'Yacking down the Genesee

TOP: Acrobatic biplanes with smokers doing loop-d-loops over the river

BOTTOM: Kayak Kathy lubing up before her post-yak nap/sunning session

x

One of my other projects is to kayak the navigatable length of the Genesee River (some dams and falls stop it from being totally boatable). Last weekend we did the section from Mt Morris to Geneseo, about 15 miles in total. We put in just below the Mt Morris lower dam, into what looked like a class 5 rapids. Fortunately, it only looked wild, it was just water with a lot of bubbles in it. Must be something that the dam caused. The river was flowing nicely, and we made over 4 mph. Peter and his dad Lee went in the tandem, and Kathy and I solo.

x

It was also "Dumping Day" on the river, as first peter and lee dumped during a bio break, and then about an hour later Kathy did the same. Can't these people learn to pee and portage at the same time?

x

We anticipated a totally secluded, quiet river paddle, and it was for the first hour or so. Then, unbeknownst to us, it was the day of the Geneseo air show, and the river basically circumnavigated the airport. So we had things like packs of P-51 fighters, acrobatic biplanes, and an F-18 take off directly over our heads. They shook the entire river, and the wildlife was going insane from the noise...as were we. But, we had a bird's eye view of the festivities, and they were very cool. The highlight was a WWII fighter flying in formation with an F-18 at about 200 feet off the ground. Very cool stuff indeed.

x

The session ended on a tough note, as our exit point turned out to be about, oh, 60 feet below the roadway. In thick, shoe-sucking mud. And up a rockface. And through a pricker bush grove. It took us 4 hours to paddle, and over 2 hours to get the boats out of the gorge through the muck, rock, and brush. Then, peter had to run a couple of miles to get the car, drive back, get me, go get the trailer, and then do the boat re-loading. A great paddle turned out to be a very long day...

x

"Apparently F-18's are faster than kayaks" Lumpy out