Roots High and Dry
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| Joe, Alice and Fran |
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Cypress Knees on Land |
We started our informal "Out-and-Back" (no close-proximity shuttles) at the White’s Park boat ramp at 10:00 AM. It was a beautiful sunny day. Alice, Fran and Joe were in various stages of unloading and prep when I arrived. We immediately noticed how low the water was – the ramp was much longer to the water than usual.
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| The White's Bayou Fleet |
We paddled south on White’s Bayou, per plan, intending to turn around at the first significantly inconvenient blockage. It didn’t take very long with the low water before a significant logjam appeared. I was able to muscle through a small gap against the shore by kind of crabbing up and tilting a little and pushing through, but we determined that the fatter sit-on-tops would not be able to negotiate the gap, so I came back through. This is where I started the GPS that I had forgotten to initiate at the put-in. It was 0.8 miles from the logjam back to the put-in, so that’s what I added to the final GPS reading. We saw lots of beautiful trees, turtles, Great Blue and Little Blue Herons, belted kingfishers, cormorants and some other little birds.
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| Look at Those Knees |
We continued north around the RV park, across I-10 and into upper Turtle Bayou, where we decided to head northeast to see how far we could paddle on Lee’s Gully, using the same guideline to determine when it was time to turn around. It only took about 5 or 10 minutes to find this spot – a single log completely spanning the gully. Of course, at normal water levels this entire obstruction would have been invisible under the water, but today we turned around and headed back to Turtle Bayou.
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| Lee's Gully - End |
Heading northwest on Turtle Bayou, we put some distance between us and the freeway to find a peaceful place for our lunch break. We circled the kayaks in a shady spot and had a very pleasant break with lots of interesting conversation.
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| Lunch |
We continued on upper Turtle Bayou, finding a way under a log that spanned the bayou (our heroic success at a slightly inconvenient obstacle) and paddled for quite a while until we came to another log that was perfectly fitted to the banks and exactly half above the water line. It was a beautiful spot, and we hung out there for a few minutes enjoying the peace and spectacular flora of the swamp in this location.
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Upper Turtle Bayou –
End of the Road |
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Goodbye to
End of the Road
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We retraced our route back to the put-in, noticing that the log we had to go under on the way up had not changed position, so we took off our hats again to get under it. This time I took a few photos of the process:
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Limbo Under The Log -
Fran Coming Through |
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Joe Coming Through
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We also stopped to take a picture of a floating dock that was not designed to be in water this low:
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Not-So-Floating Dock
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As we paddled this upper Turtle Bayou segment, the back of my mind kept registering that it was different this time – not nearly as many back yards were visible. It felt much more remote and “wildernessy”. I decided it must be that the lower water level created five foot banks that hid the majority of the development from view – a very nice tradeoff to the early turnarounds.
This was perhaps the most leisurely paddle I have done in a while – so nice, with such good friends.
Here’s where we went:
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| GPS Stats |
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Our Route –
more spread out |
P.S. We wondered why the water level was so low in this drainage when all of the water levels in the area were about normal. Our best guess at the time was that the tide in Lake Anahuac, which connects to Turtle Bayou, was low. I’m not sure what the timing of the effects of Anahuac tides are in Turtle Bayou, but it looks like that was not the cause of the low water, because it had been getting higher from 3:34 AM all the way to the time we came off the water:
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Anahuac Tide Chart
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Joe Coker’s update: “Just before I left Turtle Bayou this afternoon I was chatting with the fishermen about the low water. They had heard that the gates on Lake Anahuac had been opened to lower the water level. Presumably for flood mitigation.”
I could not find any mention of gates on Lake Anahuac, but the Texas Water Development Board website talks about a huge dam-levee with an uncontrolled emergency spillway at 8’ above mean sea level and an uncontrolled service spillway 5’ above mean sea level completed in 1954. That would seem to be enough height to keep tides from influencing the water level of Lake Anahuac, but what do I know?
Photo album link: HERE