It’s getting darker earlier, but luckily the Waterbury Reservoir being so close to my work let me meet the Ladies That Paddle there early so we could still get a short paddle in before dark.  We entered from the Cotton Brook access in the north, a much narrower area than I’d been in before, where the Little River comes in.

This was my third time on the reservoir and I spent it checking for the best campsites again, although I have yet to stay at any of them.

The point of interest this time was the massive Cotton Brook landslide that happened at the end of May, but is still active and moving at the end of September!  Sediment has completely filled in the mouth of Cotton Brook and there’s an alluvial fan reaching out into the reservoir there.  The water has been much siltier throughout the summer, although it wasn’t looking too bad tonight.  We could see just a little bit of clear stream water making its way through the silt.

It was really neat to see, but tonight would have been a good paddle anyway with the great fall colors happening.  They’re just getting started in the area and will be hitting peak in a week or two.

We didn’t have too much time before dark so we didn’t make it much past the no-wake zone before needing to turn around.

It’s getting late in the season and dark is coming earlier so this is likely to be the last paddle of the year for me.  It was a little chilly but very relaxing.