One of many
trip reports under the
SilGro home page for Alan Silverstein and Cathie
Grow.
Email me at
ajs@frii.com.
Last update: August 4, 2024
(Previous trip report: 1989_0715-16_Mummy,Hagues.htm)
HPite Jer/ Eberhard was a self-described "river rat" who grew up in Wisconsin. For a couple of years he'd talked about canoeing the length of the Poudre River through Fort Collins. One weekend he actually went and did it. I came along and brought my six-year-old daughter Megan Silverstein. Jer/ thought the trip might take two hours; I figured about three. It actually took us nearly five hours to ride about 11 miles through town.
It was a very unusual and interesting way to tour the area. Because the river followed the lowest terrain (which it created), we seldom saw much more than its banks, overgrown with shrubs and trees. It was a linear oasis through the arid plains, a world apart from the rest of the region. Seen from its surface, the river was astonishingly wild and natural, a pleasant surprise. There were many stretches that appeared to have changed little since prehistory (unless you looked closely).
Jer/ owned a 15 foot Coleman canoe. It was made of a marvelously tough, flexible substance which I dubbed "Colemanite". We slid over a fair number of rocks that I could feel through the bottom of the vessel. The canoe was also reasonably light and easy to carry when we had to portage (passing low-head diversion dams), or for one or both of us to hop out and drag across shallows. (This is not a river for an aluminum boat!)
We met at the "out" point on Prospect Road to drop one vehicle, then drove to the "in" point with a stop to get the canoe. We entered the river at 1445 (a late start) near Watson Lake and the state fish hatchery, about a mile west of Vern's Place on US 287 northwest of Fort Collins. The fun started immediately as we picked up the current.
The water was pleasantly cool but not icy. In spots it was deeper than the paddles. In other places it was only a couple of inches to the bottom, and we had to pole, push, or drag ourselves across slippery rocks. I literally lost count of the number of times we carried the canoe, sometimes for a short distance in the riverbed, usually over a small diversion structure, once for about 500' around a major pair of walls. Wading in the river was as much fun as riding, so we didn't much mind the shorter drags through the water. But the sharp or thorny stuff growing or deposited (wire, bottles) along the banks made the carries annoying.
Much of the way the river was a slow, deep, gentle flow, dark green and alive with fish below and birds above. We paddled a lot and drifted a lot. The current varied as the river broadened or narrowed, split or joined, turned or met a man-made pond behind a diversion.
Just reaching the Overland Trail bridge took a while. We began to realize that the ride would not be fast. Due to the meanders in the river we usually couldn't see very far ahead, and each expected bridge was slower in appearing than we guessed.
Most of the obstacles were in the first half, before College Avenue. We paused at the dam behind the power plant, east of the road, at 1740. Beyond that point I recall only one major inconvenience, where we had to lower the boat over a wall, and several natural obstacles (tree limbs and sharp turns). The last stretch from Mulberry to Prospect was especially wild, scenic, fun, and mellow, but also never-ending.
There was a golf course and also a driving range along the north side of the river. Hence we spotted numerous golf balls on the bottom, downriver from them. We had fun collecting seven balls, and probably skipped at least that many. The further downstream, the more algae coated them.
When we finally reached Prospect Road at 1940, we were thoroughly relaxed, reasonably tired, and quite ready to be done with it. Jer/ decided the trip would be more fun a little earlier in the season with more water in the river. He thought only the latter half was worth revisiting.
Here's a summary of the trip based on two of the three 7.5 minute quadrangles we crossed. The distance we traversed was probably a little greater than what I measured from the map.
| Where | Time | Elev | Drop | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| start | 1445 | ~5160' | ||
| Overland Trail | ? | 5050' | 110' | ~1.6 mi |
| Taft Hill Road | ? | 5015' | 35' | 1.8 mi |
| College Avenue | 1740 | 4950' | 65' | 2.6 mi |
| Prospect Road | 1940 | 4895' | 55' | 4.4 mi |
| 4:55 | ~265' | 10.4 mi |
(This was not the only time I floated the Poudre through town... At least once more, June 21, 2018, from Aztlan Center to Swetsville Zoo near Timnath; but no trip report on that outing.)
(Next trip report: 1989_0729-0805_LakePowell.htm)