Tallapoosa Kayak Trip

It was an early Friday start.  JC showed up at the house about 0615.  I had been up a while and was anxious to get going.  Today started our Tallapoosa River adventure trip.  This was something I had been wanting to do for about 8 years.  I had fished up the ‘Poosa’ thousands of times in a jet boat, but never kayaked down. 

Once we got everything loaded on the truck,  we headed out the door to our put in point, below Thurlow Dam, which is a tiny lake below Yates Lake (aka Middle Pond), which is below Lake Martin.  Our plan was (because we only had 2 days) was to float and fish down to the toll bridge, which is about mile 40 of the 51 total miles (51 miles from Thurlow Dam to the Coosa River). 

We got to your location around 0715.  My wife was nice enough to drop us off on her way to work.  She became a bit nervous upon seeing the 5’ x 6’ sign that read in big red letters “Danger” then proceeded to say “4 Deaths without life vest; 0 with”.  I assured her that we would be ok!  By 0800 we were in the water.  By 0805 we were encountering the class ½ rapids that were between us and the rest of our journey! 

We paddled a couple miles and then we started to fish.  The weather was extremely nice..low 80s, cloudy, a light breeze…not too hot, not cool, just right.  However, there was a some storms coming in later that afternoon and evening and the rain chances were 50% for Friday and 60% for Saturday.

We loaded the boats.  Bass were on bed and coming off bed, so the spotted bass were hitting.  So were the bream.  On the first day I caught 24 fish alone, including one 3lb strip on my ultra light!  We saw a lot of interesting things along the way, including a bank with a couple old cars (one of which my grandfather said was an old Studebaker). 

About 1500, the weather was starting to come in.  You could see darker clouds moving in, and the wind was picking up just a little.  We had a couple campsites marked out, campsite 1 and alternative campsite.  We past campsite 1 and said a flat no…about a 3 inch rise in water level and we would be wet.  So we continued on around a couple more bends until we found the other campsite.  This sandbar was HUGE.  And it sloped up and the highest point was a good 8 ft above the water.  This was home for the night.  As soon as we were pulling the kayaks out, we felt the sprinkles start.  We immediately grabbed the tent and started putting it up.  When we flung the rain fly over the tent, the bottom fell out!  We got soaked securing the tent and putting the rain fly on, but the tent was dry and we waited under the little porch for the rain to subside.  After an hour, the rain had go to a slow rain and we continued unloading. 

We had big plans to eat fish!!  However, that was squashed after the massive rain….plus we were give out tired from the fishing and paddling.  So we opened the tent, looking out at the river and at off the camp stove.  Not long after that, we were asleep!

About 0330, thunder sat me straight up in the tent.  It had started to storm again.  I laid there listening to it and eventually fell back asleep before I woke up at 0530 ( I get up early at home too!).  I went and purified us some water, started the coffee, at some breakfast, and we started to pack up.  The sun was peaking through the clouds, it was going to be a nice day (thanks to technology, we learned from JCs phone the rain chances went from 60% to 10%). 

At 0800 we pushed off to start a new day.  We were half way to our destination.  We started fishing almost immediately trying to get the early morning bite.  We fished on and off for about 1 ½ a caught about 6 – 8 fish among us.  The wind was picking up too, and not in our favor.  We decided it was getting to hard to fish in the wind, and we really needed to get going so JC could get to a wedding he had to go to.  So we put the paddles down!  The wind was white capping portions of the tiny river….if you stopped paddeling, you were almost immediately going in the opposite direction.  So we put our head down and stayed close to the bank and would get out to stretch our legs and rest about every 40 – 60 minutes.  

I called my wife and told her we were going to be there earlier than expected, that I would call her when we were closer to taking out.  At about 1330 we reached the bridge…man, we were hauling it!  We scouted for a path to take the kayaks through some woods to reach the road, and found a small trail.  We lugged the kayaks up, sat them down on the side of the road and waited on our ride. 

All in all, the weather did not effect us.  I have been in much work backpacking!  This was one of the best, and most fun trips I have ever been on.  It was peaceful, fun, and relaxing.  Would I do it again??  You bet…JC and I are both buying some new gear to continue to kayak, fish, and camp some more…and planning the next trip!