Hardware WMA to Bremo Bluff 9/30/12

 

The 6.9 miles between the Hardware Wildlife Management Area boat ramp and the public boat ramp at Bremo are a schizophrenic mess. The first four miles or so are almost completely riffles/rapids and fast moving water. I was actually scared while kayaking today, and that's a first.

We were coming through a section of rapids and I got slammed into a submerged rock between two boulders. I got hung up sideways in very fast water, with my kayak tilted on it's side and water just pouring in. I ended up completely swamped and had to tip out of my yak. There was really no other option, as I was jammed up too tight to pole out and my yak was almost completely full of water by then.


doesn't look like much from a distance, but I was WAY up close and
personal with a whole lotta water right up in there.
 

Fortunately, on the other side of the boulders the water was about waist deep and it was calm enough to stand. I was able to pull my yak out of the rocks and stand there holding it. Dave came back around and got the cooler, fishing rod, etc. I was able to pick my yak, still full of water no less, up on its side and dump out enough water that I could lift it up on my shoulder and get the rest out. Then I was actually able to climb back in and continue on! We went a bit further down and pulled out at a quiet little spot to have lunch.

 

A bit later we came to the end of Big Island, which was something we were desperately watching for. Dave had found and printed a map of the paddle, and we laminated it and brought it with us. The map warned that if you went to the right of Big Island there were Class II rapids at the end, but if you went to the left the rapids were Class III. The problem was that Big Island is over two miles long, and there are many islands interspersed through this section of river, so we never really knew when we got to Big Island or if we were on the correct side. But man, did we know we had reached those Class II's. That water was MOVING and there were not many good spots  to pick to try to run through. I was scared for the second time in the same day but fortunately we were able to crash on through with little problems.

Once past Big Island, the next 2 miles+ were flat water that moved at a decent clip. We floated through most of this part while trolling lines in the water. We each caught a smallmouth bass and threw them back. We really needed the calm water after all the excitement and exertion of the first four miles!

Right at the very end there was one last bit of white-ish water, a Class II known as Phelp's Falls. We had pooh-poohed it, since I drive over that bridge every day and had looked. The rocks that I assumed were Phelp's Falls were pretty puny. What we discovered, however, is that the falls themselves weren't visible from the road because they are DIRECTLY UNDER THE BRIDGE. Oh. Well, they weren't too bad and were a nice way to end the day.

All in all, it was an exciting trip, but one I probably won't undertake again unless I'm feeling invincible.