On May 24th, trip leader Bob Arthur and six other paddlers showed up in Ellinger, Texas, to paddle 14 miles on the Colorado River.
This is not “the” Colorado River, famous for running through the Grand Canyon, but rather the one by that same name within Texas. The story I’ve heard is that a Spanish map-maker a long time ago mistook the Texas river for the downstream end of “the” Colorado River, and so-labeled it. By the time the mistake was discovered in his handiwork, the name had already stuck. So Texas now has its own Colorado River.
The location of this section of river is half-way between Columbus and LaGrange, in the small town of Ellinger, about one and a half hours west of Houston. Just head west on I-10, then turn north on Highway 71. The meeting place is a country store on that highway called Hruska’s – you’ll smell the delicious fresh-baked pastries inside as soon as you pull in.
The start and end points of this trip were both on private property, courtesy of local folks that Bob Arthur’s family knows. In the middle of this stretch of river is Burnham’s Crossing – a historic pioneer homestead site and ferry crossing. Note that the marked put-in and take-out locations on this map are only approximate.
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| Map of river location |
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Close-up map |
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Aerial view |
The water level was high compared to recent levels, and there was good moving water that pushed us along at several miles per hour, requiring little work on our part to cover the distance. There were few dangers present, consisting of some strainers near the shoreline, and a few logs sticking up in the river.
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| Water flow chart |
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This stream gauge data can be viewed here:
http://nwis.waterdata.usgs.gov/tx/nwis/uv/?site_no=08161000
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Driving to the put-in |
The river bottom is quite wide and subject to flooding, and is mostly used only for pasture, as you can see from the aerial photo. We drove up to a mile for both the put-in and takeout across private dirt roads and grassy fields to get to the riverbank. Bob’s son, Matt, served as the field guide, and shuttle driver.
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Boats lined up
on the riverbank |
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The boats are lined up on the shoreline ready to begin the trip. The participants were: Bob Arthur, Sereniah Breland, Joe Coker, Dana Enos, Janis Kmiec, Mike Pollard and John Rich. Three canoes and four kayaks.
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Readying for the water |
The paddlers prepare themselves to push off into the water: Mike Pollard (blue), Joe Coker (yellow) & Bob Arthur (white). Mike had a brand new boat and this was its maiden voyage. And he hoped to get some fishing in too, while he was here.
Now for some on-the-water photos of each of the participants.
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| Bob Arthur |
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Dana Enos |
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Janis Kmiec |
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Joe Coker |
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| Mike Pollard |
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Sereniah Breland |
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John Rich |
The trip was proceeding along nicely, until about half way through a dark thunderstorm approached, with pelting rain, flashes of lightening, and booming thunderclaps.
Everyone broke out their raincoats or ponchos to wait out the thunderstorm on the
riverbank, where the Burnham’s Ferry crossing used to be. Here you see Bob
weathering the storm, looking like Sasquatch. The worst of it for him was, it was too wet to get his pipe lit. Discussion ensued as to whether it is more unsafe in a lightening storm when in a canoe on open water, or on shore on open land. The cows were all huddled under a big tree, but that didn’t seem too bright either.
Some of us used the down time to walk the gravel bar in the rain looking for interesting discoveries. Chunks of petrified wood were found, old bricks, perhaps from pioneer days, as well as one piece of petrified bone, which looks like it might be a fragment from something large enough to be a dinosaur, judging from the arc of the "tree rings".
The rain was so heavy that it was filling the boats with water, which had to be bailed out before we could proceed on our trip. Looking downstream on the river, we could see blue sky ahead, so we decided to paddle our way out of the danger zone.
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| Calm before the storm |
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Bob gets wet |
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Joe the rock hound |
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Rainwater |
In no time at all we reached the take-out point; a nice grass and gravel bar, suitable for both camping overnight, as well as driving your vehicle right up to the edge of the water for ease of loading your boat. The water was moving so nicely that we covered the entire 14 miles in about four and a half hours, including a long halt for the rainstorm.
Janis loaded up her boat on her jeep, and readied it to head home for the day. The
remainder of the group stayed behind to camp out overnight on the gravel bar. Bob’s son, Matt, drove in and joined us with his wife and two children, along with several other family friends. We were done so early in the afternoon, we had ample time to lounge around and chat. Bob took his grandkids for a spin in the boat.
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| The take-out |
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Janis loads her boat |
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Bob & grandkids |
The campground gravel bar was occupied by hordes of what must be the world’s tiniest frogs – smaller than most tadpoles. As well as some of the prettiest grasshoppers, if you can imagine a bug as being “pretty”. The gravel bar also had a plentiful variety of beautiful Texas flowers, of which just two are shown here.
One of the first orders of business for camping was creating some shade in which to spend the afternoon. The only shade trees were on a sloped hillside riverbank, so we created our own shade where we wanted it, in soft grass and on flat ground, by stretching a tarp across two vehicles. It became a comfortable spot for chat and snacks.
Everyone did different things for dinner – ranging from cold fried chicken, MRE heated lasagna, BBQ brisket and potato salad, to grilled steaks. Bob cooked up a cane syrup cake for dessert using a Dutch oven and hot coals from the campfire. Delicious!
After dinner, the marshmallows came out and were toasted over the campfire. Joe prefers them slow roasted over red coals to a golden brown color, while Caleb mostly just goes through the motions, sticks them in fire, and eats them slightly warmed, with a double-ended super ninja marshmallow stick.
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| Camp shade |
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Joe grills steak |
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Bob prepares desert |
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Marshmallows |
After night settled, and several satellites and shooting stars were sighted ("Was that a shooting star or a lightening bug?"), Joe entertained the kids, big and small, with stories involving things like seven sailors, eight elephants, and nine nymphs.
As exhaustion overtook us, we drifted off to our tents for a good night’s sleep under clear starry skies and in perfect temperatures. In the morning we awoke to dew-soaked tents and tendrils of fog rising up from the river water.
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| Joe entertains |
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Morning fog |
After breakfast, some campers packed up to head for home, while others packed up to join the Colorado River, Columbus Loop paddle trip, which would be starting shortly just 20 miles away. All in all it was an excellent time on the water and in camp, and a good time was enjoyed by all. The one-hour thunderstorm couldn’t dampen the overall mood, and such things build character and make for good stories.