Take to the Waters
Kentucky rivers and streams offer paddlers plenty of options

A large brown-and-yellow sign at Licking River Canoe Rental near Falmouth, Kentucky greets prospective paddlers with a pun “Canoe Come Out and Play?” And if you’re up for trading city noise and work stress for an exciting rush dodging rocks down a rapid-filled stream, or a peaceful afternoon’s float on quiet waters through a green tunnel of sycamores and cedars with water birds, fish, turtles and the occasional deer as your only witnesses, your answer should be a definite “yes.”

There’s no better place to make that escape for a few hours, a day or a weekend than in Kentucky, where 54,000 miles of streams and rivers number more than those of any other state except Alaska. Nine of its rivers are designated wild, with protected, unspoiled shorelines and wilderness views. These include parts of the Rockcastle, which offers one of the most popular whitewater canoe runs in the eastern U.S., Red, Cumberland, Big South Fork, and the Green, in Mammoth Cave National Park. Each has its own personality.

“When the water’s right, Kentucky offers the best paddling opportunities anywhere on the planet,” says Jim Thaxton, owner of Licking River Canoe Rental and executive director of the Professional Paddlesports Association (PPA), an international trade association representing the interests of commercial paddlesports. “In Kentucky, you can paddle whitewater. You can paddle a swamp. You can have a lake experience. You have Class I rivers (like the Licking), Class II and III like Elkhorn Creek, right on up to Class V, VI.”

His son James, who manages the family-run canoe livery, agrees. “It’s great to be able to go out and do some flat water, then to drive just two to three hours away and do some serious, adrenaline-pumping downhill paddling,” he says.

Most liveries follow the same standard procedures in renting canoes as the Thaxtons, who’ve offered float trips on the main Licking River, its South and Middle forks since 1979. Many liveries offer guides and have cabins or primitive campsites available for overnight stays. All require signing a liability release form. The majority of rental customers are families and beginning renters, says Amanda Ellis, of Sheltowee Trace Outfitters in Whitley City. “They usually do fine. It’s an easy sport to pick up.”

Safety considerations include wearing sunblock, a lifejacket, shoes and suitable clothing for the weather, carrying ample drinking water, making sure a stream classification doesn’t exceed your abilities, calling first to check on weather and water conditions and perhaps taking a lesson from a local college, outfitter or paddling club, such as Louisville’s Viking Canoe Club, Elkhorn Paddlers in Georgetown and the Bluegrass Wildwater Affiliation in Lexington.

Exquisite scenery is the order of the day along Kentucky’s waterways, where wildlife can include water birds such as great blue herons, kingfishers and ducks, along with coyotes, foxes, rabbits, beavers, muskrats and enough stream stock to keep fishermen ecstatic.

“We see more wild turkeys than any other bird, and lots of deer,” says Dennis Meffert, whose Barren River Canoe Rentals in Bowling Green offers self-guided paddling on the Barren, and on the Green and Nolin in Mammoth Cave National Park. “You don’t see anything but wilderness.”

Within the Park’s boundaries, Mammoth Cave Canoe & Kayak’s trips range from three hours to ten days. And you can stay with owners Larry and Becky Bull at their Wayfarer Bed and Breakfast, right across the road from the canoe rental.

Chris French, who with his wife Amy owns Tradewater Station, a canoe livery in West Kentucky’s Dawson Springs, helps cook breakfast, lunch and dinner part time at his Tradewater Cafe. Retracing a once busy turn-of-the-century canoe trail on the Tradewater River, their journey features a great blue heron rookery and winds past such lore-laden natural formations as Lovers Leap, Graffiti Cliff – where businesses in the spa town once would advertise – and the Devil’s Dining Table, a huge stone whose legend bespeaks the origin of the river’s name.

Like most livery owners, Mike Daugherty of Green River Canoes in Campbellsville is fiercely loyal to his home waterway, especially 14-mile “Roachville Run,” with its 200-year-old river crossing, bridge near a Civil War battle site and waterfall visible only from a canoe. “I’d put this particular run up against any other in the state,” he says. “It’s remote with very little development, clean water and great fishing.”

Servicing the Cumberland in Daniel Boone National Forest and Big South Fork in the nation’s newest National Park, Sheltowee Trace offers both challenging whitewater and easy floats. One of its take-outs is near 68-foot Cumberland Falls, and one half-day trip begins at the old mining town of Blue Heron, now a Park Service interpretive center.

“People today are seeking opportunities to commune with nature,” says Jim Thorton, “but it’s becoming harder to find what can approach a wilderness experience. When you’re on the river, even if you’re close to a farmer’s house or a river camp, when you go around a bend, the rivershed may look just like it did when Simon Kenton or Daniel Boone were on these waters.”

Known as one of the 10 best small-mouth bass streams in the country, Central Kentucky’s Elkhorn Creek was one of the water sources that lured early settlers to stay in the Bluegrass. Its middle fork, called Town Branch, runs under Lexington. Walt Whitman even mentioned it in his classic, Leaves of Grass.

If you’re looking to paddle the Elkhorn, head to Canoe Kentucky in tiny Peaks Mill, just north of Frankfort. Owned by Ed Councill, who like Jim Thaxton, is a rabid paddling enthusiast and activist, Canoe Kentucky is a family business, whose other arms are the Kentucky Outdoor Center, a well-stocked paddlesports shop in an old woolen mill nearby at Forks of Elkhorn, and Blue Grass Canoes, for which Ed annually has cranked out about 100 of the “only commercially- built canoes in Kentucky” since 1994. Daughter Allison manages the livery.

Slow business during a “mini-drought” in the early 90’s inspired him to create Canoe Kentucky franchises, or outposts, across the state. According to Councill, who serves as president of the stream-preserving Elkhorn Land & Historic Trust, spreading paddlers statewide keeps from crowding the Elkhorn with canoes and destroying the “psychological space” people come to the water to find.

“I don’t plan to destroy the wilderness ambience,” he says. “That’s absolutely sacrosanct.”

At Canoe Kentucky, moonlight groups can have burgers and dogs or a full meal catered by a Frankfort restaurant and paddle to a covered bridge. “You can see glow worms and fireflies on the banks,” Councill explains. “And the full moon’s rays piercing through the trees sprinkle their beams on you. It’s magic!”

Both Thaxton’s and Canoe Kentucky can accommodate paddlers all year. Though May to October is generally peak season, an autumn paddle can bring you up close to vibrant fall leaf colors. And adventurers who come out in the winter will find “air so cold you can hear a chipmunk breathe,” says Councill, as well as an expanded bank vista due to the lack of leaves on trees, and clear, emerald green water.

“You’re by yourself and you’re with Mother Nature, and when you’re working in harmony, it’s one heck of a fun trip any day,” says Councill, waxing eloquent on the joys of canoeing. “Around every bend is a whole new vista, a whole new experience, a whole new challenge, and you don’t know what it’s going to be.

“For me, the most rewarding part of the business is seeing people discover that for the first time,” he says. “It makes my day and makes it worth doing again and again and again.”

To contact these canoe liveries, visit the PPA website at www.propaddle.com.

Katherine Tandy Brown is a staff writer for The Lane Report.
kathybrown@lanereport.com

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