January 12th 2008: A Saturday afternoon on the Raisin River
17 01 2008What a great way to start 2008! Middle of winter and we get to paddle with family and friends!
After a good evening of Kayak Polo, I woke up Saturday morning expecting to be able to head out to New York State and get some board time in with Sylvie and the kids.
Funny how things work out. The week of mild weather made board conditions less than ideal but pushed the river levels to spring flood on the Raisin River (Williamstown, Ontario).
So we called up as many CReW members as we could and got them to our home by noon.
Sylvie, not being a big cold weather paddler (yet…) decided to be our shuttle so, Aime-Jean, Cheryl, Sean, Zachary and I set out for what turned into 3 hours of great times!
The raisin river does not often give us these kind of conditions but the wave (we call it the Williamstown wave) was out. It is a 4 foot standing wave and when we arrived it was in great condition. Everyone got good rides and an hour later the levels were starting to go down and the feature was starting to let us down.
Time to move down stream. As the water goes down we are treated to a series of eddy lines that make cartwheels and squirts really easy and fun.
When we got back to our home, we decided that it was deep enough to have a bit of fun an seal launch of the train bridge pillars.



Finally, a few good snow slides down the hill and into the water (Aime-Jean enjoyed a couple of blunts of the snow and into the river), then it was time for food and drinks for the group.
An mid-winter treat for kayakers who are usually confined to a pool at this time of year.
Categories : Winter Paddling








