Paddle: St. Croix River

Today we paddled on the St. Croix National Scenic River. We put in at Riverside Landing and paddled to Yellow River Landing near Danbury, WI, a distance of about 9 miles. We had hoped to use the canoe livery in Danbury, Pardun's Canoe Rental and Shuttle Service, for a shuttle, but they were swamped and the guy we needed to talk to was out delivering tourists. We elected not to wait. Plan B was to do a bike shuttle. The problem with that is that Yellow River Landing is private and was posted no trespassing. Nolo problemo. We found a place just up the mouth of the Yellow River near the bridge that had fair access and was not posted. I chained the bike to a tree laced with poison ivy, and we headed for Riverside Landing.

Riverside Landing was a very nice federal facility. It offered paddle-in and walk-in camping, and had water and pretty clean pit toilets. We put in and headed down the river. The river was wide, shallow, sandy and slightly stained. It reminded me somewhat of the James River below Lynchburg VA. It was a beautiful Saturday and we saw a lot of canoe and tubing traffic on the river. It was not your quiet wilderness experience. The St. Croix has designated canoe campsites and there were two on this section. We stopped at one for lunch and found it to be rather trashy and not very inviting. It did have a Boundary Waters-style pit toilet, though.

While Matilda is doing well, she is not yet totally comfortable in the boat. She spends the first hour of the trip running from one end of the boat to the other. The problem with that is that she is too tall to go under the thwarts and too short to step over them. She tries to jump over, but is a little clumsy, and it is not pretty. The second hour, she crashes and takes a nap on the bottom of the boat. During the third hour the cycle repeats. She did have one out of boat experience near the end of the trip. I didn't see exactly what happened. She likes to balance precariously with her paws on the gunwale, and sometimes she slips. I think she just fell out of the boat. By the time I reached for her, she already had one leg over the gunwale trying to get back in the boat. I took a picture of her while wet and pitiful, but I won't embarrass her again by posting it. See Tuesday's picture; it's pretty much the same.

We reached the take-out about 3:00. I left Dorcas on a gravel island in the Yellow River and waded to shore. The bike was still there. Poison ivy is apparently a strong theft deterrent. I biked 7.5 miles up WI 35 to Riverside Landing and retrieved the car. We were on the road headed for home by 4:00.

I guess I was a little disappointed with this section of the St. Croix. It was a pretty river, but it was rather wide and straight, and not terribly interesting. It would probably be better on a weekday, when there are less folks out. If we paddle the St. Croix again it will be an upper stretch above it's confluence with the Namekagon. More likely we will paddle on the Namekagon, which is also a part of the St Croix National Scenic River system.