Smaller turnout in the locks was OK

By David Horst  sandhill7@gmail.com

This was a far cry from 150 boats.

That's how many kayaks, canoes and stand-up boards we expected to show up at Lutz Park for the Appleton Locks Paddle.

That was before the one-week delay, due to hazardously high water flow on the Fox River, and the forecast for rain all day on our substitute date, Oct. 1.

The 38 boats that showed up didn't pack the locks full, as photos of past years' trips testify. No clanking of gunwales. No pushing of boats into the path of the lock gates.

Segment 8 map

Segments 4A & 4B: Marquette to White River Dam

Segment 4A: Marquette to Princeton
Launch: Lyons St. Landing, Puckaway Lake

Takeout: Jefferson St. boat landing, Princeton

Distance: 15.7 miles

Looking out over Puckaway Lake

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We are paddling our first double-header. We follow a long, twisting 16 miles from Marquette to Princeton on Saturday with a quick six miles from there to the White River Lock on Sunday.

I say lock rather than dam because the White River Dam has been removed. Unlike the lock system on the lower Fox, the upper Fox has no locks still in operation. We encounter the Princeton Dam, which actually lies several miles upstream of Princeton. It requires you to exit river left and portage through what is a heavily used park for fishing.

By this stretch of the Fox, recreation has taken a firm hold, though there is still plenty of agriculture along its banks. The structures here are more cottages than fishing shanties and lines stretching out from fishing boats are more frequent obstacles.

At one point approaching Princeton, we come upon a fisherman up on his tall pier struggling to dial his cell phone while keeping a grip on his doubled-over rod. He is attempting to call his son in the house to come down and net the lunker on his line.

Mark, one of our kayakers, comes to his aid, grabbing the landing net and hauling in a 
27-inch, 8-pound channel catfish for this total stranger. Really, there are no strangers on the river. People in lawn chairs yell to the 16-passenger voyageur canoe that leads us: ‘Hey, the guy in the back isn’t paddling.’”

“Un, deux, trios,” the voyageur in the back calls out, and all paddles rise in salute to the new friends on shore.

Upon landing at the quite nice boat landing and campground in Princeton, we are greeted by Princeton Mayor Bob Mosolf and Chamber of Commerce President Ron Calbaum. Their visit suggests communities along the Fox are seeing the potential of the Fox River water trail that our group is advocating. 

Segment 4B: Princeton to White River Dam
Launch: Jefferson St. Landing, Princeton

Takeout: White River Lock, Lock Rd.

Distance: 6 miles

Sunday’s segment downstream from Princeton brings a noticeably swifter current and a different mood.

I don’t know if it was the easier paddling or the aftereffects of the previous day’s distance, but this paddle is downright laid back. The 44 participants stay grouped up more and conversation runs rampant.

A highlight comes about halfway through this leg at a site commemorating the most famous travelers on the Fox – Fr. Marquette and Louis Joliet. A large cross marks the spot where Marquette blessed a series of springs that bubble up from the ground year-round. The spot was already sacred to the Native Americans when members of the Mascoutin, Miami, Kickapoo and Fox tribes turned out in 1673 to meet the famous blackrobe.

Segment 4A & 4B maps

Segment 3: Montello to Puckaway Lake

Launch: Rendezvous Outfitters, Hwy. 22, Montello

Takeout: Good Old Days Resort, CTH C, north shore of Puckaway Lake

Distance: 11 miles
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The day is glorious as we set out on the 11 miles from Montello to Puckaway Lake.

This stretch of river still carves its way through wetlands, including the Grand Marsh. But it’s beginning to take on a recreational flavor. There are a few resorts. Powerboats become more numerous, most piloted by fishermen.

Our crew is a similar mix of kayaks and canoes, one with two preschoolers tucked between mom and dad. Doug, the standup paddler, completes the hat trick. Marshal, one of the more senior paddlers, smiles wider with each mile.

Marshal

A couple in short river boats someone dubs “plastic milk jugs” is learning why investing a little more in boats can be a better bargain. With no keel to speak of, they’re having trouble tracking straight. By the open water of Lake Puckaway, she’s losing steam in a big way.

We make a scheduled short stop at River’s Bend Resort, where we are well received as people drop some change on sodas. Besides the fun, the point of our “Journey of Rediscovery” is to demonstrate the benefits that would come to communities and their businesses with a designated river trail and National Heritage Area status for the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers.

The campground where we’re planning our lunch stop, hasn’t gotten the message. The owner asks us to leave. His campground is full and he doesn’t want us to do the same to his holding tank. You question the business decision of sending away 50 potential customers, and sending them away mad. The sodas and ice cream he would have sold would go a long way toward paying for a visit from the honeywagon.

