Trip Week Details

ROSTER

1.   Dave C
2.   Josh M
3.   Jim M
4.   Pete F
5.   Phil P
6.   Rob C
7.   Rob H
8.   Skip H
9.   Stuart F
10. Vernon T

10-1/2.  Mike C (Friday only)
11-ish.  Bob D (possible Friday only)


LOGISTICS

Whoever is riding down with the trailer meet at my house at 7:00 am Friday.  Josh is picking up Stuart at the airport at 11:30 am.  The rest of us will either drive down together or meet at the put-in.  We will go ahead and run the shuttle and load the canoes.  Since it's only an hour from Nashville we may be ready earlier than usual - and earlier than Josh and Stuart arrive - in which case the kitchen crew and anyone else who wants to can go ahead and start downstream.  A few of us can hang back and wait for Josh and Stuart and watch their canoes.

Here are updated maps.

Map 1 is Friday-Saturday:

Map 2 is Saturday-Sunday

The distances are 5-11-5 (Friday-Saturday-Sunday).  Note this is a change - we are putting in at Hardison Mill Bridge instead of Carpenter Bridge which would have been only one mile of paddling on Friday.  There's a new highway bridge at Hardison Mill (Hwy. 431/106) and I didn't know if it was still a river access but I scouted it last week and it's a good one as you can see in this video.

You may also have noticed in the video that the remains of Hardison Mill dam will provide some potential immediate excitement for those of you who are starting early, and potential immediate entertainment for those of us who will be waiting at the put-in with our cameras.  Hint:  take the middle chute.

I also scouted breakfast at Marcy Jo's, which is just a few miles up the highway from Hardison Mill.





We will call ahead for carry out orders because we don't want to wait for an hour like we did at Readyville Mill last Spring.


Since we will be split up for part of the first day here is how the rest of you can find the Friday camp:

It is at river mile 166.5 where Flat Creek enters from the right (I'll mark it on your maps).  The best campsite and kitchen gravel bar is about 100 yards downstream from the mouth of the creek, so you'll need to go ahead and run through the little riffle before pulling over to the right bank.

Here is a video of it from about this time last summer (looking upstream after having just shot the riffle):

On Google Maps it is weirdly, and without explanation, labeled "Iwa Jima Island".

Because I liked the look of it, I stopped there in the middle of a quiet bright afternoon and made a solid camp on flat gravel under willows.  I was tired and my gear needed tending, and it looked like the kind of place I'd been waiting for to spend a couple of nights and to loaf through a little of what the abstractly alliterative military schedules used to call "materiel maintenance."  Islands are special, anyhow, as children know with a leaping instinct, and when they lie in public domain you can have a fine sense of temporary ownership about them that's hard to get on shores, inside or outside of fences.

Goodbye to a River, p. 149.

Bonnie and I liked the look of it.