Most paddling activity in the Armand Bayou waters begins at the Bay Area Park access. Sometimes I like the solitude of the Big Island Slough launch. The Big Island Slough launch is a bit more rustic.
Years ago I knew the Armand Bayou watershed simply as "Armand Bayou." The last few years I have learned the names of the different places on this system. Big Island Slough and Spring Gully are some Armand Bayou tributaries.
Despite the apex reptilian predator habitation of the lower parts of Big Island Slough and the upper portions of Armand Bayou, I like these isolated waters.
Thanks to 1950 era high altitude images I know Big Island Slough is not a natural channel that had been dredged and straightened. It is completely man made. Nevertheless it is an interesting piece of water to canoe!
After a little distance it enters the upper Armand Bayou. Old, high altitude images reveal an underwater, narrow and twisty bayou bed. That bed remains today, albeit underwater. It is helpful to know this channels location during low tide. Otherwise you may find yourself dragging across a mud flat.
Up from Big Island Slough I like to call Armand Bayou by it's original name, Middle Bayou.
Once in the Middle Bayou it becomes a more isolated piece of water. We occasionally see kayakers and chat with them. Further upstream the subsidence is less apparent and the waters narrow. Middle Bayou puts you in the woods, where the lower Armand Bayou and Mud Lake are more open. On this trip, the lower Big Island Slough, Spring Gully and Middle Bayous are more isolated, remote and natural feeling than the lower Armand Bayou or upper part of Big Island Slough.
About 2-1/2 miles up Middle Bayou the mouth of Spring Gully enters the bayou. This is a short, tributary that crosses under Red Bluff. Spring Gully is narrow at the confluence. On the other side of Red Bluff is is not much of a stream. I generally turn around at the west bridge.
It is near the Red Bluff bridges on Spring Gully that I really started to notice the trash. Plastic grocery bags, coffee cups, kids toys, tennis balls, its in there. I guess it flies out of vehicles. Its ugly. The plastic grocery bags hang from the overhanging tree branches. I try not to think about it, but they look like toilet paper. I don't take pictures of it. Its enough to turn me off of plastic packaging. Maybe I should document this in another blog. Maybe its not so much a material problem as a societal issue. Probably both.
Away from Red Bluff, Spring Gully is pretty, a nice way to add some distance to the trip.
Above the mouth of Spring Gully the bayou soon narrows and is less effected by subsidence. Trash and subsidence aside this is the most intact water of the watershed. Other signs of the metropolis are evident.
The Orwellian feeling is not as strong as on the upper part of Big Island Slough, but it is hard not to feel the presence industrialization.
Still, what an opportunity! We have seen nice bucks in the fall and winter from the power line right aways. It is nice to stretch your eyes over the countryside and see green, even if there are high line wires and towers.
After working in the oil and gas industry I think it is important and possible to manage green spaces. We need gas and electricity as well as the woods.
Past the high line wires the bayou narrows more. At times the scenery reminds me of what the Shire of Tolkien would look like in a Texas coastal region.
On one fortunate trip an exceptionally high tide coincided with a heavy rain. It was a perfect situation for navigating far up the bayou. We passed an abandoned golf course and came up to some residential development.
Eventually the bayou narrowed to the point that half fallen trees blocked the water way. Unfortunately the closer we got to Genoa Red Bluff the higher the trash concentration.
We turned back to wider, less trash filled water.
After a couple hours and some physical exertion the beauty of the place begins to settle on you. On a side note, disembarking is difficult and discouraged on all of the Armand Bayou watershed. All breaks must be done in-canoe. I find this a limits the length of the trips more than other things.
We frequently take off water breaks at either canoe launch. Both launch sites offer pick nick tables. Big Island Slough has a port-O-can. Bay Area Park has restrooms.
I have found the best way to end a canoe trip is with a hot meal cooked and eaten outdoors.
Thanks for reading!
MSM
Thank you for posting this! I’ve been looking to kayak there, and this is a helpful guide.