Gusto and Helpdesk made a long overdue trip back to the Edisto River. This time we stayed at Colleton State Park in the only camper cabin in the park. The park is relatively small but very nicely laid out. The cabin was simple but clean and had plenty of room for two paddlers. We discovered that the cabin used to function as a picnic shelter. At some point it was closed in to make the current cabin. There was no restroom or indoor plumbing. We used the campground bathhouse for those needs. However, there was a small refrigerator, microwave, coffee maker and an outside water spigot.
Camper Cabin
Path to a small beach area where we launched from
Gusto and Helpdesk did have a bit of a communication breakdown on equipment. Helpdesk had our touring boats in mind and missed the fact that Gusto didn't have his touring boat handy so he was planning to bring his smaller recreation 10 foot boat. It was a bit of a surprise to both of us that we missed this important detail. We both questioned each others responses to things like the best way to transport the boats etc. It's a different approach depending on the boat and even with the unusual answers to each other it was still missed. Most likely it was Helpdesk that missed the detail here.
As you can see there is a significant different in the length of the boats and how efficient they are on the water.
We arrived before noon on Friday December 2nd. Luckily we were able to check in early and get our gear stored away. We had plenty of time for a short paddle and decided to just paddle upstream vs driving up and having to shuttle back to get a vehicle. We paddled a few miles up stream and got a good appreciation of the downstream current. It was a nice afternoon workout for sure.
Later in the evening we worked out a deal to leave a vehicle overnight at Givhans Ferry State Park , our destination on Saturday.
We got started early on Saturday Morning and with the help of the current were able to easily set a pace of ~ 4.4 miles per hour on average. The weather was excellent, cool but not cold, and the sun broke through the high clouds around mid morning. The sun warmed things up nicely and we both had to shed a layer midway through the paddle.
Gusto found this hornets nest close to the river at Colleton State Park
The trip as captured on multiple GPS devices but not all of them were started at the same time. The paper maps indicated a 22 mile trip. However, the system that Helpdesk started as close to the beginning as possible measured 23.1 miles. All devices agreed on the moving average of 4.4 MPH. Above is the track from a Samsung phone. That information was also uploaded to AllTrails below. This is an interactive map that you can zoom in on and change the map data to satellite, topo, etc.
