River Rats? Ron Knipling, Arlington river guru, wrote: Right now the rivers in your area are running at very close to average for this time of year. Even with a lot of rain, rivers drop fast once you get into summer and fall. If you click on the link below, you get a color-coded map of WV which shows most rivers are at normal levels. Click on the "Streamflow Table" and you will get current readings vs. long-term averages for gauges like Great Cacapon on the Cacapon, Moorefield on the Moorefield, and Springfield on the South Branch. Springfield is actually a bit under average. But this has been a great year for canoeing and kayaking. Rivers have been above average for most of the year. A lot of the smaller, hard-to-catch streams have been at runnable levels much more than usual. Below is a canoe club newsletter story I wrote about paddling the upper North above Rio, a rare treat. SYOR (See you on the river) Ron waterdata.usgs.gov/wv/nwis/rt Upper North River WV Don’t fear the turtle!!! By Ron Knipling Steve Ettinger’s new book Capital Canoeing and Kayaking describes the Class 2-3 upper North River WV above Rio as “well-known if seldom paddled.” We need to change that and make it well-known and frequently paddled! As frequently as water levels would permit, that is. You need a lot of rain and water to catch this terrific stretch of whitewater. On Friday May 10 I was planning to just paddle a Class 1-2 section below Rio by myself with a bike shuttle. But I heard from Pete and Sheila Chapelle expressing an interest, which gave me the “assault team” needed to do something a little more exciting. I thought that we might have a chance at catching the thrilling upper North, which I had paddled twice, many years past. There had been a lot of rain in previous days and area gauges were up: Cootes Store = 4.9’/900cfs; Great Cacapon = 6.8’/4,000cfs; Brandywine = 3.5’/700cfs; Cedar Creek = 3.6’/430cfs, and Waites Run = 4.2’/70cfs. We met downstream on Rt. 50 at Hanging Rock, and drove up the North River valley through Delray and toward Rio. If you have been properly acculturated as an honorary West Virginian, you know that Rio is pronounced “Rye-O,” not “Ree-O.” I didn’t really think the stream would have water above Rio, but I wanted to show Pete and Sheila “something interesting” located upstream of the village. As we drove through Rio and upstream, we could see that the stream was running at a beautiful level. That “something interesting” is a rare Yellow-Striped Giant Green Creek Turtle which makes its permanent home in the middle of the creek about two miles above Rio. As soon as we got there, we knew that we had to paddle out and kiss the turtle. Besides, the water was irresistible. That would be the put-in. The upper North was running at about 3” above minimum, though many rapids seemed higher. We ran about 3 miles to the bridge below Rio, and this was probably the best 3 miles of paddling I’ve experienced in recent years. The gradient, per Ettinger, is 48’/mile. Most rapids were Class 2+ boulder gardens, spaced evenly throughout the run. There would be 50-100 yards of engaging rapids followed by 50 yards or so of easy water to set up for the next one. There were no strainers on this 3-mile run; I don’t even recall dodging a tree branch. The run was not without risk, though, because it had three ledges with dangerous reversal hydraulics. The first was a paved ford, the second a natural ledge, and the third a paved ford beneath a footbridge. We carried or sneaked all three of these; I think that the last one could have been safely runnable but the first two were dangerous, each featuring a wide band of hungry, back-flowing water below the drop. The run ended too soon. We wanted to add a few mellow miles of Class 1-2 below Rio, but, after a search, it appeared that the only legal take-out access would add 5-6 miles to the run. An intense thunderstorm further convinced us to call it a rare and memorable day.
Posted on: Sat, 06 Jul 2013 12:51:28 +0000
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