What it's like to sleep along Maryland's 200-year-old canal, one lock-keeper house at a time

The C&O Canal was a thriving 19th-Century waterway, and a strategic asset during the Civil War. Today, its historic lockhouses offer overnight guests a unique way to relive US history.

I'm somewhere in the wilds of Maryland, following the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal past riverfront undergrowth and long-abandoned locks overgrown with vines. For the last sweaty miles, the canal's towpath has led me deeper into a sea of green where, presumably, a historic lockhouse is waiting. I cross a footbridge and finally spot the 19th-Century cottage, sunlit beneath a canopy of trees.

I've reached mile nine (13km) of the 184.5 mile (297km) C&O Canal Towpath, a recreational trail running beside its namesake waterway and parallel to the Potomac River. This cosy stone structure was once one of 57 lockhouses inhabited by lock-keepers during the nearly 100 years it was in operation. Tonight, it's where I'll sleep.

My journey started in Washington DC's cobblestoned 18th-Century Georgetown neighbourhood – the canal's starting point and mile zero for the towpath. Travellers typically tackle it by bike, but several of the historic lockhouses are clustered within the first 23 miles (37km), so I'm hiking that stretch for a slow ramble through Maryland history.

Two centuries ago, only mules trod this trail, towing canal boats. Inspired by George Washington's vision of opening trade with the West, the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal was commissioned in 1825 to connect Washington DC with the Ohio River.

It never made it that far, ending at Cumberland in western Maryland. On the day President John Quincy Adams broke ground in 1828, construction also started on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad – a new form of transportation that would eventually outpace the canal. However, the C&O operated as a commercial waterway for 93 years. During the American Civil War, it served as a critical Union supply route and became a frequent target for the Confederate Army. At its 1870s peak, as many as 550 mule-powered boats navigated 74 lift locks tended by the canal's lock-keepers.

Today, only 26 lockhouses remain along the towpath. In 2007, the National Park Service (NPS) and the C&O Canal Trust decided to open them for overnight stays, unveiling the first in 2010. "Staying overnight in a lockhouse provides a unique opportunity to immerse yourself in these stories," Arden Shaer, the Trust's Canal Quarters Manager told me.

There are now eight lockhouses in the hospitality network, ranging from rustic stays to full amenity cottages, each depicting different eras of the canal's nearly 200 years. Over four days, I'll stay across several decades of canal history.

My hiking boots and rucksack draw attention as I head south on Georgetown's bustling M street, the brick path following the canal as it cuts serenely through colourful row houses.

"Happy trails!" a man calls.

"Going the whole way?" asks another.

I forge towards the fringes of town, passing three restored lift locks – the structures lock-keepers used to raise or lower boats. As I leave Georgetown behind, the towpath abruptly changes to crushed stone. I can still hear cars and planes, but now bird calls too. Around mile 4.5 (7.2km), I cross imperceptibly from Washington DC into Maryland – for the next four miles (6km), I follow the canal, watching green herons stalk fish and painted turtles sun themselves on logs afloat in duckweed.

The Potomac flickers through the forest opposite. Locks dot the bank, and I pass the Eisenhower-era Lockhouse 6 with its red trim and porch rocking chairs, then Lockhouse 8, dating to the 1830s. The odd cyclist whizzes by, but otherwise, for the next several hours, I'm wonderfully alone.

I arrive at Lockhouse 10 by afternoon. Though this is one of the network's full-amenity lockhouses, guests must bring bedding, toiletries and provisions, so I gratefully set down my bulging pack and get my bearings. 

Built in 1830, the two-storey structure is furnished to evoke the late 1930s, when the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) restored it while rehabilitating the canal's first 22 miles (35km). As I explore, I find fireplaces, an ornamental record player and a mint-green kitchen.

