Cruising Clifton and Prairie Channels

B~C":849loje8 said:
NO, go on, very interesting
Click to expand...
OK, here's a little more. That fuel depot at Three Tree had a bunkhouse and some other infrastructure, up the hill from the cove just downstream from the point, now covered with brush, but you can find an old boiler in there, among the stinging nettles. The fuel tanks were somewhere in that area, also, camo'ed and under the trees. They ran their fuel lines over to the point proper, which sticks right out into the river flow, and is quite deep there.

All that is hearsay from a guy who put me onto that site, so could be some of it is incorrect. There is a double line of pilings in that cove, so I'm sure there was some sort of access there. There is a flat spot where the nettles are -- good camping. Also, some folks tie up below Three Tree and fish there for sturgeon.

If you gunkhole the WA shoreline along in there at low water, you will see several locations where pilings indicate the sites of old structures. I believe there were fish wheels in some of them. In some of the creek bed riparian zones are probably old Cathlamet/Skamokawa native sites. Looked to me like some had been potholed. Too bad.

As to the islands, many folks make day use of the sandy beaches on Jim Crow Sands (opposite and downstream of JC Point), and similarly on the N side of Woody Island. These are a function of where and when the Corps places dredge spoils. They place material on the river side of Welch pretty regularly, and have in the last year or so added another 30 feet vertically to "Lark," which is that bit of State land upstream of Tenasillahee. Both of these are substantially larger than what the chart shows.

You can also visit Miller Sands Spit, which is the arcuate deposit running on the channel side of MS (poorly charted). Right now, there are about 100 goose nests (the Feds did a survey yesterday) on it, but later you wold not disturb the geese. Rice Island, across the channel from MS Spit, is a good stopover, providing a freighter wake does not nail you. It also has goose nests right now. Great beaches on Rice.

Enough for now.
 
Well, no wonder we ran into the Corps of Discovery in Knappa Slough on our trip. We were there on the 200th anniversary, March 24, 2006, and saw them just west of the Knappa Landing.

Corps_of_Discovery.thumb.jpg
 
By the way, thank you for all the history. I sure wish we could have joined you all on the trip last weekend. It must have looked so cool all those C-Dorys cruising through there.

Dee
 
Thanks to Chuck here is the thread (pg 3 of this thread) on the history of the channels. Sorry to hear you can't be at the gathering this year Chuck. Wow, 8 boats took the channel last year! We started this thread before our trip and looking at it again today reminded me of all of the folks that helped make this thread a great resource for anyone who wants to take this little side trip.

Thanks,

Don
 
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