The Vermont Paddlers Club

Finally we got some rain, and with Central VT getting the bulk of it, Bob and I were looking to expand our horizons and run something down that way. The lower New Haven seemed to be at a low Medium level, and that sounded perfect for a coupla first timers. I traded messages with Ryan and it turns out he turned up at the white church right on time. Bob and I hooked up with he and Matt, set the shuttle rig, so we hit it.

There were river wide strainers just at the corner below the Rt 117 bridge, so we carried just below them out of the back corner of the lot and put on. After snapping a few rolls in the eddy, because it's been a while, we rolled on down stream. It was a fun, bolder filled river that reminded me of the NBL. A little less tech., with some great surf on the fly. Matt was surfing his blunt like it was made for it, and led the rest of the group down thru for most of the run. The rest of us ran it in smaller boats and had no issues.

There was some more wood of note, a tree just below the surface that disguised itself as small ledge or horizon. After Matt bounced over it, the rest of the crew regonized it for what it was and were able to get around the root end on river left, but if the water was lower it might block the entire channel. It is located about half way thru the run, in the left channel of the river where it splits around what I think was the first Island. The right channel was just a trickle, so again, at lower levels this may not seem to be a fork at all.

At the most difficult rapid, a SHORT class III- at this level, bob and matt ran the meat, and ryan and I sneaked a river right line. From there it was II+ continuous to the take out under the next bridge.

Good trip to get my feet wet again, a river worth doing once, and at slightly higher levels worth doing again.

On a side note, we then watched Matt and his partner mac the Ledges. So THAT's what the Blunt is for. Nice boof Matt! I want a creeker!