Saturday was time for the annual Summer Solstice camping trip, and this year a friend and I went up to the East Branch of the Sacandaga River. We put in north of Arietta along Route 10, which was a tricky spot to find for someone who hadn't been there before. After going past the spot a few times we saw someone else unloading a boat from their car and finally figured it out. It's a pretty steep hill to take the canoe down, but it's short and was an easy launch site.
Since I've read that everyone goes south from the launch, I wanted to try going north and getting away from the crowd. On Google maps it looks like there are some rough spots about a half mile up, but if you get past them then you can continue on for a while. Well, I don't know if the water was high or if it's always that tough, but the flow was way too fast to take my canoe past those rocks.
We turned around and went south, and it was a perfect day to be on the water. A nice breeze, not too many clouds, not too hot, and very few bugs. After a mile and a half we found a rocky spot with a nice view, which had obviously been used as a campsite many times before. I found the remains of what looked like a DEC campsite marker, and that was good enough for us.
For the rest of the day we just set up camp, chilled out, and enjoyed the view. Nobody else came by, which was kinda surprising given how nice it was. The rocky outcropping made for a pretty nice swimming area too, and the water wasn't too cold. We took a paddle a little farther down the bend and ran into a beaver and a snake swimming past us. The only other thing of note was a tree which was about twice as big as all the others in the area, and had a base which was huge.
We went back to camp for sunset, which was great, and went to bed a bit after that. It was only supposed to get down to 50, but I woke up a few times pretty cold. I only had shorts and a t-shirt on, which I knew was a bad decision, but I figured my sleeping bag could handle the weather. I've had it for many years now and it's just not as warm as it used to be.
The next morning we woke up much later than we planned (still made the tee time) and packed up. We took out a bunch of cans and trash which were left there by previous residents, and with the current we were loading up the car within a half hour. I can't wait to head back and paddle all the way to Good Luck Lake.
Pictures can be found here, I got a few nice ones.
Since I've read that everyone goes south from the launch, I wanted to try going north and getting away from the crowd. On Google maps it looks like there are some rough spots about a half mile up, but if you get past them then you can continue on for a while. Well, I don't know if the water was high or if it's always that tough, but the flow was way too fast to take my canoe past those rocks.
We turned around and went south, and it was a perfect day to be on the water. A nice breeze, not too many clouds, not too hot, and very few bugs. After a mile and a half we found a rocky spot with a nice view, which had obviously been used as a campsite many times before. I found the remains of what looked like a DEC campsite marker, and that was good enough for us.
For the rest of the day we just set up camp, chilled out, and enjoyed the view. Nobody else came by, which was kinda surprising given how nice it was. The rocky outcropping made for a pretty nice swimming area too, and the water wasn't too cold. We took a paddle a little farther down the bend and ran into a beaver and a snake swimming past us. The only other thing of note was a tree which was about twice as big as all the others in the area, and had a base which was huge.
We went back to camp for sunset, which was great, and went to bed a bit after that. It was only supposed to get down to 50, but I woke up a few times pretty cold. I only had shorts and a t-shirt on, which I knew was a bad decision, but I figured my sleeping bag could handle the weather. I've had it for many years now and it's just not as warm as it used to be.
The next morning we woke up much later than we planned (still made the tee time) and packed up. We took out a bunch of cans and trash which were left there by previous residents, and with the current we were loading up the car within a half hour. I can't wait to head back and paddle all the way to Good Luck Lake.
Pictures can be found here, I got a few nice ones.
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