Following a River Through the Heart of the Berkshires
A writer shares his favorite ways to experience the often-overlooked Housatonic River in the Berkshires region of western Massachusetts.
Mark Vanhoenacker, The New York Times
For much of my childhood in the Berkshires region of western Massachusetts, I didn’t give a hoot about the Housatonic River. In contrast to the many lakes where my brother and I would swim or skate, attend Scout camps or sprawl out for family picnics, the hushed and shaded Housatonic seemed unfamiliar and at times downright eerie. Notions of Edenic riverbanks came from my mom reading “The Wind in the Willows” out loud after dinner — not from encounters with the actual river that flowed 330 yards from our front door.