"The Evening Campfire" from
The Herald, June 14, 2009
Remote Shenago River trip
brings adventure
Billy and I put our canoe in
just before 7 a.m. at the Kidd’s Mill covered bridge in
Reynolds and paddled downstream. It was our first time
on this section of river, although we had talked about
the trip for years and had float-fished several times on
other stretches of the Shenango.
The early June air felt cool and damp, and mist rose off
the brown river waters, which were discolored by the
previous two days of rain. But we didn’t care. We
fancied ourselves as explorers that morning, in search
of outdoor discoveries.
We steered through some shallow rapids and soon
encountered the first of that day’s many sharp bends in
the river, which made our planned passage down to New
Hamburg take longer than expected. The river pulled us
downstream on its winding course, and we paddled along
for the ride.
The Shenango seemed much smaller here, compared to the
Big Bend area only eight or nine miles downstream, and
we were surprised by the stark sense of wilderness all
around, even though we canoed only a few miles from
town. The narrow river was completely shaded most of the
way by lush green overhanging trees. Sycamores, with
their odd, mottled silver trunks, sent branches reaching
far out over the waters, along with the beech and maple
and dark green oak.
Now and then a weeping willow dropped its curtain of sad
limbs out over our canoe. We saw no roads, no houses and
no signs of civilization during our entire five-mile
float.
One mile down from the bridge, something slammed my
Rapala lure, and I set the hook on a large and powerful
fish.
“Catfish,” I told Billy, because so many times in the
past we’d hooked what we thought was a big gamefish and
later had to stare down at the wide whiskered catfish
head of disappointment.
“I don’t think so,” said Billy.
The fish surged upstream three times before I rolled him
and brought him to the surface. The best I’d hoped for
was a good-sized smallmouth, but this fish turned out to
be a 22-inch walleye, hefty, darkcolored along the back,
and sharp-toothed.
That surprised me so much I
almost lost the fish, but I managed to boat him and pose
for two quick pictures. That walleye was our one fish
and only bite of the morning. We decided later that it
was the discolored water and not any lack of angling
skill that had limited our success.
Another mile downstream we encountered the surprise of
the day. The river suddenly split into two small
branches that rushed around a large, wooded island. We
could see that fallen trees and traps of netted brush
and branches partially blocked both channels, but we
quickly chose the left branch for no reason other than
good luck. After we’d paddled and battled our way a
half-mile down that channel, the river rejoined itself,
and we looked back up the opposite fork and saw that it
was cluttered with downed trees and impassable.
We watched wildlife constantly during our five-hour
journey. About halfway along, we spotted one deer and a
short time later another, both feeding along the
shoreline and sporting their light red summer coats. We
rousted ducks off the surface several times — mergansers
mostly, but also a few mallards — and caused flotillas
of Canada geese to meander downstream at our approach.
Three different red-tailed hawks skirted the treetops
during our canoe trip, and, near the end, a mature bald
eagle lifted off a hemlock crag not 40 yards away and
winged lazily downriver against the clouds.
Toward the end of our morning, we paddled aggressively
toward our take-out point, since both of us, sadly, had
afternoon commitments.
We took our canoe out at noon in New Hamburg and talked
all the way home about our adventure on the river.
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