The canal's transformation into a recreational trail wasn't guaranteed. After it closed permanently in 1924, the waterway was largely neglected until the US government transferred the land to the NPS in 1938. A 1942 flood undid much of the CCC's rehabilitation work, and the government proposed paving over the canal. President Dwight D Eisenhower proclaimed it a national monument and it became the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park in 1971.

I continue my snoop through history, finding two bedrooms and a bathroom with a claw-foot tub upstairs. Back in the kitchen, I use a pot to heat the can of soup I've brought for dinner. Through the gingham curtains, I can see the occasional cyclist and hiker. Upstairs as I prepare for bed, I hear cars hum on Clara Barton Parkway behind the lockhouse – inside Lockhouse 10 it's the 1930s; outside, it's the modern world.

My morning starts more quietly than a typical lock-keeper's – whose day would have begun as early as 02:00 to the sound of the boatman's horn or cry of "Hey-y-y-y lock!" 

Instead, I enjoy my packed oatmeal and mentally prepare to hike eight miles (13km) to Lockhouse 21, where my husband will meet me.

The towpath continues beneath a tunnel of trees. Near mile 11 (18km), I set down my pack and scan the woodland with my binoculars, spotting a red-tailed hawk surveying the land.

By mile 12.3 (19.8km), I'm famished and cross a footbridge to Old Angler's Inn in Potomac for a much-needed burger. Back on the path, local Dave Gwyn recognises me from when he was cycling the towpath the previous day, telling me the inn puts out jugs of water for towpath users on weekends. He adds: "The stretch you're about to hit is my favourite." 

Ahead, the landscape opens dramatically at Widewater, an ancient Potomac riverbed repurposed for the canal, widening from 60ft (18m) to nearly 500ft (150m) across. After miles following a canal confined to a narrow corridor, the sudden expanse feels like the landscape taking a breath. 

I detour to Mather Gorge, a steep, razor-narrow chasm on the Potomac River. I scramble off the towpath over boulders to the gorge's jagged edge. Peering down, the greenish-brown waters 60ft (18m) below rush around clusters of rocks. For the first time, I appreciate the striking contrast between the river and the serene, engineered canal.

At mile 16.7 (26.9km), my husband meets me at full-amenity Lockhouse 21. Also built in 1830, the lockhouse is outfitted to recall 1916, when the canal was entering its twilight era as a commercial route. We find scrapbooks telling the story of the Swain family who tended the adjacent lock for more than a century, and a modern electric range masquerading as an antique stove.

The next morning, we double back to Great Falls Tavern Visitor Center in Potomac – a former lockhouse turned visitor centre – where we board a 30ft (9m) replica 20th-Century launch boat. Ranger Cheyenne Millard recounts canal history as we glide past waving cyclists, then demonstrates a restored lift lock back on shore. She invites audience members to push open the heavy balance beams – after two days passing locks, I finally get to open one myself.

My husband drives to Lockhouse 22 – our final stay – while I hike the three miles (5km) between.

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Lockhouse 22 is the closest we'll come to living like 19th-Century lock-keepers: there's no electricity or running water, just stone walls, battery-operated lanterns and outhouses. A wooden table and mismatched chairs sit beneath exposed beams and gapped floorboards. Photos introduce us to 1830s engineering feats, including the Seneca Aqueduct, a water-filled bridge carrying the canal over Seneca Creek, uniquely combined with a lift lock. A frequent visitor to the area: President Grover Cleveland regularly fished at Lock 22.

At night, lantern light catches a hefty spider before we retreat upstairs to period-style bedframes with one modern luxury: memory-foam mattresses. Awash in darkness, crickets sound through the hot, still air.

As we near the 200th anniversary of the C&O Canal's construction, its history is still unfolding: during our trip, Lockhouse 8 at mile 8.3 (13.4km), was unveiled, evoking the 1960s, when the canal became a national monument. The Trust and NPS are already working on the next lock-turned-guesthouse. 

"We hope [they'll] draw visitors farther along the canal to discover another special part of the park," says C&O Canal Trust President and CEO Lauren Riviello.

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