is there any type of white water paddling to be had in wisconsin?
schizopak? this means you? maybe?..
great whitewater in wisconsin!
– Last Updated: Jun-24-05 11:15 AM EST –
Although the levels are a bit low right now, we typically have some of the best whitewater in the midwest. Particularly noteworthy are the Wolf, Pike, Red, Peshtigo, and Menomonee rivers.
Here's a good site that covers many of these or you can just go to the American Whitewater site and start looking up rivers.
http://www.paddleguides.com/rivers/midwest/index.html
Are you planning on making a trip over here?
edited to add: I'm assuming you're not looking for class V stuff. Wisconsin has excellent class II-III runs with a few class IVs thrown in but not too many "big water" runs although I hear the creeking is pretty epic in the spring.
i am a ww novice so
class II-III is plenty for me. I have basically done A lot of surfing on Lake Michigan, and a few recirculating waves on dammed rivers here in sw michigan.
Well I have a pending job offer in Madison Wisconsin, so i was curious, but my wife wants to do a trip to the dells with the kids and I was hoping to hit some sort of whitewater this summer.
wow that’s great!
Although Madison is slightly farther from most of the whitewater (~2 hours), there is a fairly active group of Madison paddlers who I run into on the rivers almost on a weekly basis. Heck, if you did move to Madison, you would be really close to Derrick who’s in Baraboo. Maybe you could convince him to get out on the rivers as I know he has been contemplating trying out whitewater for a while. Keith, let me know when you’re coming to visit and if the timing works out, maybe I can meet you on a river for a run!
I second that.
Section 2 of the Wolf is a good place to start (class I/II) and the scenery is great. Section 3 of the wolf is a bit harder (some class III) but is a lot of fun. Section 4 of the Wolf is definitely a notch harder and you have to pay the Indians to paddle it (they provide a shuttle). The Red pretty much runs all year and is best when they are running the power plant and releasing water. The hardest rapid is Monastery Falls (class III) but it is pretty safe. Skip the Peshtigo unless there is water (which there isn’t right now). It is a fun and challenging run when at decent levels. The Pike is a very nice river and has one or two challenging rapids. Yellow Bridge and the drops leading into it are probably the most difficult section. Be sure to scout those rapids because there is sometimes wood in the river. Madison is a great place. Enjoy!
yeah that would be great.
as soon as we have some definitive plans at least for the vacation I will let you know. I would like to go to the wolf river if it isn’t too far from the dells. say a 2-3 hour drive. Is there anything else to do around there if my family came and couldn’t paddle because of the river conditions?
sounds good
The Wolf is a little under 3 hours away from Madison. Basically there is a lot of outdoorsy stuff over there. You can kayak (whitewater or on lakes), mountain bike, hike, etc. There’s also an indian casino or two in that area but i don’t think that would be good for the kids. 
Check out Bear Paw which is my home away from home on the weekends.
http://www.bearpawoutdoors.com/