Each year we run a set of special club trips out to other local rivers to explore new places as a club, often over the summer bank holidays and weekends and offer an opportunity to escape into the country for a local paddle over and enjoy the company of friends from other local canoe clubs in the area and meet up on the river.
Christmas Paddle
Paddling over the Christmas holidays we paddled the river Stour which is always a popular paddle, Getting out and about on away days are great at this time of year particularly to getting out on the river for a few hours when the daylight hours are shorter just a couple of hours on the river to relax.
Our paddles on the River Stour normally start at Sudbury Quay, where we have easy access to the River from the River Stour Trust Car Park.
A downstream paddle to Bures can take about half a day with a great pub stop for lunch at the Henny Swan pub or a there and back paddle to Henny is easy to complete in about 3 hours.
We often head over to the River Stour and meet up with the custodians of the river who are the River Stour Trust, launching boats from their landing stage at Sudbury Quay
The trust have built who some great access points to the River and it one of the nicest paddling locations in the East of England, offering a variety of river sections, with weirs to play on canalised sections as well as wild and winding sections.The River Stort trust also run Sudbury to the sea (S2S) and run a weekend tour of the river each September as an organised event where paddlers from across the region meet up for a great annual paddle-event over two days with an overnight camp at Rushbanks farm campsite.
We will be back to tour on the River Stour next year and will be offering boats and equipment for the 2024 Sudbury to Sea weekend for our club members.
Bank Holiday paddling on the Stour
The River below Bures has several weirs which offer an exciting paddle as the river goes from Canalised Navigation down to narrow stretches barely the width of a paddle though bull rushes and reeds. We paddle some of the backwaters and weirs are great at most levels for either running or playing below, offering an ideal location for introducing moving water skills to novice club members.