So we pack up quickly and cover the final half-hour to Good Old Days Resort, whose owners were good enough to let us park there and are happy to have us raising a glass to them, and another good day on the river.

Segment 2: CTH O to Packwaukee

Dirty Kettle

Google map

Launch: Landing at CTH O bridge

Takeout: CTH D landing, Packwaukee

Distance: 12.5 miles
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We reassemble at County O three weeks later to paddle the 12.8 miles to Packwaukee and Buffalo Lake. Our number has dipped to 40, still more than we anticipated at our winter planning meetings.

In this stretch, marshes line the banks. The predominant residents are cranes and great blue herons.

Shortly after we launch, a pair of bald eagles fly over the river, locking their talons in what appears to be playfulness.

The marshes south of Endeavor produced wiregrass, which was harvested throughout the mid-20th century to make rugs. Parts of the wetlands were drained to create muck farms that today grow a substantial crop of mint and Christmas trees.

This paddle is followed by a drum ceremony by re-enactor “Dirty Kettle.” We bless our instruments with tobacco, give thanks to the earth and pound out ancient rhythms.

Segment 2 map

Segment 1: Portage to CTH O

What follows are re-edited versions of columns by freelance nature writer David Horst that originally appeared in The Post-Crescent – the daily newspaper in Appleton, Wis. – during the spring and summer of 2010.

The Journey begins
Three paddle trips, three different faces of the Upper Fox River.
I’ve been involved with a group that planned a series of paddle trips covering most of the Fox, collectively called Fox River Heritage Paddle 2010. After three of the 12 segments, I can tell you, it’s not the Fox River we’re used to up in the Fox Cities.

Launch: Indian Agency House, Portage

Takeout: Landing at CTH O bridge

Distance: 10.7 miles
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Google map

For the first leg of our journey, we are to depart from Portage, the connecting point – almost – for the Fox and Wisconsin rivers. Forty-seven paddlers turn out to journey the 10.7 miles to the landing at Marquette County Highway O. 

Traveling from Hortonville, rain pelts the windshield of my truck. I’m convinced the forecast for storms and lightening will prove correct and I’m driving an hour and a half for nothing.

But the rains stop in advance of the launch and we see no more than an intermittent drizzle.

The paddlers – couples and older guys and strapping youngsters – unload canoes of Fiberglas and aluminum, plastic kayaks, skin kayaks, wooden kayaks and a stand-up “Yak.” They fill the 16-seat voyageur canoe that leads us throughout these 120 miles of rediscovery.

Up here (up river, though geographically to the south) the Fox River is not all industry and houses that make the Fox Cities tax assessors so happy. In this section, the Fox is a country stream, lined with farm fields and fishing shacks and rarely running more than a couple of feet deep. Crane music accompanies us much of the way.

Mark Hoffman photo

Some among us appoint themselves to trash detail, relieving the river of various bottles and buckets, a duck decoy and a television set, which a kayaker with a flair for the ridiculous bungies to the front of his boat.

At Governor’s Bend Park we face the entirety of the Fox River’s rapids – a little chute that wouldn’t warrant a rating but delivers a little rush of fun. While the lower Fox drops nearly the height of Niagara Falls from Lake Winnebago to Green Bay, its whitewater was harnessed by a system of locks and dams more than a century ago.

We pass under the County O bridge and beach on the muddy bank. From there we get our first presentation on the history that flows with the river – a reading of pioneering environmentalist John Muir’s boyhood remembrances at John Muir Park.

Segment 1 map

Intro: A Journey of Rediscovery

In the spring and summer of 2010, a group of advocates for public access to the Fox River organized a series of kayak and canoe paddling day trips intended to show people the beauty and diverse landscape of the Upper and Lower Fox River – a “Journey of Rediscovery” of the Fox.

Stretching 200 miles through central and northeast Wisconsin from Portage to Green Bay, the Fox flows south to north through wetlands and agricultural fields, past rural retreats and million-dollar homes, through historic villages and industrial cities. To make the paddles as accessible as possible for paddlers of all ages and skill levels, the organizers excluded areas of open water and tough portages. The result was 12 segments over nine weekends covering 120 miles of the Fox River.

People responded. An average of 63 paddlers participated per event with 424 different people taking part in at least one segment and three people completing all 12.

Many of the paddles were followed by presentations on local culture or history. One such program early on featured Ottawa medicine woman Jackie Red-Woman. She told of the power of her carving of a turtle. Placed upside-down, she said, the turtle would divert bad weather around us. Despite forecasts of rain or thundershowers for nearly every segment, none was canceled by weather. We wish you the protection of the turtle as you pursue your own Journey of Rediscovery on the Fox.