Picketts Bayou, Trinity River NWR, The Cutoff

Map Route Paddle Kayak Picketts Bayou Trinity, The Cutoff

This trip starts at Pickett’s Bayou in the Trinity River National Wildlife Refuge near Champion Lake. The idea was to see where the connection to The Cutoff channel and the Trinity River was. Pickett’s Bayou is quite wide near the launch site, but it narrows into a much smaller, tighter channel at the point where it empties into The Cutoff. And from there it is possible to go east into the Trinity River itself, so that’s interesting. The route also goes the other direction on The Cutoff, making a loop that connects with part of Lost River before heading back along Pickett’s Bayou to the launch. There were some trash and log blockages at a few locations that had to be portaged or avoided, but it was a good trip, and helped to understand all the channel connections. Just below the region shown on the above map would be Lost Lake, I-10 and Hugo Point Park. So one could make fairly long, continuous north-south trips, and fairly long, continuous north-south east-west trips, and those seem like interesting challenges.