French Broad River (section 8)

We often paddle the section of the French Broad river between Marshall, NC and Barnard – particularly when we take the dog along.  We don’t normally put it on the blog here, but we thought we’d share this one because Trout invented a new way to sit in a kayak.

Trout in the Kayak
Trout in the Kayak

What’s happening here?  We don’t really know.  Obviously sideways is not the way to do this but Trout was feeling creative.     There are an assortment of small rapids in the section of the river, most of them class II on the whitewater scale so that when the dog leaps out in the middle of one it’s not too difficult to get him back in the boat.   None of these rapids are big enough to have names so we’ve christened a few of them on our own. 

Trout Beach
Trout Beach

One of those is Trout Beach with is about a mile or so downstream from the Marshall dam.  There is a river-wide ledge with a sandy beach below it on river right.  We almost always stop here for a swim and to let the dog run around a bit.