A Tale of Two Adirondack Streams – East Branch St. Regis River and Stony Creek

By Rich Macha

Streams in the Adirondack Park have a tendency to take their time in getting anywhere in particular – this meandering quality can often offer the paddler an opportunity to get a better view of your surroundings. You also get to utilize your maneuvering strokes as much as your somewhat repetitive forward strokes.

Early this summer, on two consecutive days, I was fortunate to paddle two northern Adirondack streams that, despite being only about 30 miles apart, differed greatly in personality and character.

East Branch of the St. Regis River – The 22-mile-long East Branch flows out of Meacham Lake, travels northwest, drops 20 feet at Everton Falls before turning south, and soon joins the main branch of the St. Regis River near Santa Clara. To get to the put-in from NY Route 30, drive west on Red Tavern Road (CR 14) for eight miles and look on the right for a parking area at The Nature Conservancy’s Everton Falls Preserve. You may want to take a short walk further along the road to get a look at the falls before carrying your canoe or kayak across the road and down a 125-foot trail to the river above the falls.

Upstream, you will find over nine miles of flatwater – you will be going against the current but you can turn around whenever you desire and return with the flow. Three days before our trip, it had rained well over an inch and the current was still very noticeable – we paddled upstream for 2.5 hours, and returned in 1.5 hours!

The first mile or so passes through lands owned by The Nature Conservancy, after that you are on state Forest Preserve lands within the Debar Mountain Wild Forest. After going about 1.5 miles, there is a brief section of quickwater where you must paddle a bit harder for a couple of minutes. The 60-foot-wide river then meanders through meadows of tall grasses or is bordered with alders beyond which the spires of black spruce poke up in the near distance. I was amazed at the diversity of flowers seen along the way – I spotted Joe Pye weed, purplestem angelica, blue flag, cow vetch, meadow-rue, bullhead lily, and shooting stars.

After traveling upstream for 4.8 miles, we reached another access point – this requires a drive along a dirt road from NY Route 458 plus a five-minute carry – this little-used access is easy to miss from the water if you are not looking for it. We stopped here, in a small grassy area, for lunch – unfortunately, the local mosquitoes decided to have lunch at the same time. Thankfully, biting bugs were absent while we were on the water while bug-eating damselflies flitted about in abundance.

After lunch, we headed back downstream at a relaxed pace – I felt like I was expending so much less effort in this direction and stopped many times to photograph items of interest. Parts of this river reminded me of the Oswegatchie above Inlet except for the fact that there are no beaver dams on the East Branch. The East Branch does have a population of beavers though, however, the water is generally deep enough for them so there is no need for them to dam this river. We saw no other humans on this trip.

Stony Creek, Ampersand Brook and Raquette River – At the western edge of the High Peaks Wilderness Area, Stony Creek is not much over 1.5 miles long but your trip can easily be extended by paddling Stony Creek Ponds to the north, Ampersand Brook to the east, and/or the Raquette River to the south.

You can find a good access point by the Coreys Road bridge that crosses over the creek. From NY Route 3, halfway between Tupper Lake and Saranac Lake, drive south on Coreys Road for 2.5 miles (the last mile is on dirt) to the bridge. You can also start your paddle on the northwestern lobe of the ponds or at Axton Landing on the Raquette River.

From the bridge, we paddled upstream. It comes as no surprise that this stream meanders about, but, unlike the East Branch, this time silver maples rise up from grassy shores and the Joe Pye weed was slightly more advanced in its flowering display here. Once again, damselflies were also seen in abundance. Grasses and other underwater vegetation bent downstream in the light current. A straight channel was seen to the right off the creek and we explored it some distance until our way was blocked – this channel between Stony Creek and Ampersand Brook was man-made and used many years ago to float logs down to the Raquette River.

Back on the creek, we soon reached the southernmost of the Stony Creek Ponds. The shores of the Stony Creek Ponds offer a mix of private and state lands. Preferring to stay away from any signs or sounds of civilization, we took a sharp right into Ampersand Brook. After a short distance, we took a left into a long backwater filled with yellow bullhead pond-lilies where we enjoyed a fine view of Stony Creek Mountain rising up 1,500 feet above the brook. Upon seeing us, an adult black duck hurried its offspring into hiding.

We returned to the brook and continued upstream passing two breached beaver dams before several downed trees blocked our way – we were no more than a mile from the creek at this point.

It was very pleasant paddling downstream retracing our route on the brook and the creek. We continued past our put-in and soon arrived at the Raquette River where we turned left, going upstream against a light current, and stopped at a sandy beach for lunch. Several other paddlers went by and the peacefulness was briefly interrupted when two jet skis arrived on the scene from upriver and proceeded to head downstream.

After lunch, we paddled a short distance up the Raquette before heading back up Stony Creek to our access point at the bridge. For the most part, it was a very enjoyable 7.6-mile paddle.

Bird-life was plentiful on both of our trips. We are very fortunate to have such a paddling paradise here in upstate New York.

A lover of wild places, Rich Macha has led many trips for the Adirondack Mountain Club, and has spent 20 years in the paddlesport/snowsport business. More of Rich’s adventures can be found at northeastwild.blogspot.com.