Saturday, April 15 to Sunday, April 16, 2000
Trip Report
for Sugar Creek
Saturday, April 15 to Sunday, April 16, 2000
This gorgeous weekend we put in at Deer Mill Public Access Point and we took out at West Union Covered Bridge, which made the trip approximately twenty-six miles in length. The water level was low this weekend, but definitely navigable. We all marveled at the small amount of water in which we were still able to stay afloat. It took two pretty full days of paddling, though we weren't stressing ourselves by any means. We did have to get out and pull our crafts (even the kayaks) a short distance through some shoals, though only three or four times. (We've had much worse float trips in that respect when the water is really low during the later summer months.) We saw a couple of canoe renters, but it was a bit early in the season for most people.
What really stands out in my mind from the trip is the amount of wildlife! We saw tons of a variety of fish (some jumping and fighting their way upstream in shoals), Canadian geese galore, a pretty blue lizard, two swimming muskrats, an osprey (we had to consult the bird book on that one), several turtles, a whole great blue heron rookery (click here or on the thumbnail below to see it), the inevitable raccoon, and swarms of birds that look like black-necked stilts to me. (The bird book doesn't show black-necked stilts as being in Indiana, but I couldn't find any other bird in the book that it looked like).
Check out some pictures from our trip. They're thumbnails, so click on an image to get "the big picture". Also be sure to check out the stream flow data at the end of this trip report.
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This one shows the water level
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This is the heron rookery
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Water Level: Below is what the Guaging
station information was at the time of our trip. When we got back home we found
out that Sugar Creek was at a record low level for that particular date. The
conditions were low....right about as low as we would care to run it.
| Sugar Creek at Crawfordsville |
Sugar Creek at Crawfordsville |
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