Location: Wabash River – Covington, IN to Montezuma, IN
Distance: +/-31
Date: 10/13-10/14-07
Gauge: 4.9 (Covington)
Paddle Time: 14 hours
Weather: Variable

In reality this trip started on Friday night. We all met at my house and loaded up into James’ Explorer and my Suburban, with two boats on my trailer and the rest on James'. The plan was to drive to Cayuga & camp at my parents then shuttle the Suburban to Montezuma on Friday night. We ran a little late so by the time we reached Cayuga we barely had time to get the tents set up before dark. Fortunately my dad had started the fire for us, so we had some good coals to cook dinner with.

The beginning planning for this trip probably took place in 2006 when Miguel and I started talking about doing an overnight trip and camping on whatever sandbar was available. We didn’t get that trip in, but this summer Chris, John Haram and I started talking about a similar trip so I started planning a route. The original plan was to run the Big Vermilion River from Kickapoo State Park near Danville, IL to the S.R. 234 public access on the Wabash with an overnight stop at Forest Glen Preserve, a total of about 30 miles. However, after very little rain through the summer and most of September it became clear that we were going to be dragging the boats most of the way on the Big Vermilion, so we switched to the Wabash.

While it carries plenty of water, the Wabash does not move very fast, so the current was not much help. In some places, even though the wind was light, on Saturday you could stop paddling and still not move downstream.

Saturday we awoke to a chilly 38-degree morning. After drinking as much coffee as we could and standing around the fire for a while to try and warm up we put the last two boats and all the gear from my truck on the trailer and headed north. After we got to the ramp I couldn’t believe the amount of gear we had piled there along with the boats…I wasn’t sure it was all going to fit in the boats. But after a while it was all packed and strapped into the boats and we set off downstream.

It was still chilly and overcast, probably around 45 degrees, so everyone was fairly bundled up at the start. Until Friday night the forecast had been for partly sunny and 70 degrees with a 5 MPH wind from the north, then they changed it to showers throughout the day. The wind was from the south instead; fortunately it was very light.

Just below the put-in is a railroad bridge. Someone had painted THINK ABOUT JESUS on the side, but had gotten the J backward so it looked more like THINK ABOUT LESUS. Dad had said earlier in the week that the current in the river was 3 MPH, but it was more like 1.5 in most places. Unfortunately there isn’t a lot of scenery on the Wabash since most of it is through farming areas, but we did see a few interesting rocks north of Perrysville.

We made our first stop on an island just north of Perrysville. There were several tents set up, as well as a kitchen area complete with smoker, LP grill, Coleman lantern and a can crusher. There was also a chemical toilet facing out over the river, without any real screen around it. I guess that’s a nighttime activity, although you could sit & fish at the same time, I guess.

The next stop was a couple of hours later – at about 15 miles - at the confluence with Big Vermilion. I was hoping we could land on the sandbar on the Vermilion side and fish for a while but the current kept us to the other side. We did see an apparently abandoned boat just downstream. It looked like it was probably a decent small speedboat, but it was without a motor. Miguel had been struggling a bit with paddling because his shoulders were very sore. I told him we would need him to split wood when we arrived at the camping spot and he replied that he would rather throw himself in the fire than split wood.

The next item of note was the crossing under S.R. 32. A couple of guys were fishing on the bank at the public access, complete with a fire. They didn’t look all that friendly so we didn’t ask how the fishing was. One guy stood up as I wasn't looking but apparently had a bad case of plumbers pants going on, as I heard Tim say "Just say no to crack". We also started to hear the hum of the Cayuga power plant, even though it was still at least a mile away.

We started looking around more for the bald eagles that live in the area. A couple of times we saw what we thought was one, but it turned out to be a heron or something else when it got closer. Finally just before the power plant we saw one fly out from the trees on river left. I looked for a nest but didn’t see one in the trees.

The power plant was interesting to float by, if nothing else than for the scale…it’s a little hard to fathom how large it is.

Right after that is a large bend that would probably be an oxbow if it wasn’t for the power plant in the way. As I came out of the bend I noticed that Tucker had sort of put his head down and paddled about ½ mile ahead to the next bend. I also noticed that James was near the shore river right looking up. As I got closer I could tell that there was an adult eagle in the tree above him, just looking around. We were all able to get within about 30’ of it so we got a really good view. They are really amazing to see. Unfortunately Tucker missed it since he was on a speed run at the time.

After that it was a fairly straight run down to the stop for the night. We made a short stop on Manhattan Island but weren’t able to stay long because we had left Covington later than expected, and the overcast was limiting the daylight. We did see a couple of additional birds that we thought were juvenile bald eagles, but after talking to a friend who spends a lot of time on the river it sounds like they were probably golden eagles...pretty cool stuff. Seeing those birds was definitely a highlight of the trip.

We arrived at the campsite with enough light to unload the boats, get camp set up and start cooking. Everyone was pretty tired, but the campsite had a nice level spot under some trees and some more level area along the boat ramp road. There were four or five small weekend houses on the property, but aside from a couple of guys working on one that was still under construction it didn’t seem like anyone was there. I figured they would come over and at least ask if we had permission to be there, but they didn't so they evidently didn’t care.

We got the fire going to make some coals for cooking. Tim fired up his charcoal burner to get the coals ready for cooking cobbler. I had brought ingredients for stew and we added contributions of baked beans from Miguel and deer tenderloin from Chris. By the time everything was cooked it was getting pretty dark. Tim finished up his cobbler in the Dutch oven and shared it around. It was really good, with enough left over for breakfast.

After everyone had eaten we all sat around the campfire for a bit and took it easy. James had brought a book of short stories called A Fine and Pleasant Misery by Patrick McManus so several of us took turns reading aloud. The stories were about his growing up in Colorado and his adventures and misadventures. Some were so funny the people reading them had trouble continuing. James said he had gotten the book as a kid and hadn’t read it since. That was a lot of fun and added to the atmosphere of sitting around the fire.

Sunday morning the temperature was nicer. We got a fire going and heated some water for oatmeal, along with heating up the leftover cobbler; an excellent breakfast. Dad brought more coffee so I didn’t even break out the French press.
Tim and Joey loaded up and got on the river a few minutes before everyone else to try and get some fishing in, but didn’t any luck. Tim got snagged and had to paddle about 100 yards back upstream to get loose. The wind was a lot stronger out of the south, so we had to paddle most of the time to make headway.

Just north of the Sugar Creek confluence we started seeing some towers 50 yards or so behind the bank that we never could figure out what they were. One appeared to have been burned out, a couple of them looked abandoned, and one looked like it was still functional with a large roof vent and an A/C unit.

Sugar Creek was almost dry, just like everything else. James tried to paddle a short way upstream but could not get far.

Once again not much interesting scenery. We stopped on a sandbar a few miles from the end for a short break. The wind was getting really stiff at this point, probably at least 10 MPH, and we were headed right into it. After the stop we put Joey into the Breeze, Tucker into the tandem and I went in the canoe with Tim to give him a break.

The Montezuma boat ramp is a nice concrete one. The only downfall was the stench of raw sewage coming from just downstream and blowing up to us. I don’t know what the outfall was from, but it was nasty.

We managed to get all six boats on my trailer, a lot of the gear into the truck and the rest into the car-top carrier. I was really glad I had brought that, otherwise we would have had a lot of gear on our laps.

Overall this was a pretty good trip. It would have been nice if Saturday's paddle had been shorter so that we had more time for fishing, etc., something to keep in mind for the next trip.