A good early-season paddle is to launch at Pioneer Park and paddle down to the Confluence of the two rivers, then take a sharp right turn right to go up the North Thompson River.   It is never an easy paddle upstream, but we look for the slowest water on the river, crossing back and forth, sometimes progressing quite slowly.   This is a good early-season workout.

Mt. Paul stands above the Kamloops Indian Reserve on the eastern shore.

Cottonwood-lined Schubert Drive and the Rivers Trail in North Kamloops follows the western shore to Halston.

It takes about an hour to paddle up to the Halston Bridge and beyond to the CN Bridge.   A train was crossing the bridge as I paddled underneath and around the pylons.

There are extensive sandbars and shallows along the North Thompson River.   Along the eastern banks are signs of beaver activity, including a lodge, several belly slides, and chewed off willows and red ossier dogwood.  Great blue herons stood on the shoreline and bald eagles watched from the cottonwoods.

This is a hard workout paddling upstream on the North Thompson, but it is an easy paddle back down to the confluence.   The hard work starts again, paddling back upriver to the Black Bridge, then the Red Bridge on the way to Pioneer Park.

Early in the season there is no one else on the river.   It is a good workout to paddle the 10.6 km route, half of it upstream into the current, but it is part of developing a base of paddling endurance for the year, running this year from February to November.