The Forge River is one of the few waterways on Long Island that still moves like it did before the suburbs showed up. I didn’t know that until a friend dragged me out there on a Tuesday morning last October, and I’ve been thinking about it since.
The put-in is off Mastic Road in Mastic, where the county maintains a small concrete ramp just south of the railroad bridge. There’s a gravel parking area that fits maybe a dozen cars — nothing fancy, no attendant, no fee. You just show up, unload, and slide your boat into the water. I rented a sit-on-top kayak from a local outfitter (around $55 for a half-day, paddle and life vest included) rather than hauling my own, which made the logistics considerably easier.
The river itself runs roughly four miles south to Moriches Bay, through a corridor of Phragmites, red maple swamp, and patches of open salt marsh. Egrets work the shallows with the focused patience of surgeons. The water is dark, almost tea-colored from tannins, and shallow enough in spots that you can see the bottom clearly even in the middle of the channel. Current is minimal — this is a tidal river, not a mountain run — so the paddling is easy, the kind where you can actually look around instead of bracing for whatever’s next.
What surprised me was how isolated it felt. Within ten minutes of launching I couldn’t hear a single car. The neighborhood on either bank is there if you look, but the marsh buffer swallows almost all of it. By the time I reached the wider section near the bay, an osprey was doing tight circles overhead and I’d stopped checking my phone entirely.
The full round trip to the bay mouth and back took me about three hours, including a twenty-minute stop on a narrow sand spit to eat a sandwich and watch a great blue heron stand absolutely motionless for an amount of time that started to feel philosophical. If you want a shorter outing, the upper stretch near the put-in is worth its own hour — tighter, shadier, and quieter than the lower marsh.
Spring and fall are the right seasons. Summer works but the greenhead flies in July are aggressive enough to ruin an otherwise fine afternoon. I went in mid-October and the light on the marsh grass was something that would cost a lot to replicate anywhere else. Bring water, sunscreen regardless of season, and shoes you don’t mind getting wet at the launch. There are no facilities at the ramp, so handle that before you go.
The Forge River doesn’t get talked about much, which is partly why it’s worth the trip. Most people head straight to the ocean beaches or the North Shore harbors, and this stretch of the South Shore stays largely to itself. If you’ve got a few hours and a vague desire to remember what Long Island looked like before it was all strip malls and traffic circles, start here.
