July 19 - North Fork and Edisto River - Kill Kare to Hwy 21

The dog days of summer are here and most of the rivers have turned into long, skinny lakes. Very little water is falling from the sky to keep the our rivers full and moving, but it is going to take more than a drought to keep this duo from finding a nice stretch of river to paddle. In most cases, there isn’t much help from the current, so we are keeping our trips shorter than usual. And with all of the hazards low water can present, we haven’t been seeking out unknown stretches to run. We have been spending most weekends close to home, paddling familiar waters. We won’t bore you with those details.

But we got a message from one of our paddling friends, turning us on to a monthly paddling on the Edisto River event sponsored by the Bamberg County Chamber of Commerce. We are not usually big on paddling in groups (so we can have the freedom to move at our own pace) and the water was frighteningly low on the Edisto (192 cfs on the North Fork and about 480 on the main stem), but we figured it must be passable if the Chamber of Commerce was going to put people out there. There is information on the Chamber website if you are interested.

The plan for the day was to go from Kill Kare Landing down to Zig Zag Landing. After doing some research, we decided to stretch out our trip and go all the way down to Hwy 21. Using the information on the Friends of the Edisto website http://www.edistofriends.org/edisto-river/access-boating-edisto-river we figured that the run to Zig Zag should be about 6 miles and Hwy 21 should be about 9 miles more. We are here to tell you that the mileage on this website is wrong. Mileage from Kill Kare to Zig Zag is more like 9.5 miles. Mileage from Kill Kare to Hwy 21 is about 15.5 miles.

We arrived on the banks of the North Fork of the Edisto River at Kill Kare at 9:00 and the rest of the paddling group arrived about 45 minutes later. They decided to set shuttle before the paddle (which was 40 minutes round-trip), so we decided to go ahead and take off on our own. We had been assured that there were no portage situations, but within the first ¼ mile, we had three. Luckily, those were the only three for our entire trip. The portages were very manageable and did not require us having to completely unpack the boat. The portages had dampened our spirits a bit, but we were on our way and started feeling better when we saw a Swallow-tailed Kite and even got some decent pictures. This year, we have paddled down the Edisto for three days and have seen a Kite every one of those days.

Swallow Tailed Kite

The water was moving, and even moving swiftly in some sections. The confluence with the South Fork came at about 2.2 miles and the river immediately opened up and the amount of water under us doubled.

Looking back at the confluence. The water isn't cloudy; that's just how shallow it is.

Abandoned train bridge just below the confluence

We passed under the Hwy 78 bridge at mile 6.2.

Part of the draw of the Edisto is its “wild” feel. There are several houses along your way, which reminds you that you aren’t ever far away from civilization, but you can literally witness the changing of the river. All along the way, you can see old bends in the river that have been closed off as the river finds a more efficient route (called “abandoned oxbows”). In other places, existing curves are getting even curvier.

The mouth of an abandoned oxbow. The clearing up the middle is the old river bed

We were a little concerned about a section of the river where it splits into two channels and surrounds an island.  With the water level being as low as it was, we were worried that we would pick the wrong channel and end up having to portage. Luckily, we were actually able to travel through a (relatively) new chute in the river that bisects what used to be the island. This new section was so narrow, the water was literally rushing through. You could see trees that had very recently fallen as the new river channel is formed.

After about 4 ½ hours, we rounded the last bend before the Hwy 21 landing. Keep in mind, this is a private landing, so plan on paying $2 to park. We decided to park on a sandbar and enjoy the water for about 30 minutes before we packed up and headed home. As we pulled up to Kill Kare to get our other vehicle, a couple of the members of the Chamber group were loading up. As it turned out, Zig Zag Landing was almost inaccessible by river and they had spent a large amount of time and energy getting everyone up to the landing. They had completed a 9 mile trip in the time it took us to do 15! So, a word of caution, Zig Zag is not a good access point at low water.

Some of the wildlife we saw: Swallow-tailed Kite, lots of ducks, lots of fish that were visible because of the low water, turtles large and small, a herd of deer, herons, egrets, ibis, owl, hawk, and a 12 foot alligator that scrambled back into the water once he saw us (he was a whopper). You would have to visit the zoo to see more animals in 4 hours.

Little Blue Heron in summer plumage

Yellow Pond Lilies

Parting advice: At any water level, you should be mentally prepared to deal with portages on the Edisto. The ones we encountered were very manageable, but it is a changing river, so there are new blockages all the time. The positive of making a trip at such low water is that there are no motorboats to dodge.

If we haven’t convinced you to visit the Edisto River yet, fine, but we won’t stop trying. We are loving every minute of being out there!

We were a little late starting our GPS tracker, but we got most of it.
Click here to see most of our route
Total distance: 24.38 km (15.1 mi)
Total time: 4:17:47
Moving time: 3:50:01

Cattle Egret