News reports brought us the names of overflowing rivers from around the state. The storm did an estimated $1.6 billion in damage. The resultant flooding devastated homes and businesses ruined crops and killed livestock and damaged roads and infrastructure. Already swollen rivers spilled their banks. Another foot of rain poured on saturated ground. Hurricane Matthew hit North Carolina in October 2016 the month after heavy rains had inundated much of the state. I remind people all the time that they’re drinking water out of the Cape Fear River.”Īnd sometimes there is something dangerous even deadly about a river. “There’s one thing we all need and that’s water ” says Kemp Burdette Cape Fear riverkeeper.

And providing the elixir of life to humans. They are vital to the ecology providing habitat for fish fowl and animals. Today they are sources of recreation - paddling boating swimming fishing birding. Rivers were transportation thoroughfares in the days before trains and roads moving goods and people. Wilmington along the banks of the Cape Fear. New York City on the banks of the Hudson. New Orleans near the mouth of the Mississippi. Great settlements have grown up alongside America’s waterways. There is something practical about a river. Just ahead the river bends a suggestion of wonder and mystery beyond inviting you onward. Trees overhang the banks their reflections becoming abstract art in the water’s gentle undulations. The wide ribbon stretches as far as the eye can see twinkling as a jewel in the sunlight. There is something magical about a river.

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