Hot Springs fork of the Collowash

BETA

Stream: About 4-5 miles of the highest quality class II-III paddling Oregon has to offer, with a forgiving 15' waterfall near the beginning, and a class IV boulder garden near the end.  Watch for a nice green surf wave where a boulder bar pushes the river against a bedrock right wall after things have eased up.
  
Flows:  2,000-7,000 cfs on the Three Lynx gauge (3k-4k seems like the goldilocks zone).  It could likely be run with plenty more water, but I just don't know how it looks up there with lots of water.

Access:  Take out at Kingfisher campground (44.977569925922566, -122.0903011923093), or where the road is near the creek around a mile upstream to skip the last class IV.

Put in where NF-70/Bagby Rd crosses over Nohorn Creek (44.953138734910425, -122.17237318319891).

Iv'e also walked up the trail towards Bagby Hot Springs to where the footbridge crosses the Hot Springs fork and put in there.  That adds a couple nice ledges, but also a couple log jams.  

Notes: The gauge is far downstream, and the Hot Springs Fork is a tributary of a tributary of the river the gauge is on.  Iv'e been up there when 2,000 cfs was a healthy flow, and also when 2,000 was too low.  A good backup option is the lower Collowash, from the Hot Springs fork confluence to the confluence with the Clackamas (June Creek section).

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Story
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 My first time doing this creek was back in High School, we were in the area camping with my family near Bagby Hot Springs.  I had my kayak and an IK in the event we might paddle the Clackamas on the way home, or maybe paddle Pegleg Falls if there was enough water.  Driving up to our campsite I noticed we were paralleling a beautiful mountain stream.  I had been to the area before to run Pegleg in an IK, but wasn't aware of what was below other than my dad had told me before that he had heard of someone running a large class V rapid just before the confluence with the Collowash.

We set up at a nice campsite along the stream, and went up to Bagby Hot Springs for the afternoon.  I noticed that the road didn't seem all that steep, so maybe the gradient was manageable?  I hadn't done much off the beaten path kayaking at this point, but I was really called to the stream.  That night we did camp stuff and the next morning my family agreed to head up to Pegleg Falls, I was going to kayak it and my step dad thought he might be interested in trying out kayaking too.

After watching me go over the falls a couple times, my step-dad decided he was interested in giving it a try in the inflatable kayak.  I explained best I could what to do, and off he went.  Nailed it.

I was impressed with how well he had done at the falls and how receptive to learning he was, so we decided we would float back down to camp.  We scrapped our original plan of having my step-brother ride in the back of the IK, which was probably for the best.

Downstream was mostly class II-III, with some cool areas and a couple III+ rapids that we scouted, including a long sliding section that was good fun..  It was a magical trip for me, heading downstream with no idea whatsoever what was around the corner, and it turning out to be gorgeous at every turn.  Other than one quick pin, it was smooth sailing start to finish.  It was quite a feeling paddling into camp that night, and I reflect on this run as one of the trips that sold me on exploratory boating.



Here is a video from a trip on Clack fest weekend.  We went up and ran the Hot Springs fork after the events.  This was a trip where a couple of us hiked up to the Bagby footbridge.
Hot Springs fork of the Collowash from Jacob Cruser on Vimeo.