Late Spring Paddle in the Driftless Region

Join us for a 13.8 mile paddle on the Kickapoo River from Ontario (Bridge 1) to Rockton (Landing 12). The Kickapoo is a beautiful entrenched dendretic river system, with numerous rock faces and ledges against which the river turns and flows. The Kickapoo may also be the oldest river in the world outside of Antarctica.

If you are camping with us at Wildcat Mountain State Park and want to follow us to the put in, we will leave the campsite at 9:00am sharp. We will be reverse shuttling, so you just need to be unloaded and ready to paddle by 10am. We'll have the safety briefing at that time and start launching boats.

Plan on about 5 total hours (at most) on the river with a stop at the Wildcat Landing to eat our packed lunches.
This trip is not ideal for true beginners, but novices are welcome since it is a perfect river on which to hone one's boat handling skills.

Call Drifty's at 608-337-4288 to reserve a canoe or kayak if you need to rent one. Also, if you have a spare boat to lend/rent or would like to borrow a boat, post that in the comments below.

After the paddle, we'll hit the Rockton Bar for dinner.

Be sure to check out the Wildcat Mountain State Park camping event and RSVP on the wisoutdoors.org site if you want to camp. See here: https://www.wisoutdoors.org/event/group-camping-wildcat-mountain-spring-2025/

Check out the Google MyMap detailing all locations and routes for this trip:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=1rZsrEsRnAqR7koVKSEA048TzDNRxXQw&usp=sharing

Check out the Miles Paddled report (including embedded video) on this trip:
https://milespaddled.com/kickapoo-river-i/

As always, failure to comply with State Park or Kickapoo Valley Reserve rules will result in your removal from FVK.