Sierra Photo Drop: Wildplum, Pauely, Middle Feather, and the South Branch

This month marked a major milestone in my kayaking career: A paddling trip to the legendary sierra mountains.

On May 4th, Alex Kilyk, Dan Rubado, Dan Dellwo, Abe Herrara, and I loaded up in two rigs and headed south for a few days in the sun.

Cali Crew 2012 - Middle Feather Put-In

We had left the plan in a fairly fluid state: Make it up as we go....

After it was all said and done, we had knocked off two of the greatest rivers I've ever had the pleasure of paddling and completed two easier northern california classics.

Day 1: Travel
We left Portland after work around 6:30. We ended up crashing out along the shores of Lake Shasta around 2 AM.

Day 2: Rendezvous
After meeting up with Abe and Dan in Oroville and eating some breakfast at the delicious and nutritious Oroville Denny's, we headed up into the mountains towards to the town of Downiville and the NF Yuba.

 The NF Yuba is 8 miles of class fun. We didn't get out of our boats and it still felt like a long day.

 

The Author riding the Wildplum

After finishing up the 8 mile Wildplum section of the NF Yuba, we decided to rally up the Downie River to run Pauley Creek.

Pauley creek is similar to Canyon Creek, WA @ 500cfs in many ways. Lots of one stoke moves over steep pool drop ledges.

Slip n Slide

 

Our tour guide for Pauley Creek

After wrapping up Pauley Creek, we began a mad scramble around Downiville to find cell phone service and wifi. After checking levels, we threw together an ingenious plan to get onto the Middle Feather. The level had been steadily dropping for the past 7 days and was hovering around 2100 cfs. With warmer weather in the immediate forecast, we decided to drive that night to the put-in with designs to run the 30 mile wilderness run in 2 days, rather than the standard 3 day journey. Our plan was to beat the warm weather to the punch and hopefully be taking off the river by the time that the levels started to creep back up. Most reports I'd seen online feature Middle Feather runs at levels closer 1500 cfs, so I was a little nervous about the higher flow. However, I was reassured by several folks milling around Downville that the run didn't get really hard until flows surpassed 2500. With this in mind, we placed a call to Matt King's cousin Shawn (who lives in Quincy) who agreed to pick us up at Milsap Bar at 7 PM on the second day and drive us back to our cars.

 

Gear Explosion in Downiville

We rallied to the town of Quincy and picked up some groceries and were in bed at put-in by mid night.

Days 3 & 4: Middle Feather

Unfortunately, we awoke the next morning to temps in the mid-twenties and frozen gear. After thawing our gear by the fire, we were packed up and ready for our adventure.

Dan and his icy dry suit

 

2100cfs covers much of the mank on Day 1

 

 Abe loves Franklin Canyon

The hits just keep on coming

Reaching the end of Franklin Canyon

 

 Warm and Cozy

 

 Enter Devil's Canyon

 

 Good talk boys.

 

 Alex has it under control.

 

Rubado in Landslide - This rapid is nasty and unportable. We heard later, folks run it on the left.

 

Alex feeling the heat - One of my personal favorites

 

 Dancing with the Devil

 

Salami, crackers, and cheese.

 

Dellwo with some sympathy for the Devil.

 

The Devils mandatory portage.

Fat lady's singing over the middle feather

The Middle Feather is no joke. The rapids never let up and increased in intensity as the trip went on. There were probably 15 class V drops and over 40 class IV drops in all and several were not portage able. We were able to finish both days with time to spare due to heroic boat scouting efforts of the Dan's and Abe. Quite remarkble considering no one in our group had been down before and we only had limited beta regarding the manadatory portage. I really just followed the leader for much of the run. Thanks guys!

About a mile from the takeout on day 2, we were overtaken by another group of paddlers. Two of the group turned out to be old friends of Runados. Amanda and Macy? After sharing some laughs at Milsap Bar, they informed us that the South Branch of the Middle Feather, was indeed running and a prime level! The next stop on our Sierra Tour!

Shuttle Shawn showed up 30 minutes early and quickly loaded up into his giant pickup truck. He kept us entertained the entire drive with his stories about growing up in Quincy and the trouble him and Matt got into back in the day. Back at the Put-In, we again beded down for another night in the cold.

 

Shuttle Shawn! Thanks again man.

Day 5: South Branch Feather

We all woke up early and hit the road headed for the South Branch. We'd heard word of a sneak route through the mountains via the Quincy-Laporte Rd. Sadly, we hit snow just passed Little Grass Valley Resevior and were forced to take the 'long way' to the put-in. After running shuttle, gearing up, and eating a little lunch, we weren't able to launch on the South Branch until 2 oclock.

