By Matthew Fallow                

We had boated the Hunter River as far as the low level timber bridge a couple of years ago, this was relaxing boating. Wondering what lay above it, as the river narrowed and made it's way through the Hunter Valley towards Scone had always interested me. A phone call from new member Ryan was all it took "where could we go?" Next morning we were alongside the low level Melville Ford Bridge at Aberglasslyn looking for a place to launch off the river bank. A clean sandy bottom greeted us with barely a foot of water in the deepest parts, this was to become the norm.

 

We headed upstream into the sun, this combined with low flow (and high wind) made it difficult to read the river as it braided it's way up into the valley. It was not long before we were high and dry having chosen the wrong path and run out of water. The clean sandy bottom is very deceptive, although it makes for great scenery this does not balance the fact that it stops you very quickly. From a clean plane at 3200rpm to stop in about 2meters!! So if you do make a wrong choice and run out of water, you cannot simply jump across the bar to boatable water. The right decisions must be made or a hard push (preceded by very rapid deceleration!) is in order. After another push and about an hour of great boating we came across an old timber causeway bridge partially buried in the river, there was just enough water and room to idle through the wreckage before we were off again. For only about 100m as it happened, as we ran aground having taken to the wrong river bank. With the prospect off a very long push we emptied our boat of all people and backed Ryan snug into the bank and under a over hanging tree, he had about 4m of water in a hole barely 1m wide to get on the plane. He did in a flurry of water and sand and we met him towards the other bank where he picked us up mid stream. Another ½ hour upstream and it was time to head home, however the sun was now behind us. This created much easier boating conditions and we could now clearly see the sand banks, channels and different water colors. The trip back was significantly faster and was without wet feet as we cheekily explored a few narrow channels back to the trailer.
This was a great day out, and with at least another 120km of river yet to explore I am sure we will be back.