Quinebaug River Putnam to Pomfret
Details
Requirements:
- PFD, 10-foot length of rope and whistle. You must have your PFD on and fully fastened to participate in this event.
- Be prepared to give your emergency contact number to the host if he or she asks for it.
- Event start time is in your boat, in the water, and ready to paddle!
Please be considerate: be on time (in the water and ready to depart!) and cancel if you aren't able to come. Everyone must meet at the put-in and shuttles will be arranged. Please be early if possible!
We will put in at Simonzi Park in Putnam. (82 Kennedy Drive, Putnam, CT in your GPS will get you close). It's near the intersection of Kennedy Drive and Canal Street.
From Route 395: Take exit 95 for Kennedy Drive toward Putnam. Head west for.9 mile to the paved parking area on the left across from Canal Street. From Route 44: turn south on Kennedy Drive in Putnam and head .5 mile to the paved parking area on the right across from Canal Street.
We will paddle from there about 6 miles downstream to the take out at Cotton Bridge Road, Pomfret Center. It will take about two hours.
From the paddle guide noted below:
The trip to Route 101 is 5.9 miles long with current, some quick-water and flat-water, but no portages. It is an excellent two-hour outing for paddlers who are comfortable with moving water. At high flows the current is strong and spans the river. The riverbed slopes gently and there aren’t many big rocks, so there are few eddies or waves. If you launch from Putnam with moderate and higher flows, be ready for a stretch of quickwater right away. With good flows, the current will do a lot of the work almost all the way to Cotton Bridge, but you will need to watch for turbulence and strainers (partially submerged trees and branches). The first mile and a half parallels Kennedy Drive and Interstate 395, but even with cars and trucks in sight, it’s surprisingly quiet and peaceful. There are few houses and businesses once you paddle away from 395. This is pleasant and beautiful paddling. At River Mile 35.9, watch on river right for a small man-made inlet and a monolithic curiosity left over from a never-completed hydro dam: a freestanding stone wall with three round holes, each about 12 feet in diameter. Farther along, you may catch sight of an abandoned cabin along the way. On the river bottom, look for remnants of Native American fish weirs, visible as cobbles arranged on the river bottom. Historians have documented weirs in Killingly and downriver.
For more information about this and other sections of the Quinebaug River Water Trail see: http://www.americantrails.org/NRTDatabase/trailDocuments/3846_52_QuinebaugRiverPaddleGuide2012.pdf