 

En Route

We had some serious reservations about putting on so late into the day. It's said that folks who know the run can do two laps in a day, but the run can easily take over 7 hours for those who have not been down before.

After a quick discussion, we threw some food, headlamps, and lighters into a dry bag and headed down stream.

 

 Mank on the First Third

 

Looking down into the mandatory gorge!

 

Alex amongst it!

Mandatory Fun

 

Dellwo finishing up the mandatory gorge.

 

 Alex too.

 

Okay guys... Don't over boof. My bad.

 

Double Dippin on the South Branch

 

I'm sure all these drops have names.....

Out on the porch

 

Planning my route to China.

 

Dellwo headed for the southern hemisphere.

Sunset over the sierras

 

Wait. It didn't look this big in the pictures.

East-bound and down.

G-force

"I didn't know this thing was must run."

 

 A fond farewell.

 

 Seven Falls.

The South Branch is far and away, the best creek I've ever had the pleasure of paddling. The drops are big, mostly clean, and don't stop. I never heard a firm number on the gradient for this thing, but I'd have to guess that bottom half drops over 600 fpm.

The photos don't do this run due justice.

We finished the portage around 199 problems and all remarked how 'un-runnable' the falls looked. Little did we know, that a few days prior, Chris Korbulic had actually fired er off.

The sun was setting over the Sierras as we came to the last drop on the South Branch. The much anticipated 55 foot waterfall.  With day light running thin and the line being evident, I was ready to get it out of the way. After Abe and I fired it off, the race was on. Everyone had great lines... with one broken paddle.

With that, we began snooping around the banks for the 'obvious' boater trail the leads up the canyon walls to the parking spot far above. This trail was not as easy to find as had been indicated, but Abe followed the plastic to the head.

An hour later we all at the car in the dark after tackling what was one of the worst hike-outs I've ever done. Dan R compared it to a double dose of the Hoffstadt hike out... with more poison oak...

Day 6: The Road Home

The next morning, we got leisurely and ate breakfast creek side. After getting organized, Dan R. Alex, and I bid farwell to Abe and Dan D. and headed North.

After a quick stop at In 'n Out for a much deserved burger, the guys dropped me and the Redding Airport so I could catch a flight to LA to complete a short job for work.

I have to admit, it felt rather surreal to dawn the business clothes and enter one of the biggest cities in the country after such a wild 5 days in the Sierras. I'll be back next year... without a doubt.

Many of the photos in this report were taken by Abe Herrera. Abe grew up in Ecudor and runs private kayaking trips through his company Boof Sessions. Check it out at:
http://www.ecuadorpaddling.com/

Spring Thaw: Water's Up in the Wallowas

Matt here, checking in after a long hiatus.  

The past couple weeks have seen increasing temperatures and some significant snowmelt, so it's time to get after the whitewater I've been thinking about all winter.  This waterfall was the first project this year.  Connor Ross, who's from La Grande, has been looking at this thing since he was a kid.  As a youngster, he had dreams about it and often wondered if it could be kayaked, rafted, tubed, or otherwise survived.  Conner, who also tends to be my best and only boating partner round these parts,  told me we had to go look at it soon after I moved here.  So off we went, last spring, to scout the thing.  It was winter and the water was low, but it looked alright and we knew the time would come when we'd have to give it a try.  Last summer, we checked several different flows, but none of them looked very good.  Between the tricky lead-in with a huge boil, the weird rib that parallels the current at the lip and the cave/wall combo at the bottom, this thing has a pretty small window of opportunity.

This year we knew had a feeling about what the right flow was, and we got a willing crew to come out east (Jacob, Andrew, and Scott Baker).  Fortunately, the flow was right and we got it done.  Connor and I even did a couple laps.  I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking for now.  Stay tuned for some sweet video footage!

The Top

 

 The Entrance

 The First Half

  

 The Finale

An Earth-bound quest for the celestial: Return to Wiki #1

Photo:  Emile Elliot

This creek has been gaining attention as the season nears its end.  The final quarter mile of boulder gardens (Smokin' Aces) has proved a force to be reckoned with.

Matt King runs Smokin' Aces on our initial exploration of the canyon last year.

 While this section of whitewater is fun, it is best experienced as icing on the cake after a run starting from Black Hole Falls.

One of the gorges on the middle section.

Photo: Matt King

For my third run of this creek, I joined a crew Andrew Bradley had conglomerated with high hopes of running Black Hole Falls.

