Back in 2020, I did a really beautiful (and fairly easy) paddle from Turning Point Park to the Lower Falls of the Genesee River. This past weekend, I decided to do it again – only with a few improvements. First, we started at the Petten Street Kayak Launch instead of dragging our kayaks down the hill to the (useless except in high-water weather) launch in Turning Point Park. This was a great improvement in terms of ease. The dock is right next to the parking area, and the launch is similar to the one in Black Creek in that it’s super easy to use.
Of course, starting here meant we had about an extra mile each direction, totaling about 10 miles RT to the Lower Falls and back. But we also saved a lot of time (and hand muscles) by not carrying the kayaks down (and then back up) the steep hill, let alone trying to launch from one of the fishing platforms (hopefully never again!) Early in our paddle, we passed the “Spirit of Rochester,” a 2 hour lunch or 3 hour dinner cruise ship that was quite popular from 1985-2004, when it hit a sunken tug in the Genesee River. Repairs were completed in Toronto, but the ship has slowly degraded, achored in the Genesee River, for the last 20 years. It’s not in very good shape at this point.
Up near Lake Ontario, the trees were still fairly green. But by the time we came to Turning Point Park, the trees were becoming quite colorful. I’d say that they’re not quite peak, but they will be within the next week or two. So if you’re looking for a great place to leaf-peep in Rochester, I highly recommend either walking at Turning Point Park or else making this kayak trip!
We were by far not the only people out on the Genesee River. I saw at least half a dozen other kayakers, and then there were at least a dozen motor boats heading up to just beyond the Veterans Memorial Bridge (the water must get too shallow beyond that point, since none of them went up to the Lower Falls).
There were also quite a few airplanes – apparently, the approach for landing following the Genesee River was in use that day!
And then there were the people fishing. Wow, were there a lot of people fishing below the Lower Falls! One man told us that the fishing wasn’t great at all, but we did see people catching, too (mostly gigantic salmon).
One of the biggest surprises from our last adventure was that we could hear the falls almost as soon as we paddled under the Veterans Memorial Bridge. The water level up to that point had been similar to what we’d experienced in 2020, so we weren’t really expecting the falls to be that much fuller, either, even though we’ve had a lot more rain this fall.
Well, we were wrong on that front – the falls were absolutely roaring with water. This also meant that the river near the falls was faster and higher. Between the swift current and the number of people fishing, we pulled our kayaks over to the right (western) bank and one of my group stayed with them while the rest of us took the muddy, slippery trail up to the falls, themselves. Crazy as it sounds, the rock bar where we stood last time was completely underwater!
We pretty quickly headed back downstream and at a snack while drifting down toward the Veterans Memorial Bridge.
Then it was back under the pedestrian bridge between Maplewood Park and Seneca Park.
I took quite a few more photos, but I’ll only put a few here at the end of the post – enjoy! (Note: Because I’ve detailed this trip before, I won’t put in the GPS track, mileages, etc., which can be found over here.)
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