Thread: Buckaloons
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Old 09-13-2022, 10:45 PM   #7
Ambridger
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While this Buckaloons trip was free of tofu, it was not void of adventure and camaraderie. We had some folks on the water that were newer to kayaking, as well as new to our club. My brother, Mike is a bit of a novice, and most certainly to moving, active water. We also had Beth and Stephanie join us, both of whom are newer to kayaking. And we had Bob Lewis, an avid kayaker, but newer to our group; he has been rather active in the Allegheny Canoe Club for some time. Also in attendance were Rich & Patty, Jeff & Judy, and Dustin and two of his girls, and my brother, sister-in-law (Melissa), and my two nephews, Matt and Alex.

On Friday, Rich & I did the stretch from Betts Park back down to Buckaloons. The Noels arrived a little later in the day and they took to the water out of Buckaloons and paddled down towards Brokenstraw Creek, and then back up river to camp. After recent years of arduous floats at Buckaloons, we opted for a shorter (than prior years), although more adventurous stretch of river for the main paddle of the trip on Saturday. We launched from the "Big Bend" access at Kinzua with 14 paddlers. The USACE recently upgraded the access road to the launch ramp; the road is now a continuous loop, no longer requiring two-way traffic on the road down from the parking area. While the water was low, we had little difficulty, and I don't think anybody actually had to get out of their boat due to running aground. There were some spots where we scrapped, but with some rocking or ski-poling with paddles we kept moving along. We lunched on an island about half way through, and then continued along to the much anticipated "refinery rapids".

With the low water, the rapid wasn't too extreme, but the wave train was probably about 75 yards long. Some folks went back around for seconds, and it was one of those second runs that got a canoe sideways. Fortunately, there were no injuries to human nor canoe, and our gang sprang into action with a canoe-over-canoe maneuver down the right shoot, where the boat ended-up, while others assisted the swimmer in the left shoot, where the current had carried her. If there was a lesson to be taken from this carnage, it may have been to have more throw ropes readily in the hands of those not actively on the water. Our take out was only about another mile below the rapid, at Point Park. We finished the trip without further issues.

Back at camp, we had dinner before dark for a change. Most of us had plans to stay into Sunday or even Monday, however as the forecast evolved, it seemed certain that rain was coming for both of those days. Not wanting to have to break camp in a rain storm, the difficult decision was made to tare-down after dinner. I'm sure we all got packed-up without getting wet, but I know we drove into rain on the way home that night.

Some things to look forward to: #1 The city (Warren, PA) has plans to install a new river access at the end of Liberty Street, adjacent to the Allegheny Outfitters shop. #2 The City of Jamestown (NY) has plans to install a new access at Panzarella Park on the Chadakoin River, which I hope to explore on some future trip up north. This could be a run from a launch on Chautauqua Lake down into the city. This would only be about a 30 minute drive from Buckaloons.

My thanks to all who attended, as well as all who pitched-in with cooking and clean-up for breakfast and dinner. Also thanks to everyone looking-out and helping the newer folks along on the water. Things ran pretty smoothly, even when when they didn't. Our recent safety training came in handy, and I'm hoping we can possibly add some sort of re-cap of that training at the Jan or Feb meetings. I might add, that since the club purchased two-way radios a few years ago, several members have also purchased similar radios, and they came in handy during our carnage at the refinery. Even though a boat was being recovered in one channel of the stream, and a person being rescued in another, and more paddlers were still coming through the rapid, we were able to communicate and get resources where they were needed, and assess situations that were out of our sight lines. As trip leader, I wanted to be in all of those spots at once to lend a hand, but knowing we had folks addressing each aspect made me feel better as the trip leader. Again, my thanks to all.

See yinz at the next one!
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