Darin McQuoid Photography

Middle Fork American
Below French Meadow
Class V?

82° F is the average temperature in Sacramento on May 22nd. You couldn't ask for a better average temperature for doing a flow study. Through the cooperation of American Whitewater and Placer County Water Agency that's our date to see if the Middle Fork American River below French Meadows Reservoir is good for kayaking. The L.L. Anderson dam construction started in 1964 and due to the efficiency of the system, it rarely if ever spills. We'll have eleven miles of unknown river to complete in one day. The gradient looks manageable, but it'll be a long day so we head up the night before. The team is Charlie Centers, Macy Burnham, Thomas Moore and the obligatory photographer; me.

We'll store Macy Burnham's truck at Middle Fork Interbay.

Apparently these custom made turbines cost a cool million dollars. Thomas Moore thinks it's pretty neat.

PWCA gives us a lift to French Meadow Reservoir at ~5,000'. Temperatures seem below the seasonal average.

French Meadows Reservoir as dusk sets in.

There is good news, PWCA has a nice lodge that was used to house workers in the dam building era. It's quite nice, decor era correct.

To maximize our chances for a successful flow study we rise at five, to be greeted by a beautiful but not so charming view considering the circumstances.

We'll put in at a gauging station a quarter mile below the dam. It's going to be an interesting day.

The issue is rain turned to snow and it's all frozen to the kayaks. The only solution is to dunk them in the river.

Thanks to Kokatat, Macy Burnham has all the right gear for a below freezing expedition.

We put on but only too soon are out to portage. Due to ice and snow, every time we walk it's a slow, painful process that is happening all too often due to an incredible amount of wood. Two hours into the run and maybe a mile downstream, Charlie Center is passed Macy's boat.

I don't take many photographs, we have eleven miles to cover and are not moving fast enough.

A nice boof is had by Macy Burnham.

The riverbed has good character, unfortunately most of the lines are full of wood. Macy Burnham charges through a branch to boof into a large rapid.

Continuing from above, Macy ducks a log to go through a big hole and dodge a few more logs. This is be the cleanest decent sized rapid we've run so far.

Around the bend it's a blowdown across the river. Trees as far as we can see. It's time to look at progress. We've gone under two miles in three hours. If our rate of progress continues we should be at take out in thirteen to fourteen hours if nothing goes wrong. So we should hit the interbay around midnight. We discuss the options. As a flow study we didn't get a thumbs up to do it as an overnight run. Plus the water will be turned off tonight. The choice is simple, as all we can see downstream is a succession of portages. Spending a night without gear in these conditions is out of the question.

Macy Burnham makes the call to let PWCA know we'll be hiking out

PWCA has hired a helicopter for the day to keep track of our progress and help if things go wrong. We hike a logging clearing and by random chance the pilot is flying by on his way up the river.

The pilot informs us that he's been hired for a set amount of hours regardless and doesn't mind flying us down the canyon before heading back to the dam. Initially the river is full of wood for a few more miles.

Then it looks interesting.

Back at the dam Charlie Center unloads and we wait for the rest of the team and boats to be picked up.

Perfect weather.

On this one we don't feel too bad about turning back with the conditions. Charlie Center and Alex Wolfgram returned a week later, putting in a bit lower than where we pulled out (I think) and had this to say: "It ended up being a great run. Nothing large, but consistent 5-20 foot drops, a lot of bedrock."

Google Map with Put-In and Take-Out for where I believe Charlie and Alex put on.

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