The recent rainy weather is bad for boaters in parts of our area. The water level is high at lake Augusta near Sunbury.
Lake Augusta Outfitters sits along Lake Augusta at Shikellamy State Park near Sunbury. The sign on the boat rental shop says, "Closed due to high water". It's easy to see why.
"It's very muddy. Very high, obviously. It's probably going to take a while for it to settle down again, which is probably going to keep people off the river for a little bit," Harvey Shutt said.
Lake Augusta is usually a popular spot to boat and fish, but not this week. Recent rainy weather caused the water to rise.
"I think it's pretty much really high and blown out right now. Did you catch anything? Not today, no, not even a bite," Dennis Eckrote said.
Michele Billig and her son hoped to kayak over the holiday weekend, but probably won't.
"I wanted to come down and bring my son down. It would have been his first time kayaking. But with the river being so high we chose not to," Billig said.
In addition to the high water, there is a lot of debris floating down Lake Augusta. The boaters that Newswatch 16 spoke to say this makes conditions on the lake very dangerous.
"There's not a lot of good reason to be out there. If you want to just take a run somewhere you have plenty of room to do it, but if you want to fish it makes it pretty difficult," Shutt said.
The National Weather Service says the river will crest overnight in Sunbury, which means the water should recede. If you decide to go out on the water on this holiday weekend, be safe!