Special delivery

Pilot and postmistress ply Lake Winnipesaukee in summer, their mail packet carrying tourists and treats, too

July 31, 2011|By Patricia Harris and David Lyon, Globe Correspondents

WEIRS BEACH, N.H. - As Captain Chris Day eases the M/V Sophie C. away from the dock, past the gigantic M/S Mount Washington steamboat and out onto Lake Winnipesaukee, postmistress Anne Nix has her hands full. The mail arrived late and she bustles around in the cabin sorting the letters and packages into gray canvas mail sacks, each destined for one of nine islands on the lake.

After all, people are counting on her. On the isolated islands, where many (but not all) summer folk eschew modern conveniences, mail delivery is a big deal.

“I grew up on Bear Island,’’ says Nix, 58, who works as a registered nurse and dietitian in Waterbury, Vt., in the off-season. “We would hike through the woods from the southern tip of the island to the northern tip to meet the Sophie C. When we were swimming, we knew what time it was when the Sophie C. went by.’’

Nix’s family was among the island’s original settlers, but when they arrived in 1896, the mail run was already established. Mail service on Lake Winnipesaukee began in 1892, and the Sophie C. is the only floating post office on an inland waterway in the United States. The fifth boat to serve in the lake’s postal service, the vessel was built in East Boston as a supply ship for the US Navy and was launched in August 1945. Welders later attached a B&M railroad car to the hull to create a cabin. Renamed the Sophie C., she became a tour boat on Winnipesaukee. In 1969, she took over the mail.

From mid-June to mid-September, the Sophie C. delivers mail Monday through Saturday to nine of the more than 250 islands on Lake Winnipesaukee. Although Nix has noticed a slight dip since Internet service came to some of the islands a couple of years ago, the Sophie C. delivers about 35,000 pieces of mail each season. Nix also accepts outgoing mail - some of it destined for another island on the lake. As Nix sorts express and priority envelopes into the mail bags, Day, 46, jokes that “our definition of express might be a little different from others.’’

The 76-foot-long, 80-ton vessel with a jaunty red, white, and blue paint job welcomes passengers to ride along on the two daily mail routes. The voyage attracts many return visitors each summer who enjoy the intimate, personal view of the lake, and the chance to get up close to some of the islands. Joe Columbus, a Woburn letter carrier, is aboard this day on the ultimate postman’s holiday. “Working for the post office I had to do it,’’ he says. “It’s a great way to see the lake.’’