Oconomowoc River IV

Touring Loew Lake within the Kettle Moraine State Forest:
This is an easy there-and-back trip on the impounded waters of the Oconomowoc River and the little bulge called Loew Lake, surrounded by the Kettle Moraine State Forest featuring pretty upland ridges and sedge meadows in a nearly wild setting.

Rating: ☆ ☆ ☆
Trip Report Date: October 21, 2024

Skill Level: Beginner
Class Difficulty: Flatwater

Gradient:
<1′ per mile

Gauge Recorded on this Trip:
n/a

Recommended Levels:
Water levels should always be reliable for this segment of the river.

Put-In + Take-Out:
Loew Lake Unit launch, County Highway Q bridge, Colgate, Wisconsin
GPS: 43.19305, -88.33828

Time: Put in at 2:15p. Out at 4:45p.
Total Time: 2h 30m
Miles Paddled: 7 (there and back)

Wildlife:
Great blue herons, hawks, sandhill cranes, carp, frogs, turtles, turkey vultures, and muskrats.

Shuttle Information:
7.1 miles. Uncannily as long as the paddling mileage, the shuttle route is pretty simple, if a little indirect. It’s not unsafe for bicycling, although there’s little to no shoulder area on the roads (as often is the case in Waukesha County).

Background:
I first paddled this unique section of the Oconomowoc River ten years ago, when I was working on a book about boat-building called The Art of the Keel, ghost-written by Donald J. Duck. I’m kidding, of course, but I am writing this trip report the day before Halloween – and a week before the election. And I did write a book about paddling in the southern third of Wisconsin that I believe has the wordiest title for the smallest demographic – basically the opposite of Bob Woodward’s new book, War, which is simply one word (and one syllable at that) yet is both revealing and relevant to pretty much every human being on the planet. But I digress.

The concept of the paddling guidebook was simple: 60 individual trips within a 60-mile radius of Madison, the state capital (and conveniently where I myself live). The premise was not unique, as it was modeled after the series of hiking guidebooks already in circulation; I just applied it to boats, instead of boots. But one of the principal sources of inspiration for such a paddling book came from the Ice Age Trail, actually. To wit, the man responsible for preserving the legacy of Wisconsin’s glacial past and promoting the public’s right to partake in its natural beauty – Ray Zillmer, a lawyer and avid outdoorsman who lived in Milwaukee and died in 1961.

Instead of doing a deep dive into that history, I’ll simply skim the surface. Zillmer’s grand idea was to have a linear national park here in Wisconsin that would trace the extent of glaciation during the last Ice Age and showcase its effects. He proposed that it would stretch from one end of the state to the other and thus be close and approachable to everyone – to be used “by millions more people than use the more remote national parks,” in his words. Would it be as glorious as the Everglades? No. As spectacular as the actual glaciers in the Northwest? Nope. But it would allow for more than 50% of Wisconsin residents to live within 30 miles of such a federally protected place full of idiosyncratic treasures – especially here in the southeast nook of the state.

It would take some 20 years and go through as many metamorphic changes as the rocks along the trail’s way, but by 1980 it received national status – one of only eleven in the United States, and all of it enclosed within the state of Wisconsin.

This notion resonated with me profoundly – and still does. And so I wrote a book that offers 60 splendid adventures within an hour’s drive in hopes that paddlers could get their dose of water and nature without too much windshield time or gallons of gas. This section of the Oconomowoc River, I knew, would be one of those trips. And it would be all the more fitting that it lies parallel to a lovely segment of the Ice Age Trail itself, from Monches to Holy Hill.

That’s the personal background (or should that be backwater?).

The wee hamlet of Monches looks like it should belong in a fictionalized setting, with a veritable bend on a country road on the county line around an old inn featuring a second-story wrap-around balcony straight out of Flannery O’Connor or William Faulkner – with a bar and grill below. Originally called O’Connellsville in the 1830s and 1840s after the firebrand emancipator, Daniel O’Connell – well, by white settlers; it was the home of native folks before then, of course – the town name was dubiously changed to Monches in a move that had more to do with British contempt for the Irish than anything else. But Gaelic nomenclature pervades the area with road names the likes of Emerald Drive, Shamrock Lane, and Donnegal Road.

