Delaware River Trip - 6/22/15 to 6/24/15 Hancock,NY to Lackawaxen, PA with my wife

In 2014, my wife and I did an overnight trip in the Delaware Water Gap.  So this would be a different experience as there is faster moving water and it is much more private especially during the week..

The river agenda was planned as follows:

6/22 - Drive to the drop off point at Buckingham, PA
6/22 - Camp at Soaring Eagle Camp Ground in Stalker, PA (~13 river miles)
6/23 - Camp at Narrowsburg Camp Ground in Narrowsburg, PA (~22 river miles)
6/24 - Arrive at The Roebling Inn in Lackawaxen, PA (~12 river miles)

So we would travel about 47 miles over the trip which is very modest.

Day 1

The trip up the drop off point was uneventful.  I had utilized the Buckingham access point in 2013 and it is a very convenient ramp.  You can get right down to the water as it has a full ramp.  We pulled down and then loaded up the boats.   We said our good byes to the girls and off we went.

The river was at a nice level as it had recently rained although it was brown with sediment.  When it has not rained for a while you can see down 4 to 5 feet along Delaware from the upper Delaware through the lower section of the river near Trenton, NJ.  I think the river was moving probably between 2 and 3 miles per hr.

As you can see from the photos, it was a beautiful day to paddle on the river.  We passed a waterfall dropping into the river on the left side.  Judy said she could see people standing around it at the top of the waterfall.  I didn't see them, but I did look it up later.   I believe this is Bouchoux Mountain Waterfall which is close to Jensen Ledges.  There are hiking trails to the top that afford great views of the river from the high ledges.  Note to self that it would be great stopping point to do a hike to the top to check out the view.

It didn't seem like much work to get down to our camp site at Soaring Eagle Campgrounds.  I really like this campground since as I mentioned before it has little cove to pull the boats up and is very well maintained.   Very clean bathrooms for the ladies and the owners are very down to earth.  I has a larger percentage of permanent, laid back residents.  I've never had a problem noise on any of my stays.

Judy and I setup camp.  I always try to get the one closest to the cover to minimize the distance that we have to move the boats or carry gear.  There is never any problem during the week, but I can't comment on weekends.

You can see the cover and Kellams bridge in the background of the photo below.    Kellams bridge was built in 1889 and is the 3rd oldest still spanning the river.  It is single lane with metal deck.  It is pretty noisy when cars go over in the middle of the night.

I had prepaid for our stay and picked up a stack of firewood as well.  We were $10 each and $6 for the wood.  Pretty economical.

Judy was relaxing by the fire.  We didn't have any problems with mosquitoes and the weather was very pleasant.  Judy is sitting enjoying the fire...she's pretty isn't she.

After we setup the camp, we decided to get a closer look at the bridge.  I never got around to this on my previous stays.

It was a very short walk up to the bridge but well worth it.  I wanted to walk across but the boss said no since there would not be much room if a car was crossing the bridge.  I'll have to do that the next time when I am not supervised.


It really is a cool old bridge.  I'm glad they rehabilitated it in 1990 instead of tearing it down.  I read on line that is one of few remaining short span wire suspension bridges remaining in the state.

I did go on the bridge 30 feet or so even with the objections to get a couple of pictures.   Really nice view.  Someone would not let me go on far enough to get a picture of our campsite from the bridge.

On the way back, there was a deer on the road that grunted at us before running off into the woods.  I guess that we were intruding.

We headed back to camp for the night and took it easy for the rest of the night.












Day 2

The second day was going to be more exciting as we would be going through the best known rapids on the Delaware...Skinners Falls.

We had nice breakfast.  The new french coffee press was a real winner for us.  I enjoyed the fresh brew immensely.  Hot coffee while camping is just one of the pleasures that one must have.

  After packing up the boats, replenishing the water supplies, and hitting the head, we started down the river.  We had 22 miles to go so I was not completely sure that we could make the trip as Judy was not used to paddling a lot, however, she looks really good in a kayak.

The weather was overcast and we were caught in a major rain storm.   We pulled off to the edge of the river as I was going to get us out of the boats at the first sign of lightening.  I could see a cottage up through the Japanese Knotweed that has taken over the banks of the river in many places along the upper Delaware including the islands.  This is an invasive species that is detrimental to the river ecosystem.  It grows really thick along the river and people hack through to create access points.   I was just about to pull the boats out and run up to a porch on one of the houses (trespassing or not) when the rain blew over and we were able to continue on down the river.

We went through Skinners Falls without incident.  I distracted Judy from the warning sign advising that we scout the rapids before attempting them so she just followed me through without issue.  She will not admit it, but I think she liked it.

The picture to the left is one of the 10 or so Bald Eagles that we saw on our trip.  I will not say how many Judy spotted first as it is a bit embarrassing.

Overall, the rest of the day went well.  Just as we were getting to the Narrowsburg campground, Judy hit a rock and was dumped out of the boat.  We went over to the side and pumped out the water.  Ironically, we were only about 100 yards from the campground access point.

Since it was during the week, the campground was basically empty.  We checked in and sorted where we left the boats.  I gave one of the workers 5 bucks to let us load everything in one of their vans to transport to the campsite.    We paid a little extra to stay in a lean-to since there still was a threat of storms passing over.  I don't remember the cost difference but it was not significant, but overall the campground was fairly expensive at over $50 for the night.

Overall, the campground was nice.  However, it really is not conducive to kayak campers as while you can see all the campsites before the pull out, the embankment is steep and probable 20 to 30 feet above the river.  It is a long distance from the pullout to one of the shaded sites.   Once you get to them, the shaded sites are very nice.  There are a few open sites that are near the public access point but these are completely in the open which we didn't want due to the potential for bad weather.   I can't comment on what it is like during the weekend.  

We had hot showers and cleaned up after setting up our sleeping area.  We took the short walk up to town to look for food and drink.  We walked up to town and then basically went over railroad tracks and back the direction that we came from.  We found a grocery store, package store and a nice place to eat (Nora's Lovin Spoonful).    We had nice dinner at Nora's and picked something from package store.

After dinner, we enjoyed short walk home and had a beverage or two and retired for the evening.  The next day we have breakfast at Nora's.  We saved a lot of time by just cutting directly across the railroad tracks to Nora's.  Food was very good home style food.  We chatted with the workers and patrons about Eel Weirs...interesting discussion.  The waitress was one of only 9 people with permits only the rivers.


Day 3

After breakfast we headed back and made numerous trips to load up the boats.  We only had 12 miles to go so I didn't have much urgency to get going.

Judy was nervous as she got a map that showed we were going through 4 set of named rapids.   Since she had hit the water on the previous day, I was particularly careful to choose a good line through the rapids.  I believe this to be one of the fastest sections of the river.  We did enjoy seeing some more eagles, but I was amazed at how quickly we got down to Ascalona Campground where I had stayed in 2013.   This basically meant we where at out stopping point.  I paddled ahead to get some time to the figure best way to pull out the boats.

We arrived at the Roebling Inn.  They have a nice sitting area by the river.  I pulled the boats in and went to check in.  Judy and I debated whether it would be better to go back to the access point to pull the boats in or just pull them up the embankment.  The road is narrow there so in the end, I put on our flashers and we just loaded up there.







Roebling Inn

We spend the next 2 nights at the Roebling in.  This was our first B&B and we really enjoyed it.   The owners were excellent hosts.  We had dinner down in Barryville, NY, but it was just average.

The next day we toured a revolutionary war battlefield at Minisink and later in the day we drove up to Bethel, NY which was the site of the Woodstock concert.  It was only about hour and 1/2 away.  Very nice drive through the countryside.   On the way back we stopped in Narrowsburg for dinner at The Heron.  The Heron was great.  We sat on the deck overlooking the river and enjoyed nice dinner and a flight of ciders.  They had NY state pear cider that I thought was absolutely fabulous.

Overall, we had a great trip.  I'll plan another but I think the upper Delaware might be more than Judy would care to do again.

Happy Paddling