July 24,2012- Smith River Marrowbone to Mitchell rd.

I am begining to think paddling the Smith Rhttp://www.henrycountyva.gov/content/File/pdfs/ParksandRec/parks__rec_map_brochure_layout_1.pdfiver is bad luck. The first time we tried out truck broke on the way.  Today the weather report said it have a 15% chance of rain.  Arrived at the Smith River and it started to storm. We not willing to give up again and we drove 1 hour 15 minutes to get here, we waited and waited. Finally the sun came out again and we decided to try the Marrowbone access.

We decided to put in after the rain cleared.  Our put in was Marrowbone to Mitchell rd.  The Henry County sites are helpful.
http://www.henrycountyva.gov/Parks.html  and http://www.henrycountyva.gov/content/File/pdfs/ParksandRec/parks__rec_map_brochure_layout_1.pdf

This stretch is about 3.37 miles long.  With not dam water release it took us 2 hours.  I have heard with a dam release water it is 1 - 1/2 hours.  This a a very pretty stretch with many rapids we put in before the dam water reached this section and the river gauge in Martinsville said 2ft which is a min. for this section.  This was one of the prettiest sections I have ever done.  I hope to do this with dam water.  Discovered it takes 4 hours for the dam release water to reach Marrowbone.  If the Martinsville dam releases at 1-5 like usual M-F then the water will reach here by 5 but is is easy to out run the water so 5:30 -6 might be better.

This section has so many rock formations in the water and 10 class 1 or 2 rapids in 3.75 miles.  In low water this run is interesting but look forward to doing it with the dam release water.