Colorado River, Altair to Garwood
Feb. 3, 2018
by Bruce Bodson
Attendees: Bruce Bodson, Ken McCormick
Distance: 13.73 miles
Map link, here.
This trip was great! We did get misted on a bit, but no hard rain. The river above the Garwood Dam was relatively slow and wide, with some good sandbars. Below Garwood dam, it got considerably faster- a modest effort paddling had me going between six and seven mph. There were numerous small riffles, but nothing I would classify as a real rapid. The sand bars were very interesting with lots of cobbles and I suspect if we would have spent a bit of time there that we would have found some interesting fossils. We saw 57 species of birds, without really looking too hard, including one green kingfisher. We found two active bald eagles nests and saw a total of five adults.
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Launch at US 90A,
just east of Altair.
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Ken McCormick
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Impromptu trash dump
just above the take-out
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The shoreline habitat wasn’t too good up in this area. My review of aerials indicates that the next 27 miles is really nice bottomland forest though. I’ll set that one up soon.
The portage at the dam was fairly long. I probably made it longer than necessary, because the recent high water had washed out the sandbars near the dam and I felt it was safer to land higher up and walk farther. After helping me, Ken paddled down a bit farther and did fine. I think the landing near the dam was okay for one boat at a time. There were three runnable spots on the dam, which I probably would have done in warmer weather. The loose rock stacking made it so there was not a hard drop and no hydraulic. It would have been exciting, but manageable, even in a long boat, provided you didn’t care too much about scratches on the hull.
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Subtle warning on
the portage path.
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One of the runnable
spots in the dam
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Same spot from downstream
side after we'd portaged |
Bird list, Colorado River, Altair to Garwood, Feb. 3, 2018:
| Double-crested cormorant |
Eastern bluebird |
| Neotropic cormorant |
Northern mockingbird |
| Anhinga |
Eastern phoebe |
| White Pelican |
Blue jay |
| Blue-winged teal |
American crow |
Green-winged teal
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Carolina wren |
| Gadwall |
House wren |
| Wood duck |
Bewick's wren |
| Great Blue Heron |
American pipIt |
| Great Egret |
Northern cardinal |
| Snowy Egret |
Red-winged blackbird |
| Killdeer |
Brewer's blackbird |
| Greater yellowlegs |
Eastern meadowlark |
| Lesser yellowlegs |
Carolina chickadee |
| Spotted sandpiper |
Tufted titmouse |
| Least sandpiper |
Ruby-crowned kinglet |
| Wilson's snipe |
Yellow-rumped warbler |
| Black vulture |
Pileated woodpecker |
| Turkey vulture |
Red-bellied woodpecker |
| Osprey |
Northern flicker |
| Bald eagle |
White-throated sparrow |
| Red-tailed hawk |
White-crowned sparrow |
| Red-shouldered hawk |
Field sparrow |
| American kestrel |
Song sparrow |
| Crested caracara |
Savanna sparrow |
| Forster's tern |
Vesper sparrow |
| Belted kingfisher |
Mourning dove |
| Green kingfisher |
White-winged dove |
| American robin |
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Photographing eagle nest
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Active bald eagle nest
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The author, Bruce Bodson |
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