Join Mike Houck, executive director of Urban Greenspaces Institute, for the grand finale of Great Blue Heron Week 2018. The Ross Island Paddle is an opportunity to enjoy a morning on the Willamette River, kayaking or canoeing through the no-wake zone on the Holgate Channel, into the Ross Island lagoon, around Ross Island and back to Willamette Park. This is the perfect time to circumnavigate the four-island archipelago (Ross, Hardtack, East and Toe), which will be redolent with bird song, including the eerie melody of Swainson’s thrushes. We might even see a river otter or two! We will be looking and listening for black-headed grosbeaks, purple martins and other migratory songbirds, spotted sandpipers, peregrine falcons, red-tailed hawks, and wood ducks. In the Ross Island lagoon we’ll see nesting bald eagles that took over what had been a large great blue heron nesting colony.
The paddle is a leisurely 2.5 hours and is suitable for beginning paddlers and families. You must provide your own life jackets and kayak or canoe.
Meet no later than 9:30 a.m. at Willamette Park Boat Ramp to unload your canoe or kayak and get into the water by 10 a.m. The Willamette Park entrance is at SW Macadam Avenue and SW Nebraska Street. If you are renting a canoe or kayak from the nearby Portland Kayak Company, make sure you leave plenty of time to get your craft and be at Willamette Park at 9:30 a.m. sharp to put in. Portland Kayak Company, 503-459-4050; www.portlandkayak.com.
After unloading your craft at the boat ramp, be sure to park in a car parking space. You will be ticketed if you park in a trailer space. Be sure to pay for parking. There are two parking pass machines near the restroom at the south end of the main parking lot.