2016 Paddling Summary

I only did 10 paddles this year due to my bad knee.  I hurt it again getting out of the boat at Blue Mountain Lake, so that was my last paddle.

• Blue Mountain Lake
• Cedar River Flow
• Floodwood to Polliwog
• Long Pond
• Massawepie
• Middle Branch of St Regis River
• Rainbow Lake
• Raquette River - Axton to Crusher
• Raquette River - Crusher to Moody
• Second Pond to locks and then to Bluff Island

Paddling Blue Mountain Lake

I finally got back on the water today.  Actually, I did a trial run on the Flow yesterday to be sure I could get in and out of the boat with my bum knee.  I decided I could take a chance and paddle with the group today.  The weather was perfect for a leisurely exploration of Blue Mountain Lake.

Paddling the Cedar River

We did a nice 11 mile paddle today.  We put in at Wakeley Dam and paddled down Cedar River Flow.

As usual, it took some exploring and backtracking to find the entrance to the river.  But it was worth it on such a beautiful day.  We paddled down to the lean-to for lunch, carrying around a big beaver dam which we managed to ride over on the way back.




On our way back down the flow we explored Buell Brook, which we had never done before, and got farther upstream than we expected given the relatively low water.  As you can tell from the photo, the clouds were moving in by then and they were welcome since it was about 80 degrees.

Paddling from Second Pond

We paddled about 8.5 miles today, in two sections.  We put in at the boat launch at Second Pond and paddled down the Saranac River toward the locks.  There were lots of pretty water lilies in bloom.

Along the way we explored Cold Brook until downed trees made passage difficult.

We paddled to the locks then returned to the launch where we got out to stretch our legs.  At that point we had paddled about 5 miles.
We got back in the boats and paddled through First Pond to Bluff Island in Lower Saranac Lake where we climbed to the top of the bluff to eat our lunch and hiked around a bit.  It is one of our favorite spots.

By the time we left the island there were white caps on the lake so we headed back to the boat launch, paddling a total of 3.5 miles more.

Paddling the Middle Branch of the St Regis River

We did one of our favorite paddles today - 12.5 miles roundtrip on the middle branch of the St Regis River, from the put-in off Route 458 in Santa Clara to the rapids and back.  As usual, we had the river to ourselves.  We stopped briefly at the old homesite where we used to eat lunch, but it is very overgrown.  But the scenery was as beautiful as ever.




And the rapids were as impassable as ever.  We again could not find anyplace to get out at that point so we turned around and headed back.


We did find a nice place to stop and rest about 5 miles from the car.


We saw many of our favorite flowers along the way, including cardinal flower


and swamp milkweed.

Paddling from Crusher to Moody

We had a great paddle on the Raquette River from the Crusher to the state boat launch at Moody, for a total of about 8 1/2 miles.  It was quite hot so we didn't mind a bit of a head wind to cool us off.  We stopped for lunch at a spot just downriver from the museum where there was a clearing that looked like the end of an old road.  We weren't sure if it was all private property but there were few signs and really no where else to stop.

A Beautiful Day for a Paddle

A small group of us did one of our favorite paddles today, putting in at Floodwood, paddling down Fish Creek, through Follensby Clear, then portaging to Polliwog and taking out there where we had spotted a car.  It was a beautiful day.

Paddling the Raquette River

A large group of us, about 20, paddled the Raquette River from Axton Landing to the Crusher, stopping at a campsite for lunch.  We expected a leisurely paddle, but the winds were strong out of the west, completely negating the current in some spots.  But it was nice as always with good weather and good friends.  This is a view from our lunch spot.


After the paddle we cleaned up then drove to Plattsburgh to see the movie "Now You See Me 2".  That made for a very long day but well worth it.  The movie was fun and we were afraid it would be gone when we got back from vacation.  More on that in the next post.

Paddling Massawepie

The scout camp at Massawepie hasn't started yet so today we did a group paddle around the lake.  It turned into another "adventure paddle" due to very high and gusty winds.  But it was a beautiful sunny day with lower temps than we have had recently and much lower humidity.  Since we paddled the circumference of the lake, we were able to hide from the winds about half the time.  We stopped at a great spot for lunch at the end of an esker jutting into the lake.  This leopard frog greeted us at the landing spot.

There is a great trail along the esker - this is the view of a bay on one side of the trail.
I got a trail map and am looking forward to hiking there in the fall.

Paddling Rainbow Lake

Today was the traditional Memorial Day paddle and picnic, so there were 19 boats paddling Rainbow Lake.  We put in off Clark Wardner Road at the southwest end of the lake and shuttled cars to the northeastern end of Rainbow Narrows on Kushaqua Mud Pond Road.  We paddled up the Flow then into Clear Pond then through the esker to a campsite on Rainbow Lake for lunch.  After lunch we headed down the lake toward the narrows.  There was a lot of wind behind us so we were glad we had the cars at the other end.  When we got to the underpass leading to the narrows things got interesting.  Just looking through under the road you could see that end of the lake was several inches higher than the water we were on.  There must have been lots of water coming down the North Branch of the Saranac River.  The current was very swift.  A few brave and very strong folks managed to get through, helped in some cases by a hardy soul who waded into the breach and helped pull some boats along.  Most of us got out on a handy dock, dragged our boats up over the road, and walked down the road a ways before finding a place we could get back in.  With that many boats it took us some time.  Nothing like an adventure paddle to work up an appetite.  Then we headed to our hosts' home for a leisurely visit and picnic.

Paddling Long Pond

Seven of us paddled on Long Pond today.  There were few mosquitos but lots of black flies, though we managed to find a breezy spot for lunch so they didn't bother us there.  The temperatures are unusually high for this time of year so it was a very pleasant day.  Although our lake is low, there was plenty of water there to paddle up to Pink Pond and to Little Pink.