn’t so bad. Near the stadium, a worker on a cart zipped by, transporting what looked like propane tanks. His name was Mariano. He gave me a ride to the credentialling tent. From start to finish, the journey took less than three hours.