For this trip John Edwards, Emile Elliot, Anna Herring, Andrew Bradley and myself camped at the take out the night before anticipating the adventure taking all day.  This approach turned out to be the right call as we hit snow almost 4 miles from the end of the road.  Emile got us 1/4 mile closer by some impressive charging in his truck, but sooner than later we resided ourselves to hiking the road.  Having anticipated this as a possibility, we dawned our various kayak shlepping devices and headed into the mountains.

Photo:  Emile Elliot

With only one short detour and a quick stop to fashion some low tech crampons for Andrew we arrived at the end of the road and the beginning of the bushwhack.

This is a lot steeper than I expected, are you sure that was the right road...?

3200'

Photo:  Emile Elliot

Andrew upgrading his footwear and testing them out.

Photos:  Emile Elliot

 Carrying kayaks down 30+ degree slopes is not something most people practice and this was apparent as we watched our precious hours of daylight tick by.  People pushed through the pain [Andrew had something colorful to say whenever we gave him a chance, we appreciated the positive moral :) ] and around two hours after starting our 3/4 mile bushwhack, we arrived at a bedrock laden creek.  There was a presence of wood in this upper section, but it was mostly out of the way and easy to deal with.

Put-in

Photo: Emile Elliot

We hiked upstream to run two fun bedrock slides before a short log portage placed us above another horizon.

First rapid, fun and straight forward.
photo: Emile Elliot

 The next half mile was horizon after horizon of easy, but oh so fun slides and ledges of all varieties.

Andrew lookin' fly
photo: Emile Elliot

Next two photos shot by Andrew Bradley

After leaving this series of fun rapids (The Asteroid Belt), a tributary came in on the right signaling the big falls.

This drop was tricky to scout, with an exposed climb right at the lip of the falls.  Andrew and I forgo this move and waited to hear back from the others.  On this day the falls was too low, with a green water landing (the landing itself is not visible from the scouting platform).  We made quick work of the climb to the trail on river right and took advantage by following the path to the pool below the falls.  We enjoyed the scene for awhile, paddling below the falls before continuing on.  Many more fun bedrock rapids continued, usually dropping about ten feet in various ways.

Two rapids stood out in this stretch.  The first was a fun double boof with a log below that made it a tricky undertaking, but everyone who ran it had upright lines.

Photo: Emile Elliot

 The next was a narrow slot-ledge on the right that looked pretty angry, which Emile apparently had no reservations towards.  He paddled right up and got stopped quickly by the hole at the base and began an impressive surf.  The boxed in hole below was not as wide as a boat is long, and he was pinned sideways twice, once upside down.  He fought through both of these, but once it was apparent he was not coming out in his boat, gave the signal and pulled his skirt.  We got him a rope and pulled him out using a non-traditional approach and were able to get him and his gear to shore safely.  We dubbed this one Solar Flare*.  Emile continued to lead the charge after this and we cruised down some read and run.

Shortly below here we came to the traditional put-in I had used before described in the initial trip report.  From here down it was apparent to me just how low the water was, as well as how low energy levels were becoming.    We took advantage of the trail once again to portage the V+ gorge and ran a few more good rapids that benefit a lot from twice the flow. We had the second swim of the day occur in a class two pin, really bringing to light the toll the long day had taken on us.   Eventually we reached the great wall signaling Smokin' Aces.  We ran the lead in and after recovering a paddle from an ill fated trip a few weeks back we found ways to get out on the right and look at the biggest boulder garden of the run.  The low water lead us walking around on the right.  There is also a wood sieve on the bottom left that was not there when Matt and I ran the drop on our first run.

We tried our best to keep it together through the last two boulder gardens, everyone fought hard, staying in their boats and soon enough we were walking through camp to nourishment at our cars!

Emile edited a video capturing many of the highlights of the trip, including his first swim in over ten years!


Wiki Creek #1 from Difficult E on Vimeo.

It was a long day and everyone was beat by the end.  Attitudes stayed positive the whole trip and the day went smoothly/according to plan.  Even the two swims were taken care of quickly. We also had a very small number of log portages, I only recall 2 or 3 near the beginning of our trip.  From the sounds of it, we all plan on returning sooner than later to once again enter the adventure, and see the rapids with more water.  I have chalked this up as my favorite trip of the year, and the satisfaction has kept me charging through mid-terms here at Western.  This trip has reminded me to never shy away from the unknown in favor of the known.  For I find the rewards of adventure far outweigh anything else I have done in a kayak.

photo: Andrew Bradley

*The solar cycle resulting in flare's is 11 years, and the last time Emile pulled his skirt was over a decade ago. 
 = Solar Flare is name of the drop


   -Jacob










cc@650
want cc 1,000-2,000
900 min.