This section of the Oconomowoc River is one of the most popular, in part because it is so pretty, but also because it’s flatwater paddling that requires no shuttling. It’s a there-and-back trip through the Kettle Moraine State Forest.

Overview:
There is excellent access on the upstream (north-facing) side of the County Highway Q bridge, left or right. If you stand at the northwest corner of the bridge (left) and squint in the distance, you’ll see the surreal but beautiful sight of Holy Hill (more on that below). You’ll also notice that there’s no discernible current, courtesy of a dam only one-third of a mile downstream. The river here is 60 feet wide, representative of this trip. While the actual lake is three miles upstream, the river for this trip essentially is a skinny lake.

As you paddle upstream, away from the bridge, you’ll see a fenced-in pasture and a house on the left – by and by, the only sign of private property on this outing. Cattails abound as you venture north, accentuated by muskrat huts. After a right-hand turn a stand of attractive oak trees greets you on the left, while off to the right you’ll see tamaracks marking a swamp. Soon you’ll come upon a low- (Loew?) clearance footbridge, which can be portaged on the right if the squeeze-through seems too tight. The river will meander after this as the setting becomes increasingly isolated and pretty.

A ridge will come into focus, then disappear after a bend, only to return again in sharper relief. In geology-ese this is called an “esker,” or a sinuous ridge made of sand and gravel deposited by tunnel-flowing streams at the base of glaciers. If you’re thinking this sounds like a borrowed word from Iceland, the land of volcanoes and glaciers, you’d be close, but off by one letter: it’s actually from the Irish word eiscir. Fun fact. And pretty appropriate, given the local history.

Of the many things my imagination fundamentally fails at appreciating about the glaciers that rasped and pestled and ground the landscape to numbing oblivion 10,000 years ago, apart from their inconceivable size, is that they weren’t just dumb mountains of ice that moved forwards or backwards like a cheap prop on a high school stage; they were absolutely wild, violent actors with their own unique ecosystems, totally dynamic.

Think of a city. Think of the sewer systems below you, the electrical wires above. Think of all the vehicles commuting to work, or delivering food, or transporting freight. Think of trains on the railroad. Think of joggers and dog-walkers. Everyone is individual and doing their own independent thing, but collectively all are subsumed within the city. That’s how glaciers were. As they bulldozed forward or receded backwards, all sorts of reticulated tunnels of meltwater within them and at their base flushed astonishing amounts of sand, dirt, and gravel, not to mention boulders as big as VW bugs. And when you consider that your average glacier was easily a mile high and thick, then a 100′-tall ridge of present-day earth deposited by a mountain of ice like a baker’s frosting bag seems like a cake-walk.

What’s particularly cool (pun obviously unintended – come on) is that, surrounded by flat marsh, the uplands stand out more dramatically (OK, that pun was intended).

A pleasant straightaway resumes with a teasing glimpse of an attractive pedestrian bridge and another ridge looming behind it. The bridge connects sections of the Ice Age Trail, but also marks the entrance into Loew Lake itself, which is a slow, no-wake zone. Loew Lake is as many acres large as it is feet deep: about 23. Long glacial ridges elegantly frame the west and north periphery, while the east is characterized more by woodsy pines and white birch. In autumn, glorious glows of golden tamaracks – “smoky gold” in the words of Aldo Leopold – positively capture the rapture of the season, “their golden lances thrusting skyward.” The poised prose comes, appropriately enough, in the “October” chapter of A Sand County Almanac.

Honestly, Loew Lake itself is unremarkable. It’s more of a destination in terms of distance than what it has to offer. Don’t get me wrong, it’s pretty, but also pretty humdrum. If you wish to continue some, you can paddle into the inlet on the north side of the lake – in between 11 and 12, if the lake were a clock. A pretty knoll rises from the left bank with lush grass, abundant skunk cabbage, and attractive oaks. At a right-hand bend the stream seems to bifurcate: to the left is a creek with no identifiable name, to the right is the Oconomowoc River. Either can be paddled as far as conditions allow, each about half a mile before things become impassably shallow.

