The Vermont Paddlers Club

We were in the mood for some exploring and that is what we did. Neither of us had been on the Upper Warren section of the Mad and so we decided to try it. Our information was that it would be good to go between 700 and 1,100 cfs. It turns out the our run was done with the Moretown gauge running between 800 and 900 cfs. Italos turns out we both thought that was too low by probably a couple hundred cfs. Rivers change. We scrapped an awful lot and pushed off the bottom a couple of times too. We drove south on 100 and when the river was looking too closed in with snow we pulled over and dropped off the boats roadside so we could set shuttle. We continued driving south looking for a place to turn around. Within 100 yards we came to picnic area pull off. Okay, so we weren’t felling particularly bright about that. We dropped a car at an old Bobbin Mill where the Lincoln Brook joins the Mad. The run was about 3 miles total. After dropping the car at we went back to the boats a few easy drops downstream of the parking area. We didn’t try to catch the first two drops as one was snow capped and the other wood choked. While not exactly a theme for the day we did end up carrying maybe six times due to snow / ice ledges / wood. Not too bad. The first drop should have been relatively straight forward but it was NOT. I got caught in an ice shelve. Though remaining upright the whole time, it was very unpleasant and a more than a little unnerving. Fortunately, I’m a “trainable” and I learned my lesson well. Justin found out how slightly undercut rocks are hard to lean into. It wasn’t a good start for either of us. Throughout the ride we found lots of slightly undercut rocks (and tons of ice shelves that we avoided). The rest of the trip was mostly II maybe a couple of easy III’s. Warren Falls was definitely not going to be run due to an ice bridge right at neck level just beyond the lip. There may have been t a couple of III’s that we had to walk around due to snow or wood. The only thing we saw of consequence was Warren Falls. So, not much of an adrenaline rush (other than the opening drop). But the woods and rocks / ledges we were around were definitely worth it, at the least for one round. And there were some interesting houses (huge) that we passed that were definitely not your McMansion.