2003 Cali-Trip

Scheduled to leave out with Ray and Kyle this afternoon for Cali. Heavy rain in the Ozarks overnight lead to all three of us deciding to do some local creekin' and postpone the trip for a day. We met up with Fish, Noel, Billy and Mike for the first descent of Boen Gulf Branch. Great Ozark creek with the highlight being 25+ foot Paradise Falls. Rained hard on us at the take-out, so Mike, Ray and I hiked up and ran the first known descent of the natural bridge/cave on Clark Creek in Lost Valley.

Rained again during the night. Ray and Kyle decided to stay home to finish up packing and last minute chores that were previously scheduled during our Boen Gulf run. I met up with a big group for a run down Boss Hollow. Had to pass on the follow-up run on Bobtail to drive home to meet Kyle and Ray. We were loaded and leaving Little Rock by 7:30 pm heading West.

Drove straight through to Santa Fe, NM. Arrived at put-in to Rio Santa Cruz around 9:30 am. Dropped off boats, drove to take-out. Met two local boaters taking off. Hitched shuttle and got pointers on the main drops. Great short run, continuous class III-IV. 1 mile, 200 ft drop. Got sand washed in my ears due to a pin/flip near the bottom of the run. Left Rio Santa Cruz drove to Flagstaff for dinner at one of the downtown joints. Drove all night to just West of Barstow.

After a 2-hour nap at a rest area, I discover connector on GPS cable breaks, leaving Street Atlas impaired. Will just have to manually interpret the gps position on the map. Arrived at Kern River around 7:00am. Hooked up with Chris from San Franciso area and ran Brush Creek. 1.5 mile, 550 ft drop, level was medium-low?. Great slides and two nice waterfalls ~15 feet. Ray discovers that the helmet cam is malfunctioning and now won't work at all. Camped at put-in at remote primitive Camp Rincon.

Awoke to two deer checking out the put-in. Started checking rack system on Kyle's Yukon and find that they need major overhaul. Drive to Kernville to buy drill and parts, Ray orders new helmet cam. Drive back to find put-in to Dry Meadow Creek by 3:00pm. Brushy, boney 1 mile paddle with some portages to get down to the Teacups. Portaged the nasty slot above the teacups. WHAT A PLACE! Breathtaking scenery, not to mention the gradient. Tough portage around first slide to avoid the undercut ledge right above the first tecup. First drop straight forward 10+ footer. Second drop is tall and looked tricky, 15+ footer. Third drop is Superfreak, 20+ footer with a twisting slot entrance. Fourth drop is straight 15 footer, Fifth drop is slide down right to avoid hole on left. Last drop is straight 10+ footer. Ray flipped at bottom of #1 and rolled just in time to go over #2, I blew my line at #2, flipped and tweaked my shoulder. Kyle found the curler at Superfreak, #3. Bottom 3 drops were clean fun. Awesome drops below the teacups force a sketchy portage down several hundred feet of steep granite slabs. Finish with a 2-mile paddle on the end of the Forks of the Kern with big water, ~1700 cfs, and 2 of the 4 have clean runs through Carson Falls.

Drive through Sequoia NF over and down the Tule River to get to the NF Kaweah. One sweet creek. Level was probably medium low, guessing 500-700 cfs. Due to late arrive, we didn't hike up to run the upper section, so we put-in at the Sequoia National Park boundary. Lots of good boulder drops reminiscent of Bobtail but longer, much longer, plus some slide drps. Portage around impressive Cherry Falls was slippery. Later, found out it was runnable, but the ledge half way down looked iffy. Ray had minor pin and Chris got surfed in a couple holes. Left at dusk on our way to the Kings River area. Found nice camp spot next to main Kings.

Met Steve from Tahoe, who was camped next to us and ran the North Fork Kings at ~1000 cfs. Put-in ~.5 miles upstream on Dinkey Creek to a mile down on the Main Kings. Big Water Class IV-V. Kyle found his swimming skills after hitting the meat of the hole at Spirit Falls. Everyone had a small working at some point during the day. Camped again at the Kings. Saw our first clouds of the trip, a few high ones that cleared by nightfall.

North Fork of Mokelumne (Tiger Dam run). Nice class III-IV run with on big IV+ drop at the end at ~1200 cfs. Met Kyle and Noah, BLM rangers, who ran shuttle and paddled with us in official capacity. Scenery was more like home with lots of lush diverse vegetation. Lots of hardwoods with nice granite river bed. Left for Auburn to hook up with Josh.

Headed up to the South Yuba for the Hwy 49 to Bridgeport run. 7+ miles of BIG water class IV-V at ~1500 cfs. Lots of hole punching and stern moves. I rolled 3 times just running stuff, but avoided getting caught in the big holes. Beautiful run with a nice walled-in bedrock gorge. Put-in and Take Out are State Park, Take Out has the longest covered bridge in the States. Ray's buddy Ryan met us at the River and we drove back to Nevada City just a few miles from the river and Ray set us up with his buddy Jerry. We went over to his parent’s place, which is a spectacular house in the woods with a creek out the back door. Jerry had T-bone steaks hot off the grill when we arrived! Looking forward to a shower and another great day tomorrow. Kyle finally got a hold of Jake, but Josh hadn't made it back from work. Will try to hook up with them tomorrow.

Finally got a hold of Josh. Met Josh, Jake and Jeremy and we all headed to Pauley Creek. The creek was pumping at a good level 300-500 cfs. Lots of fast big class III-IV action, with some large drops. A 6-ft ledge and 20+ footer at the take-out. Ryan lost his boat portaging the first big drop and hiked out after recovering it. I threw some ends in a ledge drop in the Micro, or it was more like the hole throwing me for ends? Ryan rigged the cataraft and dropped the big one at the take-out for some redemption. Pizza was great on the river bank of the North Yuba in Downieville. Camped along the North Yuba.

Ran the Goodyear Bar section of the North Yuba with Ryan along on his cat at ~3000 cfs. Big water class III with a couple of big class IV-V at the end. Drove back to Auburn and camped along the NF American with Josh, Jake and Lindsey.

Awoke to some clouds and one or two rain drops. Clouds clear by mid-day and we headed to the Chamberlain Falls section of the NF American with some other folks from the raft company. Big class IV water at ~2500 cfs. Missed a boof and got trashed in a hole for a while, rolled up just before the raft came in on top of me! Missed another boof and got a big stern ender just above a big ledge hole. Cleaned the last big drop and found my boof at a nice spot in one of the last drops. Josh and Jake made a bomb run again to retrieve my camera left at the play spot. Got some of the photos developed, many turned out great.

Last full day in Cali. I demoed a Flipstick from Sierra Outdoors and we hooked up with Jake for a play run on the South Fork American (Chilli Bar Section) at ~5000 cfs. Nice big waves for wheeling and surfing. Packed all our stuff up for the flight home tomorrow.

Back to work. Notice the rain move across Newton County. Decide that I need to ease back into work and not overdo it on the first day. Take the afternoon to catch a run on Richland Creek. See a bear run across the road near Falling Water Falls on the drive home.