I wanted to go for a paddle and an adventure today. Somewhere I’ve never been, but also might be useful for me. That destination for me was the Bourbeuse River. Specifically from Union (Uhlemeyer Access) up to the Guth’s Mill Dam and back. I failed last year on my attempt of the Circum Louis. This stretch of river would have been some of the new water I was going to have to paddle. I knew there was a dam there, but I was not sure how to go about getting around it. Today, I would get a good look at it. First, a map to know where it was.
It started off as most paddles do, pushing away from a boat ramp. Most of them look similar.
Unfortunately, Uhlemeyer Access is right next to I-44. The first 10 minutes of our paddle upstream was the highway getting louder, then slowly quieter.
The Bourbeuse river is pretty. Okay, the water is muddy brown, but gets away from civilization fast and has great rock formations.
When rocks are not your thing, how about huge sand bars.
Again you argue, I’m there for some technical small river paddling. Farther upstream, it is that. Near Union, Missouri, we’ll take what we can get. Some occasional fast water that we had to portage via a tiny side stream.
Eventually we could hear, then see the dam. There was enough current, that we had to park the boat and walk up or it would have been a heck of a workout!
Danelle didn’t want to get too close, but trusted me to get up there and see what I was going to see. I took the video below with my idea about how to portage the dam and continue on our way.
Only time will tell when I eventually get around to a second attempt on the Circum Louis how this will go.
Once the dam was visited, I paddled on while Danelle enjoyed the scenery occasionally paddling when I asked. I very much enjoyed the workout. All told I recorded 10.7 miles out and back. I’m happy to accomplish some of my paddling goals and spend time with Danelle in the process. I’ll be back to paddle this again!
Hogan Haake