Kayaking Chartiers Creek: The Heidelberg to Carnegie Oxbow

This is Chartiers Creek, where it separates Heidelberg (on the far side of the bridge) from Carnegie.  The trouble with kayaking on moving water is that you don't end up where you started, so you need someone to taxi you--and your boat--back to your car.  But the water levels were good today, and I couldn't resist the river's call.  

I far prefer moving water to flat water.  And so, last year while poring over maps, I came up with a way to travel the moving water of Chartiers Creek without calling on anyone to transport me.  It was a pretty ingenious plan that I finally enacted today.  Despite the fact that this part of the creek runs through densely populated and industrialized areas, it's a beautiful ride, scenic and serene.  The urban sprawl isn't visible from the water.  In fact, for the first quarter of the ride, you'd think you were out in the country.  The early summer air is sweet with honeysuckle, and privets, and the mossy smell of fresh water.  It smelled exactly like a Pennsylvania childhood in the 1970s, the adventure, the discovery, the freedom of the water.

There's an "oxbow" in the stream as it runs between Heidelberg and Carnegie, and there's a railroad track that traverses the narrow neck of land between the two ends of the oxbow.  You start off at the great "put-in" spot in Heidelberg, beneath the bridge in the top photo.  You use a bicycle chain to secure your kayak someplace near the bridge, then you leave the boat there and drive into Carnegie with all your gear.

Park your car in the PNC Bank parking lot (metered parking, but not often checked).  You'll be pulling your boat out of the water under the Mansfield Blvd Bridge, just adjacent to this parking lot.

Get your paddle, life jacket, and all your gear--especially the key to your bicycle chain--and then walk along the railroad tracks back into Heidelberg to board your kayak.  The walk's not as long as you think, and the time you'll get on the water is way more than you'd expect.

When I was a kid on a Sunday afternoon in early summer, the creek and railroad tracks would have been crawling with kids--troublemakers, swimmers, rock-throwers, smokers, bike-riders, drinkers.  Where are all the kids nowadays?  They must be in their bedrooms playing on their wiis.

The trek down the tracks from the bridge in downtown Carnegie to the Heidelberg bridge is exactly 20 minutes at a moderate pace.  It's not a scenic stroll, but not unpleasant at all.  Mostly just back yards planted in old fashioned vegetable gardens, with aluminum pie plates dangling over the plants to keep the birds and rabbits away. 

Once you get back to your boat in Heidelberg, you take it under the bridge and push out into the deep.  Let the currents carry you downstream to Carnegie and your car.  The creek forms a wide C between Heidelberg and Carnegie, but the railroad tracks cut a straight line between the two towns, running directly from one end of the C to the other.  

For that reason, your 20-minute walk down the tracks affords you a full 50 minutes on the water!  Near the beginning of your downstream paddle, the riverbanks appear wild, wooded, and silent.  You can't see the neighborhoods and streets at the top of the valley wall--if there are any.  There are geese, and ducks, and an occasional blue heron.  What sounds like a waterfall just around the bend turns out to be passing traffic on I-79, which comes pretty near to the creek at times, though you never have to see it.  In places, the current is choppy--which I love--and in other spots it's deep and gentle.  But the pull is always strong, even in those places where the water appears placid.

There are gravelly shallows where you might have to get out of the boat and walk for a few feet, but they're surprisingly few.  I only had to get out once.  For the most part, the creek is nicely navigable.  As you draw nearer to Carnegie--a more heavily industrialized community--old factories raise their heads on the riverbanks.  The abandoned factory in the fourth photo might be worth checking out someday--though the feeling of remoteness is an illusion.  There are houses all around.  Most of these homes are humble, but some have great views and access onto the creek.  You cross under more antique railroad bridges, too.  The stream becomes deep and wide as it passes through the center of town.

In Carnegie, this old hotel looms over the water like a vengeful math tutor.  Not to denigrate Carnegie, I think it's a great old town with lots of character and easy charm, but the creek in this town has a pretty distinct odor of sewage.  You have to slow down and get into the left channel as you pass under Carnegie's Main Street Bridge, the first bridge in town-proper.  Plan to stop under the second bridge, because that's where your car is parked.  Besides, there's better space for putting in and taking out a boat down there.  Be careful not to dash yourself on the rocks.

All in all, the whole adventure took me about an hour and ten minutes--including the railroad track walk.  If I include travel time to and from the Heidelberg / Carnegie area, then it took less than two hours.  Sounds like something I could do early in the morning when all the world's asleep...