If there’s feasible passage, following the Oconomowoc River upstream is quite pretty. The streambed ditches its weeds and aquatic plants to become rocky instead. The water is clearer, and banks are piney and boulder-lined. In other words, it’s quintessential Kettle Moraine country. After a couple bends right and left the riverbed will probably become too shallow and riffly to continue, unless the water is high. Still, deadfall will likely put the kibosh on venturing too far upstream. Best to head back and enjoy the second verse in reverse. Unless it’s a cloudy day, the sun will definitely kiss your face, as you’ll be paddling south and west back to the bridge. Given the Irish history of the area, let me complete the proverb with a wish that the wind be at your back, too.

What we liked:
This is just a really pretty paddle, full stop. It’s serene and gentle, easy-going and oh so accessible. It’s fun to do by yourself, with a friend or partner, or even a small group. We paddled this trip on a very windy day and shared the water with lots of other paddlers, yet the wildlife was still impressive.

What may be my favorite aspect to this trip is how recognizable the effects of glacial events are. Each and every feature along this trip has the signature of glaciation, from the eskers to the tamarack swamp, the Oconomowoc River itself. And while glaciation affected all of Wisconsin, except for the Driftless Area in the southwest, the tell-tale evidence of that too often has been effaced by the blade of a plow or will of real estate development. But here, it feels like a living laboratory and interactive museum. After all, you’re surrounded by the strewn rubble from a glacial lobe left behind around the time that nomads began gardening in the Fertile Crescent – long before the reigns of the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, or Romans, long before we came up with an alphabet or architecture. These pebbles and rocks, this sand and gravel – this river itself – are all the result of cataclysmic glacial melt. In the long-game of geological time, 10,000 years is a fraction of a fraction of a second, an eyelash’s blink in an ocean. We are closer to that time, when it all began to end, here and now today, than when that time first began. Closer by a long shot.

And we’re awfully lucky to live in or visit a state like Wisconsin that cared/cares about conservation and preserving this legacy.

What we didn’t like:
The wind! Talk about trick or treat – I guess you don’t get an 80-degree day in late October, in Wisconsin, without a stiff wind from the south. To be fair, considering the meandering nature of the river on this trip, there were plenty of respites from the blustery drawl of the southerly wind. But since there’s essentially no current, the wind will be a factor.

And lake-paddling isn’t really my thing, which is why this trip receives a very biased, admittedly subjective rating of three stars, not four. For many paddlers, this trip will be one to remember.

If we did this trip again:
While not quite as fantastical as I remembered it (seriously, is anything in life?), this still is a really nice trip. It’s very scenic, especially in autumn – the best time to paddle this trip, hands down. It’ll be too strewn with weeds and blue-green goop in the thick soup of summer, and why would you paddle a lake in spring when surrounding rivers have broken free from their locks of blocky ice and are running unbound? Catch this trip when the fall foliage is at its finest; it’ll feel like candy for the soul.

Also, consider adding an après-paddle hike along the corresponding Ice Age Trail. The Monches segment is especially pleasant. And if you still have room for dessert, check out the Oz-like basilica called Holy Hill, shimmering in the clouds like an ethereal cathedral. The twin spires of the basilica are nearly 200’ high, and the building itself sits atop a tall conical hill (called a “kame” in the geology glossary), with the whole effect of being over 1300’ above sea level, such that on a clear day one can see Milwaukee some 30 miles away.

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Related Information:
Oconomowoc River I: S. Concord Road to County Road P
Oconomowoc River II: Wisconsin Avenue to Fowler Lake Park
Oconomowoc River III: Monches to Okauchee Lake
Camp: Kettle Moraine State Forest – Pike Lake Unit
Map: Mid-Kettle Moraine
Rentals: Sherper’s

Photo Gallery: