BLUE ISLAND — Chicago may feel like a concrete jungle, but this Saturday you can catch a glimpse of muskrats and minks on a canoe trip down the meandering waters of the Little Calumet River. Friends of the Chicago River’s “Little Calumet Paddle” will take boaters down the smaller and more wooded of the river’s two forks.
"People think of the river as wide, with buildings all around,” said Claire Snyder, the group’s conservation programs specialist. "This stretch is the opposite of that. It goes through forest preserve and meanders back and forth. You could be anywhere in the wilderness.”
Snyder said that in addition to muskrats and minks, paddlers may encounter turtles basking in the sun or some of the 300 species of birds that pass through Chicago every year. That includes the potential to see black-crowned night herons, a diminutive blue and yellow variety of the bird.
“They’re endangered in Illinois,” Snyder said. “But they’re locally common along the Calumet River.”
The event begins at the boat launch at 1500 Jackson St. in Blue Island at 10 a.m. Saturday and is expected to last approximately two-and-a-half hours. The cost is $45 per person. Volunteer guides will offer an orientation in safety and paddling techniques before the group sets off up river.
“We’ll be starting against the current and coming back with the current,” Snyder said."Generally if we haven’t had a lot of rain it’s pretty calm.”
Paddlers will also be some of the first Chicagoans to experience the newly disinfected waters of the Little Calumet. The Metropolitan Water Reclamation District brought its new Hegewisch disinfection facility online last week. Now waste water and storm run-off passing through the facility will be bleached free of harmful pathogens like E. coli in addition to being filtered for solid waste.
Still, Snyder doesn’t recommend a dip in the river if paddlers get too hot.
"I wouldn’t say [it's safe for] swimming just yet,” she said. "But we’re much closer now than we were a week ago.”
Saturday’s paddle is sold out, but check Friends of the Chicago River’s website for future events.
Robin Amer is a contributing reporter to DNAinfo Chicago. You can follow her on Twitter @rsamer.
For more neighborhood news, listen to DNAinfo Radio here:
