Hello fellow paddlers been a minute since I posted anything typically when its warm like this and water temp is a comfy 84 degrees I tend to stay on water in my free time.just wanted to stop in and say hi.
Now that we here in virginia are having extreme temps and lack of rain rivers are dropping low making it difficult to paddle but is still manageable if you know where deeper water channels are at and know how read the river polarized sunglasses are also a great way to see things just below surface of a river such as logs,trees and sandbars but here lately have been on several nice lakes as well laying thank goodness for lakes
Yes, thank goodness for ponds and lakes. I just returned to the land of warm water… like anything over 62. I plan to make use of them once we get by the tstorms.
Hello back 'atcha, Kayakingnut.
Conditions such as you describe are about the only occasions when the word thalweg is of any use at all. Best to you and I hope you get some rain soon to kick those levels back up a bit.
Water levels here (S. Wisconsin) have been a bit higher than normal over the last month. Here its been social distancing and shuttles that have been the limiting factor for river tripping this year. Some of the liveries are operating as if infection rates weren’t rising and all is normal, but I don’t trust their ability to properly decontaminate buses after each run every day so am disinclined to use them. All my usual paddling partners seem to be pretty well hunkered down. Radio silence.
But I’m not alone. Its driving everyone, paddlers and everyone else, to the lakes and making for some pretty crowded paddling conditions there - at landings especially. Same for you? But I agree, thank goodness for the ponds and lakes - there’d be next to nothing without them. The thing that is next to the nothing here is a creek that has a little ~3 mi section between bridges that can be paddled with a hike back to the car. Its got some little riffles and drops on it, but it isn’t much. Pretty thin soup, but its paddling.
There’s a reason I mention this. I noticed the other day that on the hike back in sunny, humid, 95 deg heat (like most of us are now seeing, I assume) that my mind was wandering to considerations of the symptoms of heat exhaustion and a certain recurrent unfocused amazement that anybody at all survived the Batan death march. I don’t usually spend much time pondering those subjects - but a bit of an extended stroll in this season brings such things to mind. And it is probably for the better that it be mentioned. I see you’re in Virginia - as I recall that’s a place that can get pretty darned steamy too, though probably you’re more used to it than many of us.
I bet there are more than a few of us out paddling, bicycle shuttling, hiking, and generally baking in this seasonal sun and heat. We talk and worry about hypothermia a lot, but heat exhaustion and stroke can be dangerous, too. Just a thought.
@kayakingnut
Good but just getting to where l can be comfortable, got back to a couple of days of 92 to 94 degrees so was mostly immobile.
Looking forward to a return to the land of cold water in a bit.
Been hot here as well but enjoying nice water temps in mid 80s but rivers are lil dry.but thankfully there are plenty lakes here to paddle in and offers a change of scenery as well …went paddling in river other day and was ruff going due to water level being so low lot of sandbars to navigate around as well as log jams only thing bout when water levels in rivers drop have to be extra careful in reading river .thank goodness for sunglasses that are polarized that let u see what below water surface more easily
Best to you and I hope you get some rain soon to kick those levels back up a bit.