Arkansas Canoe Club Forums

My cousin says that my Grandfather and uncle built a boat and paddled up the Arkansaw River to Colorado from the Little Rock area. He lived in Hazen, Arkansaw from 1904 to 1910. Is it possible to paddle upstream to Colorado. I can't seem to find much info on paddling the Arkansaw River.

Thanks
OutaAmmo

There's a lot more dams, now. Don't see why it wouldn't have been possible.

I do not know the exact spot but somewhere close to the KS CO state line the Arkansas River runs pretty much runs dry. There is a COE lake there at Hasty CO where I some times camp. By the time the Arkansas River runs into that lake it is pretty much a little stream not much of a river unless there is a flood somewhere upstream.

I know when I cross over the river bed at Dodge City KS and head south to Oklahoma, all I see is grass in the river bed. No running water just grass.

I do not know when the river re creates itself but it has to be some where east of Dodge City KS.

No reason not to believe that they could not have pulled it off if they had the time and no commitments anywhere. The McClellan-Kerr navigation system did not start construction until 1963 and was completed in 1969.

According to Wikipedia, the river still flowed through Kansas until the early 1940's until pumping of groundwater in eastern Colorado and western Kansas began to deplete the flow.

"Water flow in the Arkansas River (as measured in central Kansas) has dropped from approximately 248 cubic feet per second (7 m³/s) average from 1944-1963 to 53 cubic feet per second (1.5 m³/s) average from 1984–2003, largely because of the pumping of groundwater for irrigation in eastern Colorado and western Kansas."

Obviously, they would have had to work around fluctuating water levels with regards to rainfall at certain times of the year. Rough estimate of mileage would be 800 miles or so just to make the Colorado state line makes it possible.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkansas_River" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;