Chapter 19

Highgate Dam to East Highgate .. and back to Swanton

The night was shorter than I expected it to be. I lulled asleep when the rain stopped but it started in the middle of the night. With as much rain as there was I was worried it would run along the ground but this didn’t happen, and I stayed relatively dry, and warm.

I had set my alarm for 4 in the morning but when it went off I decided I needed a little more, and slept to 5:30. Getting out of the sleeping bag was not fun, I put on wet clothes and shivered my way through packing. I don’t think I mentioned it in the last post, but this sight is right on the portage trail after two sets of stairs. Katina’s book says “not easily wheeled” for this portage, but I found it relatively easy, easier than carrying everything. 

I stopped to look over the dam and boy was the water coming down. I didn’t linger long and started paddling. Above the dam the river was as wide as a small lake and was windier than I would like. Lots of debris was floating downstream, sticks and leaves and dead knotweed canes, the occasional log would bump my bow. The going was slow and my ambitions of getting to Enosburg that night were shot.

The rain held off however and the scenery was pleasant. This was more wooded and steeper banks than the river was down stream. I saw a large beaver go under water, and several gaggles of geese honking as I came near.

After a couple hours I neared a set of ledges and rapids that you’re meant to track up. It was immediately clear to me this was not possible. I had gotten the impression since Swanton that the water was higher than implied in the guide book, but with the additional storm from the night before it was extra high. The book talked about getting out of the boat to get over sand bars on the river, I never saw a single sand bar it was all under water.

The book said to go along route 78 and ask a private landowner for access to the river from their land to get around the rapids if tracking wasn’t possible. So I scurried up through the weedy banks to the shoulder-less highway and strapped on my wheels. It was over half a mile to a private road which went past the rapids. I knocked on the door, not expecting someone to be home at 10 on a Tuesday, but a man answered. He didn’t want to waste time talking and I don’t blame him but he said it was fine to go through his property. He said the tractor path was the easiest.

This was a cleared patch with a burn pile and tractors near the water a small beach. Unfortunately it was below the last set of ledges. There was a stream pouring into the river here too. I tentatively waded into the stream to test its strength it was waste high. If this runoff stream was this high how deep was the river? Suspicions confirmed I was not going to be wading up these rapids with a boat in tow. The banks were steeps and had tree branches jutting out so walking along shore pulling the painter wasn’t an option. I wheeled my boat further along the road that went uphill and away from the water. There was an overgrown side path I started down with branches lying across in the way of my wheels. Worse was poison ivy growing in the path. I did my best to avoid it but the path also steered away from the water. I retreated back to the road to soap and scrub my legs as best I could, I am very reactive to poison ivy oil “urushiol” but that’s another story.

I was stuck. My phone and GPS batteries were low and my battery bank seemed water damaged (not to mention not enough sun to hope to charge it). I thumbed through the guide book for some numbers of outfitters and shuttles. The one in Enosburg did not provide shuttles, the man sympathized but couldn’t think of someone with a truck to get me a ride. I tried a shuttle service number; I had called them in September when I was considering doing this section then, and as before I couldn’t get anyone to pick up. I checked my maps it was a 7+ mile trek to Enosburg, and as I mentioned my wheels are damaged, and that didn’t sound like fun. [I was reading in the guide book last night during the rain that one of the cons of the wheels I have is the over heat and the bushings melt, so I’m not crazy it’s happened to others!]

Running out of options and out of batteries I decided it was time to arrange a ride a home while I still could. Luckily my aunt could pick me up that evening and save me from another night of sleeping in the rain. To kill time and find an easier spot pick me up from we decided on Swanton.

Retracing my steps from the past 24 hours but going with the current this time I could go faster and was in no real rush knowing I had time to get to Swanton. As I drifted by a knotweed patch my beaver friend startled me and I him. Boy was he fat! He looked like an ottoman footstool. I looked for my mink friend under the bridge but couldn’t find him. At some point the air smelled almost like bubble gum, and then turpentine and I noticed the railroad cars were loaded with wood chips (I guess I couldn’t have slept in them if I wanted to). In the wider parts of the river the wind was blowing against me now slowing me down some, if it’s not one thing it’s another. But soon enough I was back in Swanton cold and wet though I was.

And that’s this trip done. I’m glad I got across Champlain with relative ease, and completed what I had left of New York! I’ve got plans for a couple weekend trips this summer so stay tuned.