Adventure Planning

I've been thinking about paddling the Sammmish River from Lake Sammamish to Lake Washington. I've learned how to measure distances more accurately in Google Earth. You can zoom way in and then use the arrows to move the map around. By doing this I've calculated that from Lake Sammamish to the boat ramp in Kenmore is 13.6 miles and to go all the way to SSP is a total of 18.7 miles. The river looks wide enough for the whole distance, too. You can faintly see red dots where I mapped out the river and then a while line finishing the route to SSP.

After lunch I showed the course to a co-worker and that opened a whole new can of worms. He pointed out that the river passes very nearby the Red Hook Brewery. We then spent some time pinpointing the brewery. By zooming in and looking around we located it. Then I measured it and came up with a distance of approximately 7 miles. Why, that's totally do-able! In fact I think I'll do it this Sunday. Have a nice paddle, stop, load the boat,and head in for some lunch. Not sure if you can make out the red dots for the shorter route, but they are there.

I mentioned the long course to a few club members and they seem keen on the idea. I'm trying to work out something with Seattle Raft and Kayak for trailering our boats to the launch point. SRK is located right next to SSP down at Magnuson Park. More details and pictures of the adventure to come.