marscanoe wrote:
littleredcanoe wrote:
Dress for immersion.. The water is snowmelt.. It is barely above freezing.. You are very early in the season and need to be ready for snow and freezing temps and high winds.
Having done the Green in both late Sept and early May.. they were not the same trip though geographically they were.
Thanks for the advice! We are prepared for cold water & the expected temps - have done the San Juan 2 years ago at the same time period - April 18-27. However, weather averages show zero snow in April along the Green River so I suspect it would be minimal at most. We got close to freezing temps on the San Juan at night but during the day it was beautiful. And we did experience the the afternoon winds whipping up the canyons!
We are greatly looking forward to some beautiful early season paddling!
Weather is highly localized. I had a blizzard that bent our mountaineering tent over ( MH Trango 3.1) was thankful the tent was built for Everest Base Camp.. I had three inches of snow . on Mothers day. Meanwhile Hubby was on a ten mile hike up the canyon and had nothing. He did not even get wet.
Averages on the Green are kind of pointless.. ( we had snow on the return jetboat back to Moab on our trip that ended Oct 2). It was so cold though officially 32 d F which seems not a big deal. But a jetboat moving at 45 mph makes a lot of windchill.. everyone was on the floor to huddle and keep warm as best as possible out of the wind.
While sandbar camping is attractive in the early fall, and absent during the spring the tradeoff is blooming cactus. do not run out of camera batteries! the flowers are amazing