“Don’t call this a festival,” New York legend whitewater legend Chris Koll said of the original Beaver River Rendezvous in 1998.

The three-day event has stayed true to that mantra, despite the popular “Beaverfest” dubbing, the event lacks any sort of commercial qualities. Just great whitewater.

From the Class III-IV Taylorville to a Class V+ spillway on the Moshier section, releases on the three stretches of the Beaver and the Raquette provide a great variety of whitewater for intermediate to expert paddlers during the generally-dry late summer days.

As it has in the past, the Labor Day releases drew a great crowd. Hats off to Brookfield Renewable Energy Partners for guaranteeing water during the exceptionally dry summer. And extra thanks to former AW board member Pete Skinner who spearheaded a decade-long effort to secure scheduled releases on these rivers. If you like paddling the Beaver, you should probably be an AW member.

While access to the Eagle, Taylorville and Moshier sections of the Beaver has been relatively seamles, there are generally parking issues over the Labor Day Weekend. American Whitewater is working to improve access to these sections while focusing on protecting the watershed.

If you were at the Beaver this year or in past years and have recommendations for how to improve access, please contact alan@americanwhitewater.org. There is a fund that goes toward these types of projects. Here is a brief description of what the money should be used for:

 [A] Beaver River Fund was established as part of the Settlement and License, to be used for a variety of measures within the watershed related to ecosystem protection, natural resources stewardship, public education, additional public access to outdoor recreational resources not provided for in the Settlement or License, and applied research needed to accomplish these purposes.  …  A Beaver River Advisory Council was established to oversee the Fund, comprised of settlement signatories and chaired by NYSDEC.

Also, if you have any input on the specific release levels or days when each river runs, they are not set in stone, and we welcome any recommendations for changes. For example, would you prefer to see the higher water Raquette release over Labor Day weekend on Monday instead of Saturday?

See you next year.