Canoeing the Colo River

A two day canoe trip on the Colo River NSW .
Poling, paddling and some rapids. Due to thick bush, portaging around rapids was impossible.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• canoe
• colo
• river
• poling
• paddling
• whitewater
• rapids
• bush
• old-
• town
• penobscot
• 164
• australia

[winterka100]

I used to enjoy taking my 11ft. jetboat up as far as the rapids and stay the night.It took about 40 minutes each way for the trip.It wasn't uncommon to be speeding along in 3 inches of water. Of course we took plenty of rope to drag the boat off the occasional sandbank at the end of dead end tracts in the river.One of my favourite places.

[cmir1]

@winterka100 , That sounds like an awesome trip. It would be great to jet boat up and over the rapids when in full flood! It too is one of my favorite places, and I learnt to navigate the land as a young man while bushwalking in the area.

Cheers Chris.

[MrMarcooda]

Can you give a GR on topo map where you got up too?

[cmir1]

@MrMarcooda . Hi, on this trip we got to Maille's Cave on another trip we got to Kings Rapids. I will post the GR soon.

[cmir1]

@MrMarcooda , can't get a grid reference but it is about 27 Kms upstream of upper colo bridge.

[MurphyBorder]

Great trip, Great video. thanks for sharing!

Thinking of getting a Penobscot 164 this vid makes them look great.

[cmir1]

@MurphyBorder , Thanks the penob is a great tripping boat, it is fast and efficient. It is not however ideally suited to white water as it can be a bit of a beast to turn. As a general purpose boat it is excellent. If you can specify your needs, I can tell you if The penobscott would suit you. Cheers Chris.

[nonstoptom]

Great sights and sounds. Makes me want to get offline and get out there!

[Rennfaultier]

Great trip!

Makes want to escape the alpine winter and go straight to OZ!!

[MGoose66]

We took our boats (various incl inflatables) from Glen Davis to Upper Colo in the eighties... but needless to say, there was plenty of walking (and quicksand)... about 4 days I recall...

[winterka100]

@cmir1 Thanks for the inspiring reply. I'm going to get my boat back to it's old self again (after 10 years of non use) and get back into it. Just as a sideline, I couldn't help but smile when we would go zipping past canoes being dragged by ropes (not deep enough for poling} I suspect maybe they might wish that we should crash for not doing it the greeny? way.

[FatPaddler]

Great video, love the rapids sections! Am going to investigate and maybe get my Mad River canoe up there for a bump! Thx for sharing. :)

[MurphyBorder]

@cmir1 Thanks, i will be using it mostly on slow moving rivers (norfolk broads and south suffolk rivers in England) , sometimes solo sometimes 2up and hopefully after a while maybe some longer trips.

(been looking at getting a "real" canoe for 4-5 years and have pretty much decided the penobscot would best suit me...been using an inflatable stearns backcountry for the last 3 years)