 canoe ferrying construction material (photo by Bill Menke) |
excerpted from NCTA blog by Bill Menke
We had a very productive (but also very strenuous) outing last week. For several years we puzzled over how to get our puncheon materials into the trail segment that is on the north side of the St. Croix River and between the Gordon Dam ATV Trail and West Mail Road (map), Because of the flat rocks that we used to construct a walking surface on the upland portions, our powerwagon would have bounced around and literally destroyed the work we had already done while we were waiting for the WI-DNR to issue the permits we needed to construct the wetland structures.
We considered a helicopter contract (too expensive at a minimum $100,000), and draft horses, snowmobiles, and ATVs dragging or trailering the materials through the woods. All of these latter three modes would have also destroyed the trail. We also thought about boating the materials down the river from Gordon Dam but there are too many shallow places which would prevent passage with a loaded boat.
Finally, crew member Phil Anderson came up with the idea of working them across the river with two canoes that were fastened together to form a carrying platform.
This was a tremendous transportation job. All in all, we moved over 100 4x6x16 foot beams, 100 telephone pole sills (5 feet long), and almost 1900 deck boards (3 feet long) across the river. All that is left of the south side for next month is about 15 sills and 15 beams and these are all already at the river edge or at the top of the bluff.
For lots more pictures and more explanation see the NCTA blog- link below.
This segment is on NCTA map WI-02 See Rover’s unique puncheon material canoe ferry operation
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