Cadron Creek

[Charlie Ford]

Does anybody know what the real name of the highway or road that the put in is on for the 3.5 mile float. We went on friday and put in at the 124 bridge, and got off the creek at 9:30. We luckily found some people that lived on the creek that gave us a ride. I can't say that I'm a fan of paddling at night.

[Zach]

It is Pinnacle Springs Rd. but it may be called something else where it crosses Hwy 65.

Basically when you get on Hwy 65 from the take-out, head north and take your first right. May be called Old Hwy 65. Follow this till the first right again, this is Pinnacle Springs.

If you take the second Right while heading north on 65 you get to Pinnacle Springs also, but is a little longer.

Either way, you should be going about a mile for the first right or a mile and a half for the second right. Total distance should be under 3 miles from the take out up to the put in. If the put-in is taking you 10 or 15 miles to get to, you're going to the wrong one.

[Trismegistus]

OR: Pinnacle Springs Road is also known as Highway 310. From the Highway 65 bridge (takeout) go a mile and a half (1.5 miles) and turn right on Old Highway 65. In another half mile (0.5mi) take the first right onto Pinnacle Springs Road/Highway 310. Follow it as it curves the right (south) and goes down the hill to the bridge. Cross bridge. Park on left (east) side of road taking care not to block the gate.

[N. Henderson]

That isn't all of the story, is it Charlie??? I heard something about Dirty Phil, powerlines, lost paddles, and racoon-watchers, etc. etc.?

[Trismegistus]

Bring it on -- nothing like a late night river walk out to pick our interest....

[Jim Krueger]

Charlie,

I'm glad everything worked out for you. You're not the first person that has taken a longer trip than you thought, it's happened to me at least once Usually it's not misidentifying the put-in, rather it's troubles along the way that eat up too much time or passing by the take-out without recognizing it... In my case it was a trip on the lower Saline, down to Jenkins Ferry in which the river was terribly low AND I based my understanding on the river by a highway map which didn't do justice to just how long the float really was. It was midnight and fifty fallen tree crossings later when we arrived at the take-out...
The first trip I took my wife to the Cadron on, we floated from near Quitman to CCO, the same stretch as you were on but starting off further upstream. I can only guess ,from the 124 bridge to the 65 bridge, is about 10 more miles than you bargained for. Experiences like these have taught me much about planning and equipment :)

Best Regards
Jim Moose

[Charlie Ford]

Well if you must know the whole story, here it is. After we floated what seemed to be about three miles or so we could here traffic and assumed that it was our bridge, there so happened to be a small wave that we played around on for about thirty minutes and by then the sun was really beginning to drop behind the trees so we decided to go to the bridge and take out. However the bridge was not the right one, I think it was mill road bridge or something like that. Anyway we decided that this must have been highway 310 and we still had an additional three miles. This is when I got nervous, prior experiences on piney told me that we should have taken out here, but against my better judgement my paddling buddies convinced me to carry on. Apparently they are doing some sort of natural gas exploration in the area and have strung some sort of seismic test lines accross the creek, most of them were strung high enough that they caused no problems. However Phil, the most experienced paddler in our crew, felt the need paddle ahead and scout using only the light from his watch. This watch is about as bright as a lightening bug. He hung the T-grip of his paddle on one of the lower seismic lines. Instead of turning over Phil loosed his paddle and it shot upstream like an arrow. Phil begins laughing uncontrolably and then asks me, in my little kayak, if I happened to have an extra paddle stuffed in there somewhere. We then tied Phil's canoe onto one of the other kayaks and continued on. Finally about 9:30pm we saw a light on the creek. Much to our timidness Phil and one of the other guys go to investigate the source of this light. They return to inform us that there was an older couple sitting on their back porch watching the coons play around in their yard. They said that it was about another 5 or 6 hours to our take out in the daytime. They were kind enough to make us coffee, give us a ride to our vehicle, and make us sandwiches. They even told us that we were welcome to come back and put in at their house. After much research on google earth we decided that we floated roughly 9 miles. However I think we are going to attempt the run again today. We are leaving earlier and have better directions to the put in, so hopefully by the time the sun sets we will be off the creek.

[Charlie Ford]

Good news we made with no problems. Nice float might try to do it again next week if the level holds.

[ljasonl]

Yeah, I was there for the first trip. Y'all didn't even see me nearly get sucked under the strainer I hit before I even saw it. Wrapped an arm around an overhanging limb and kept from going under. That was when I came sloshing back upstream on foot yelling 'Hey, don't go left!' haha.
After Phil lost his paddle I was towing him and holding a little LED keychain light in my teeth to see where I was going. Everyone wanted to keep going instead of walk up and check out the lights at the cabin, and I almost agreed because we all still thought the takeout was just around the next bend. Glad I decided to check out the cabin anyways. We would have been floating into the next morning at the rate we were moving.