Cygwin psql with Windows native Postgres

I thought I'd be clever and use the cygwin 'psql' client to connect to
the Windows native PostgreSQL 8.1.3 running on the same box, since the
the cygwin port feels more like home (keybindings). Unfortunately, I
get the following message when connecting (after about a minute):

$ psql -h 127.0.0.1 -l
psql: server closed the connection unexpectedly
This probably means the server terminated abnormally
before or while processing the request.

So it looks like psql is connecting just fine, but timing out. I can't
find anything of interest in the logs, and pg_hba.conf seems to be set
up just fine. The native cmd psql works fine, as well as pgAdmin.

Has anyone done this before with/without success? Any ideas on what
else to check out?

Thanks
-Mike