Arkansas Canoe Club Forums

Hi everone. Has anyone thru-paddle Bayou Bartholomew? Are there any other folks interested in long thru-paddles? NFCT, Mississippi river, accross Canada, etc...?
Thanks, Lagerdom

Sorry, I just saw this. I recently did a several day paddle on the lower White River. It was very nice. Since Bayou Bart. Is the longest Bayou in the world, it is certainly tempting to paddle its length. It would be a difficult trip though, since very little has been actually developed as trail. I have explored accesses there with that long distances in mind and with the idea of developing more of it, however, a lot of exploration needs to be done. There is a lot of private land that it flows through, so accesses need to be scoped out, and there are some reported big log jams. Still, would be a very cool trip.

i have paddled the jefferson county portion and working on the lincoln county portion.i'm almost to star city. access are tricky and a chain saw would be helpful. i normally go in early spring before the snakes get bad. if you want to go hit me up. it has to be a small group do to limited parking.


robrt

I see this thread hasn't been active for a few years. I'm moving to Louisiana in a week with grand ideas of paddling all over the area. Bayou Bartholomew is one of those areas I want to learn. I hope that as I learn the area I can make an attempt to thru paddle the bayou. Are there any clubs/organizations/alliances/coalitions etc. that are attempting to clean up the Bayou with the idea of thru paddling or making more access in general? I haven't been able to find anything "recent".

We'll see how my grand plans fold out in the upcoming years.

A long trip through privately owned lands presents a challenge. Unless a corridor has been established, there is the basic problems of access and trespassing issues, so resupplying and support are hard. The Arkansas Water Trails are floats worth investigating. There are a couple in the Felsenthal NWR in Arkansas and the Upper Ouachita NWR is downstream in Louisiana. Both are government reserves, so the only worry is access. Research may help you to get resources. State tourism agencies can be a starting point. I've collected paddling handouts at the LA. welcome center west of Vicksburg; for the northeast region of LA.