Moira River Playday

Submitted by NessBill on Wed, 04/20/2011 - 20:40

Whitewater

Due to our rainy spring the Moira has remained at high spring levels, and we will get a chance for a May Day paddle on it. Hopefully, the weather and water will have warmed up a bit by then, making it an excellent opportunity to get out and do mellow some river play. We'll meet at Chisholm's Mill at 9:00 and do a run down the easier lower section, which is mainly long sections of Class 1-2 with lots of rollercoaster waves to go for a ride on. After lunch, we'll drive up to Lost Channel to run this shorter but more intense section, which has an interesting long Class 2-3 rapid. For first time Moira paddlers, we can have a look at it on the car shuttle to the put-in, and you can easily walk it if you don't like what you see. This trip is a great one for those with good novice skills who want to move up to an intermediate level river.

The Basics

Event Location:

Moira River

Date(s) & Time:

Sunday, May 1, 2011 (All day)

Registration Cut Off:

April 28

Event Duration:

1 day

Difficulty Rating:

Novice

Itinerary

Itinerary description:

Chisholm's Mill to Latta in the morning. Then lunch at the cars and a drive up to Lost Channel. We should be finished between 3 & 4, depending on how much people want to play. Afterwards, we hit the dairy in Latta for some excellent local cheese, maple syrup, and ice cream.

Required Items to Bring:

You need a river boat with air bags. Some of the rapids are long, and if the boat does go over, we want to be able to recover it easily. As the water is still going to be chilly, you should have a full wetsuit or a drysuit. We'll have lunch after the morning section at our cars, so you don't have to carry one with you. However, you'll want to bring a snack & drink.

How to Get There

Event Directions:

Meet 9 am at Chisholm's Mills. Exit HWY 401 in Belleville onto HWY 37 north (Exit # 544). Go north on 37 to the village of Shannonville. Turn right onto Shannonville Rd. This goes east for a km or two, and then makes a right angle turn to go south. You'll hit Chisholm's Mills and the river. Parking is in a little parkette on the south side of the river. We shuttle and paddle down to Latta.
For the curious who want to eyeball the upper section on a map, for the put in, follow 37 north to Chapman & Bethel Rd. Go right on Bethel, over the west branch of the river, and then turn right to go down Carss Rd. for about a km & you'll hit the river. We paddle down to where Esker Rd. comes along the north side of the river.
Driving time from central Toronto is about 2.5 hr. if you don't have a lead foot.

Event Coordinator/s Contact Information

Contact (Name):

Bill Ness

Phone:

416-321-3005

Email:

bness@look.ca