Luckiamute Landing, an undeveloped park, preserves for public use all the land between the Luckiamute and the Willamette for half a mile upstream. Then paddle 1.3 miles downstream to the Buena Vista Ferry, where you've left a shuttle car. Near the trip's two-mile mark you'll pass the smokestacks and effluent of Teledyne Wah Chang's rare metals factory and Kraft's paper mill. The city of Albany lured these companies here with incentives in the hopes of raising the city's tax base. But the factory owners promptly held an election to create their own tax-haven city, Millersburg, and then drove down Albany property values by polluting the air.
Herons are common here, but expect to see Canada geese, too.
There are no fees. The Buena Vista Ferry is free for pedestrians, but charges about 50 cents for cars. The ferry only operates on weekdays. This is the launch site. To find the take-out point, drive back to downtown Albany, turn left across the Willamette River bridge toward Corvallis, take the first right onto Spring Hill Drive, and follow signs 7.4 miles to the Buena Vista Ferry.