Green River, Day 3

Amazingly, we started the morning with smooth water, but it didn't take long  before we were working against a stiff south wind again.

We stopped at the River Register site on river left at mile 77.5 to check out some of the inscriptions. Some date back to early river runners, but lots of others are relatively current graffiti - a practice the BLM and most visitors would like to see stopped.

Eventually, after working strong headwinds in the southbound section past the former Hey Joe mine, we arrived at the only spot we could find to unload near the trail to the Bowknot overlook. It was a steep spot but worth the work

for a campsite on the bench above. There used to be some beach access further upstream but I wasn't able to locate where that had been.

Once we were unloaded, several decided to scramble up to the overlook

where you could see back up the river on the north side of the bend

as well as the river on the south side of the bend. While these two points of the river are very close to one another, it takes about 7 miles of river travel to get from the north side to the opposite side of Bowknot Bend.

While the rest of the crew was checking out where we would be going tomorrow, I was back in camp watching the light change on the canyon walls and the clouds change as they scudded overhead. We did have a bit of rain and lots of wind overnight.

Water flow for the day was approximately 2240 cfs with winds forecast for 20 knots with gusts to 30. We were fortunate that we didn't experience that wind consistently.

Green River, Day 2

Forecasts were calling for growing winds today with gusts up to 40 mph. It was 9 am before we launched and the winds were already starting to build.

We worked our way down river, leveraging the wind shadows as much as possible and taking it head on in the southerly sections of the canyon. There weren't any pictures of the really windy areas - we were too busy paddling.

Steve was in the best boat for the conditions with his low lines resulting in less impact from the wind.

We had noted that the sandbars were not as large or as prevalent as in previous years, so when we spotted a dry sandbar with a firm sandy bottom for unloading the boats, we called it home.  One of the other parties that launched with us also landed here.

My canoe was tied down and loaded with most of the gear while my tent went alongside with some protection from the prevailing wind. Four sand anchors and a deadman plus two tieoffs to the canoe made sure the tent didn't go anywhere. (And yes, the rain fly did go on right after this picture was taken to help keep most sand out of the tent.)

Some of the folks found an easy route up onto the bottom behind us and hiked down to Ten Mile Canyon.

Once again, we were treated to beautiful colors as the light changed on the canyon walls.

Water flow for the day was approximately 2330 cfs with winds forecast for 20 knots from the south with gusts to 40 although I don't think we saw that high of gusts.

Green River, 2013

This year represents the 10th Green River flatwater trip for me in the past 14 years. As usual we started the trip at Tex's Riverways in Moab, UT who provided the shuttle services for the four of us. This time we had two other groups of two launching with us.

Once the boats and gear were loaded (we had a rented aluminum tandem canoe, my single canoe, and a beautiful fiberglass sea kayak in our group) we were ready to hit the road on our nearly annual adventure. A big thanks to Helen for the invitation after my own planned trip was cancelled.

We headed up the road towards the town of Green River and then started wandering down a gravel road towards our launching point at Ruby Ranch, 97 miles above the confluence of the Green River with the Colorado River.

The launch at Ruby is on private land and has a launching fee, but the launch area is much nicer than some of the other launch locations.

We stopped at Trin Alcove at river mile 90 for lunch but it was really messy. Mud up to knee deep and very slippery. The canyon had flashed recently and potential camp sites were fairly rare. Amazingly, none of us got pictures of the Trin Alcove "beach."

Home for the night was a sandbar at the lower end of June's Bottom, about mile 88. Because of the higher water a couple week prior, every low edged sandbar featured a muddy ring near the water. No worries, we were off to enjoy nine days on the river!

The evening was spent watching the light change on the canyon walls across the river.

Flow at launch was approximately 2390 cfs.