A little brush dodging and
one high quality drop under our belts led to us hiking out. This
section was steeper and mankier than Ben remembered, and we hiked out
to the road. At least we got one good one in.
We
were back minus one after a much needed break on Christmas day. Water
had dropped a bit and Ben and I were off to get back on Patterson
Creek, in slightly colder weather. We decided to put-in at a previously
used halfway point. Ben said we would miss one really good rapid, but
avoid a lot of hiking, something I liked the sound of. It was 11:00 by
the time we reached the abandoned road to the put-in, and we quickly
geared up and headed off down the road in a flurry of wet snow.
It’s a shame that the hike to most runs isn’t
downhill, it certainly makes it go by fast. The weather and the put-in
road, snow elevation dropped quite a bit during the weekend.
Ben led the way down the road until there was a
log across
it, and from
there we dropped off the side and did a combination of hiking and
sliding to the water. Right where we were started off with a nice set
of small slides and waterfalls, but ending up in a logjam that was
lacking an eddy, quite a shame. These cleaned up the next year and gave
us access to several thrilling drops at the put in.
Devin
Knight gets into the goods.
Nothing like two nice slides back to back.
Putting in below this set of rapids we
bumped our way down into a quick log portage, then an extended scout.
The rapid itself looked sweet, this picture only shows the bottom
¼ of the rapid. It started off with a bunch of clean slides
leading into this little fall that was infested with a tragic piece of
wood, ruining the whole rapid once again.
The pace after this was rather slow, low volume
junky
rapids with lots
of log portages. Eventually we came upon a fun ledge drop that Ben runs
in this video.
We
were off to run some more junk,
interspersed with fun drops like
this.
Eventually while portaging some wood ended up on
the right
back and on
another abandoned road. This road would probably be a better put-in
than the one we used, unless all the wood was cleared out. We put-back
on the water right above this twisty little waterfall.
Jon runs the
twisty waterfall.
The next waterfall
looks more than
a little dubious.
Right
below the falls we
eddied out and portaged around a nice
waterfall that had some logs all the way across the lip that would make
it super sketchy. A bit more mank carried on for a while, when all the
sudden we came upon a large horizon line and hopped out on the right.
This is a pretty sweet spot, you can climb perhaps 20-30 yards and you
are on a ridge between two drainages that have a confluence immediately
below. You can see rapids on one side, then walk 20’ and see
rapids on the other creek as well. Ben led the way down this
30-35’ off vertical waterfall, the confluence drop.
Ben
works the photography angle for me
and makes it look huge as I run
it from right to middle.
Less water, better weather.
After the confluence drop the run suddenly got quite classic, and we
did quick scouts and signals to run down several fun waterfalls.
The
log in this one is gone, opening
up the left boof.
Ben
about to go deeper than expected.
Following this drop was a huge, quite long section
of
boogie water that
could have used a bit more water. We bumped our way down it getting
quite cold in the process. Eventually it turned back into bedrock and
we eddied out to scout this rapid, here is the first 1/3 of the rapid.
From the eddy this rapid looks absolutely
horrible, but
after a
scramble up the hillside it looked like a go, although it had a
terrible pocket that it would be wise to avoid. Here is Ben in the
bottom 1/3 of the rapid, it was actually one of the best on the run,
and the last real rapid before take-out. The last time I did this run,
in 2008, something changed in the bottom rapid and it looks terrible
from all angles.
[Spring 06: this run is now a relative classic and portages have
dropped to 5-6]
In fall '05 and our 7-12 portages it took us from 11 at the put-in to a
4:00 take-out. At that time I didn't consider it a classic, but a lot
of wood cleaned up since then. The mini gorge after the confluence
rapid is undoubtedly classic, and I am sure I will do this run again.
We did it with the
Scott at 3,000, and found the
flow was medium, but
good for the current wood situation.
Beautiful
video of Crapo, Patterson, and Dillon.