May 21, 2007

May 21, 2007

Two days ago I began my Susquehanna River kayak adventure.

For the past twenty years I have enjoyed paddling canoes and kayaks occasionally on the Susquehanna River. In fact in the beginning my good friend Sue Sill and I twice entered an annual 13-mile canoe race that went from Mehoopany to Tunkhannock, PA. During that twenty years I thought about attempting to paddle the full 444 mile length of the Susquehanna River which begins at Lake Otsego in Cooperstown, New York and ends in Maryland at the Chesapeake Bay.

Last year Sue and I got to the point of planning the first segment of our adventure. The only way for us to complete the whole 444 miles would be to break it down into several weekends and holiday weekends since Sue works full time. We were going to spend the three days of Labor Day Weekend paddling from just downstream of the Ulster, Pennsylvania bridge to however far we got. We couldn't begin in Cooperstown because the river was closed to watercraft in the Binghamton area due to flood damage to a sewage treatment plant on the river.

In June of 2006 our area got hit badly with heavy rains that caused our creeks to go over their banks. That resulted in mud slides and culverts getting jammed with debris and corrupting roads. The flooding also caused some bridges over the Susquehanna River to get damaged. The repairwork of the bridges many times required paddlers to portage around them. The Ulster bridge was closed so we were going to start just below that point.

We had gathered dollies for portaging around dams, freeze dried meals for suppers, water filters so we could drink the river water instead of carrying lots of water. We would bring a tent, sleeping bags, changes of clothes, food, a backpacker stove, cell phones, hand held ham radios, etc. We had a “dry run” one night just before Labor Day weekend. We loaded the two 12 foot Pungo kayaks with everything we were taking and launched them to see if everything would fit and to see if we could still maneuver them in the water. We had some significant rains the two weeks before and the river was high—so high that the islands we planned to stay on overnight were just starting to show above water. So we cancelled the trip.

We got everything together again this spring and planned to start our adventure at Lake Otsego and hopefully cover 70 miles in two days—Saturday and Sunday, May 19 and 20. My husband Bill and his son Chris drove us up to Cooperstown Saturday morning. We live in northeast Pennsylvania, so the road trip was 2-1/2 hours. Sue and I launched at 9:45 am to the serenade of loons on the lake. It was overcast and 45 degrees. We had layered our clothing and put on rain jackets. The hats we wore had brims to keep the rain off our glasses. We were hoping to get below Goodyear Lake by the day's end which would have been over 30 miles.

The river is nothing more than a creek when it begins, and it had so many twists and turns. We encountered trees half hanging in the river and logs just under the surface. We also found places where trees fell in and debris built up behind them which made the river impassable. We had to pull over and climb out and drag the kayaks up the three or four foot bank and then carry or dolly them and put them back down the bank and into the river beyond the blockage. The edge of the river before the bank generally consists of clay-like silt that you sink into and then can't get your foot out of easily. We tried to find areas that weren't so mucky but were not very successful.

At 11:45 it started to rain.

At noon we found one blockage that had another blockage about ¼ mile after it, and we had to paddle back upstream just to find a place that we could haul the kayaks out and up the bank. We put the dollies on and pulled both kayaks ½ mile through an overgrown farm field that had brush, skunk cabbage and ruts. I found out that my back isn't strong and I fall apart with adversity. Sue did 80% of the pulling of the kayaks. We were out of the water 1-1/2 hours.

The rain never stopped and the temperature never improved. At around 3:00 two canoes passed us. They were practicing for the General Clinton Regatta which is a 70-mile canoe race held on Memorial Day from Cooperstown to Bainbridge. We asked how far Goodyear Lake was and they said 2 to 3 hours away. At that point we realized we hadn't gone very far. We got to the Milford Bridge and planned to go ashore under it and fire up the stove and have some hot tea to try to warm up. We thought we could be out of the rain for a little while. Sue's teeth were chattering. We were soaked. The river was deep right to the edge which made getting out of the kayaks impossible. Up the angled bank under the bridge was 20 feet of muck. So we stayed in the kayaks and studied the map and found out we had only gone 17 miles. And it was 4:15.

Our plan was to look for a place to pull over that didn't have muck where we could set up our tent. We had to get into dry clothes. We started paddling again and I thought I found a beach area we could go ashore. Sue got onshore first and plowed through the muck to firmer ground about 20 feet out. She looked for a place to camp. I got out of my kayak and sank to just below my knees in the sucking clay goo. When I tried to lift my right leg, my left leg went deeper. I couldn't move. I gave up the idea of trying to get ashore and spent ten minutes turning my feet 90 degrees to the left so I could sit down in the kayak and try to release my feet from the goo. Sue figured I couldn't throw the tent and dry clothes up to her so she got back into her kayak. At that point we decided to quit the trip. We didn't know if we would find a place to get ashore. We didn't know if we could get a fire started since it rained all day and was still raining. We didn't know if we would be able to get warm.

We looked at the map and found a boat access point about 6 miles downriver and decided that's where we would go. I called my house at 4:45 and got the answering machine. I called Bill's cell phone and Chris's cell phone and got recordings. Our original plan was to check in with Bill between 8:00 and 9:00 pm, so he didn't have any reason to be home before that. I left messages that we wanted to be picked up and I described where the boat access was on the map. Bill had copies of the maps we carried. He called me back at 5:10. He and Chris had just gotten home. They had gone from Cooperstown to Elmira to take glider rides. He was glad we were OK but wasn't happy about getting back in the truck for the 2-1/2 hour ride back to us. Our lifeline for the first day was too far away. It won't happen again.

We got to the boat access around 6:45. It was a state access in a reforestation area. It had nothing but a parking lot. We walked around a while and realized Bill wouldn't be there for at least another hour. Sue had brought a vinyl tarp with her, so we took it and our dry clothes up to the parking area. I draped one end of the tarp over a 5 foot high sign and held the other end up so Sue could strip out of her wet clothes and get into dry ones. Then she did the same for me. We couldn't put our rain jackets back on because they were soaked through. The rain was a steady, fine mist at that point We took everything out of the kayaks and brought it all up to where our wet clothes were. Then Sue fired up her stove and I had a cup of hot coffee from a coffee bag and she had raspberry tea. We had second cups and some string cheese. The dry clothes and shoes, and the hot drinks got us warm. We walked the half mile up the driveway to the road with a flashlight and phone and hand held ham radio to wait for Bill. He arrived about 8:15 and we loaded the truck and got home at 11:30 pm.

With everything that happened, we still had some very beautiful moments. We saw lots of birds in the trees overhanging the river, even some turkey vultures. There were mallards paddling along the edges along with sandpipers picking in the mud. We saw a field full of llamas. Cows walked up to a fence and watched us go by. Sue thought she saw a river otter. And about a mile from the end we saw a black bear scramble out of the river and up the bank.

We have a better plan for this coming weekend. The three of us will take our camper to a campground between Oneonta and Unadilla Thursday night and stay there till Sunday morning. Sue and I will start again at that boat access near Milford Friday morning and hopefully take out at a boat access 30 miles downstream Friday evening. Then we'll kayak as far as we can on Saturday. Sunday we'll go home because Bill has to work Memorial Day. The weather will be in the 60's and 70's with some scattered thunderstorms. But who cares? We have a dry camper close by.