Old Man McCoy

With a busy work week and an impending trip to California, I don't have the time to write up a full post, but I will say this:

McCoy Creek is cleaner than it has been in years!

Our crew of four put on the creek Saturday morning with trepidation. The Cispus was hovering right around 3100cfs, which would make McCoy higher than we had heard of people running it, and the last group who attempted the creek reported over 30 wood portages. Arriving at the put-in and seeing the creek wasn't in flood, we did a quick pow-wow and decided to to give er a go. We noted that there were no log portages in sight, a positive sign which strongly influenced our decision to put-on.

All in all, the creek was a blast. Plenty of big drops and unique rapids to keep you busy. We portaged logs 5 times on McCoy and Yellowjacket combined and none of the portages ruined rapids.

The flow turned out to be a double edged sword. The majority of the creek benefited from the extra water; however, Chinook Falls was too big for our taste. We opted to do an extended portage on river left that required a short rappel, but wasn't too taxing. Chinook, with the proper level, looks to be one of the best pieces of whitewater I've ever seen.

We ended up leaving our boats below the 25 foot vertical falls (just above the portage) and hiking off the creek when a member of our crew dislocated his shoulder. 3 of us returned the following day to retrieve our boats and finish the creek. Unfortunately, the one boat remains in the canyon. I carried the Jefe through a majority of the portage and anchored it to a tree just above the ledge that leads back down to creek level below the falls. For the time being, it serves as great marker to better signal the correct portage route.

I did shoot some video, which I'm hoping I can throw up here in the coming weeks.

Note: The very first rapid you hit after putting on is deceptive. It occurs at the first right bend in the creek bed. Two members of our group flushed into a nasty crack in the center of the river that isn't visible from above. Both disappeared for a good second or two and emerged upside down in the manky run out before rolling up. Run this drop on the far right to avoid a similar fate.

-Nate

Little Klickitat Video

Emile brought his helmet cam along on our recent trip to the Little Klickitat River.  He got a ton of footage and edited it down to just over 5 minutes.  

Trip report from Nate.

Here it is, thanks Emile!


  -Jacob

Little Klickitat@ Wahkiacus  ~1300

TR: Abiqua Creek headwaters

I was curious about seeing the uppermost section of Abiqua Creek, so hiked in 3.5 mile past the yellow gate on Crooked Finger Road, a good bit of which involved post holing through the snow to a confluence just downstream of a bridge (44.8781, -122.4453).

With 400 cfs in Butte Creek, this section was far too low.  But for me it was about seeing it, so despite it being rough on my boat and hitting more rocks than boofs, I enjoyed myself.  The rapids were almost entirely boulder gardens. 

Access:  Follow Crooked Finger road until you hit the yellow gate.  Hike 3.5 miles and put in.

Take out at the spur road on river right that hits river level around Abiqua Lake 44.8832, -122.4993, or continue 5 more miles to Abiqua falls 44.9263, -122.5675.

THERE IS A NEW GATE ON CROOKED FINGER ROAD.  IT IS LOCATED HERE
44.9278, -122.5405

From this gate the hike into this section would be just shy of 7 miles.

Story:  At the end of the day I left my boat down at river level and walked up to Crooked Finger Rd, with plans to jog upstream to my car at the yellow gate.  About the time I hit Crooked Finger a Sheriff pulled up and asked if I wanted a ride.  I set my adult beverage down and hopped in.  He was asking about my kayaking and what my name was, when I said "Jacob" he replied "Cruser?".  This seemed like it couldn't possibly be heading anywhere positive, but he explained we had been corresponding with via email about his team wanting to float the creek looking for illegal netting operations.  That lowered my nerves back down to normal and I learned how it was challenging for him and his fellow sheriffs to patrol the area.  Apparently every 4th person up there has a warrant, and with spotty reception and radio coverage it's a risky job patrolling the area and arresting those people.  This risk for law enforcement played a role in the new gate (2018) that went up on Crooked Finger road, blocking access to Butte Creek Falls from that road and the area higher up in the drainage.  As a kayaker, this closure causes me real pain.  But it's not hard to see things from the perspective of law enforcement either, or Weyerhaeuser, who stood to loose millions of dollars if one of the illegal fires that were being set got loose into their timberland.  It's been rough seeing access to so many areas I was able to freely enjoy so much just 5-10 years ago getting blocked off.  I guess we have human nature to blame.

   -Jacob