A friend and I just finished a 24 mile trip from North Walpole, NH to Brattleboro, VT. We put in at the southern end of the portage trail and paddled to the Windyhurst Campsite to sleep, then on to Brattleboro to take out. We had the northern section of the river to ourselves and only started seeing power boats and houses in the last 8 or so miles.

I was glad I had brought along my machete as I had to clear the trail leading up to the campsite. It's hard to find from the river but it is on the New Hampshire side (your left going down river) just after a corn field. It is separated from the cornfield by a deep ravine cut by a brook, so don't bother getting out at the corn field, go down river about 10 yards to the trail. There's a picnic table, fire ring and privy. We had some obnoxious neighbors in the cornfield, but it all worked out.

If you have two vehicles, you can do what we did. We unloaded the boats at the put-in and locked them to a tree with a cable lock. Then we drove both vehicles to the takeout at the Vermont Canoe Touring Company (they were very gracious and even refused my offer of a "docking Fee".) We parked across the street per their request. Then we drove back to the put-in, loaded up the boats and set off down river. The current was mild but pushed us along pretty nicely and we made the 9.4 miles to the campsite in about three hours.

We camped there and set off again in the morning. The river got a lot wider and deeper the further south we went and the current was much milder so our speed was not as fast. We made the 14 plus miles in about five hours. After hauling the boats and gear up to the truck, we drove back to North Walpole for the other car, and pizza. Lola's Pizzeria in North Walpole was fabulous, get the Lola's special.

I hope you have as much fun as we did.