Harpeth River - Harris Street Bridge to Harpeth River Bridge Campsite 20.4 miles
Me, Scotty & Dick, Weather in the morning was high 60's and by the afternoon - mid 80's, 5:03 minutes paddling time, 14:54 avg minutes per mile (anywhere between 11 to 17)
We've often thought of kayaking further down the Harpeth River as we've taken out at the Harris Street Bridge many times. So today we did just that. We couldn't find any reports of other people kayaking this section online, although we had heard of people kayaking from here down to the Cumberland River. We estimated it could be between 22-25 miles from what we had been told.
The current was fast when we started. For the first 16 miles, we averaged anywhere between 11 minutes to 14 minutes per mile. We saw 3 bald eagles soaring above us and one even posed for a photo above me. At one point, when the current was swift, I noticed a branch hanging down towards the river on the left side. I needed to get farther right of it and paddled like crazy, but within the last seconds I realized I wasn't going to make it. I probably could have gone a little further left and gotten under a higher section, but instead I was going straight for the branch and didn't have time to scoot down into my boat. I leaned right to avoid it hitting my head/body and flipped my boat. I tipped and floated probably 100 yards down the river. Scotty saved my paddle and as I got closer to Dick, I handed him my cockpit, water bottle and seat cushion. I realized I could stand and was able to walk towards shore on the right side dragging my boat. It was an adrenaline rush. I wasn't really scared about myself, except that I did try to keep my feet up so that I wouldn't hit any trees underwater. I kept thinking that I didn't want to lose my boat!!!
When we got to about Mile 16 of our paddle, the current flowed considerably. The river widened and we averaged 17 minutes per mile. In my head, I kept thinking, 'I sure hope this paddle isn't 25 miles'! My arms were definitely beginning to get tired. We began to notice a few houses up on the bluffs and that's always a good sign that you're nearing a city. Sure enough, we heard traffic and were not disappointed to see the bridge by our take-out. The paddle ended up being 20 miles and we were not sorry for it to end at that point!
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| Our smiles don't reflect how we're feeling on this SLOW stretch of the river! |
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