Winter

Winter in Boone is usually pretty frigid and this year was no exception. It was actually the snowiest winter on record, which made for some great backcountry and campus skiing, but not so great for boating. I don't mind boating in the cold, but for a large portion of the winter everything was just frozen over. I am going to focus on kayaking in this post and do a different one about skiing later.

I left off the last post at about Christmas break so thats where i'll pick up with this one.  I went home to Georgia for break, so fortunately it was warmer and not frozen over like Boone so we got some good boating done.

First thing we got on was the Chauga Gorge, which parallels the Chattooga, near Long Creek, SC. It was pretty low water when we were there, but there were a few fun rapids, with the highlight definitely being "super socemdog" a rapid that resembles socemdog on the Chattooga.  Well at this low level it wasn't really anything like it, but it was a rather epic boof. Pics for proof:

Mac Mcgee

Stomping it out

The next day, me, my brother, Paul Griffin, Jay Mahan, Greg Watson, and Robbie Gilson headed to Little River Canyon in Alabama.  The Canyon is probably one of my favorite runs anywhere. It has awesome rapids and boofs in a really unique canyon, unlike many other places in the east. It also has a lot of scary undercuts and sieves, so you have to be on your A game.  

Most of us went to the Suicide section, while my brother put on lower down for the upper 2 section, where we would meet him and keep going down. The suicide is the uppermost mile and a half of rapids with the hardest rapids, then the upper 2 is the next 2 miles that are slightly easier, with 2 solid class V's to its own name.  It also has about the best mile of class IV boogie anywhere. We met up with a few other people at the put in and had a group of about 10 going down. There was one swim at Pinball, but other than that everyone had good lines, and the first timers had a really good time.

Everyone routing through above cable falls

Coming through Cable Falls (photo ben)

Paul on the paddle out

Me, Paul, Jay, Mac, and Robbie also got on Overflow Creek in Georgia. It was my first time, this was a run I had been trying to get on for a long time and never got the opportunity too.  It lived up to every way I imagined it, its a really classic, quality run for sure. Marginal Monster was the highlight for sure for me, its probable one of my favorite rapids now, its a longer, technical rapids with some really good moves and boofs. 

Unfortunately this is the only picture we got from the day while trying to get Jay's boat out the cave

After getting back up to Boone, there was not a whole lot of boating to be done, buy myself and Tyler Mayo tried to get out one day. We found the Watauga to have much too ice to be safe to boat.

Watauga put in

We decided to go try Wilson Creek, but on the way over there we stopped and looked at Trashcan Falls. It was frozen over solid and looked really cool.

At Wilson Creek, we found not too much ice, but low water. We put on and had a good, but slightly sketchy run. Ice undercuts were about, but we made it through. 

Ice was thick in some spots, I portages this while Tyler tried to run it, below. He got pinned.

Tyler routing through the ice bridge, he got pinned but freed himself

The frozen over rapid

Trashcan Falls is a big multi-move, multi tiered drop on Laurel Creek, a tributary of the Watauga, right beside the put-in to section 3. I scouted in within the first week of being in school up here and had seen videos of a few people running it. I passed it up once due to really high water, but it finally came in at a good level one day, and Colin Hunt convinced me to go check it out with him. We both fired it up with good lines! 

A few days later I went back to Trashcan with Will Stubblefield and he fired it up with a sweet line. Thankfully were out of the drought from the past few years, it was the first chance Will had got to run the falls.

In mid January I finally got a chance to get on the Raven Fork, near Cherokee, NC. I had been waiting to get on this creek for 6 months, ever since I got back from Colorado, I felt I was ready. Well everything finally came together, and after a night in Cullowhee, myself, Mac Mcgee, Colin Hunt, and Jay Mahan headed over there. 

After leaving a note (because of the time) and some cash (because none of us were 21) we headed to the put in.  On the hike in, I was really excited to finally get on this river. I had been psyching myself up ever since we decided to go there, and I was ready. I knew I had the skills to be there, I had waited for a long time.

On a side note, the Raven Fork probably has the coolest names for rapids anywhere. Think about it, Lord of the Rings, Headless Horseman, Wet Willy, Big Boy, Atomic Supercollider, Mike Tysons Punchout, Caveman, what other river has as many cool names as that??

Jay and Colin hiking in

 After warming up on Lord of the Rings, we got to Anaconda and scouted. After a quick look, me and Mac got in our boats and ran it. Both of us had good lines, and once this rapid was out of the way, I was on, and super excited for the rest of the run.  Jay and Colin also fired it up after seeing me and Mac.

Mac

                                       

Me

Jay

We found this perfectly round bowling ball sized rock while scouting.

Anaconda

Next was Headless Horseman, another really fun rapid that involves a boof over a hole and avoiding an undercut on the left.

Me

Me boofing over the hole

Colin entering headless horseman

Jay in Mortal Combat

When we got down to Wet Willy, Mac told us to follow him over this "kinda slide thing" and to just follow him and keep our elbows in. I knew what it was once I got to the lip, but I definitely clipped my elbow on the rock near the bottom and since I neglected to bring my elbow pads, ended up with a chipped elbow bone! Oh well.

We got down to Big Boy and scouted. It was a good Big Boy level, around 8 inches, but after 15 minutes of scouting I had to walk away. Its not going anywhere, i'll wait until I am more comfortable.  Mac decided to fire it up though, and had a sweet line!

At the lip

Tucking up into the curtain

After portaging Big Boy, we put in to run Mike Tyson's Punchout. I flipped above the final drop when I hit the rock, but rolled up immediately and ran it backwards, but I got a good boof and actually planed out into the pool. Mac Jay and Colin followed with good lines.

Me in the ring with Mike Tyson

Caveman was an even better boof than it looks in the pictures, me and Mac blue angeled through it with good lines. I got out on the cave rock to take a few photos of Jay and Colin and ended up pulling them both out of the cave with Mac's help, one after the other! Its pretty easy to get sucked in there. 

Colin at Caveman

After this and the mangler portage, there are a few more fun smaller rapids to the takeout, where we talked with Emmanuel for a while, and then headed back to Cullowhee. The Raven Fork lived up to my every expectation, its a beautiful gorge with some of the most amazing rapids ever. I felt like I was ready for it for sure, and I am glad I waited a while to get on it, it made it that much better to finally do.

After two boat abusive laps on the cascades the next day, we headed back to Boone. 

Ravens Fork

A week or two after getting back to Boone, we got a good rainstorm on top of some snow and got on the Laurel Fork of the Doe again, this time a little lower than the last, but still a good level for everything. This time it was a much bigger group consisting of myself, Mac, Colin, Edgar Peck, Will Stubblefield, and Eli Smith. We put on in the snow, and it was really cold. All of the rapids in the gorge went well and everyone had good lines. We had to pull a tree out of Darwin's Hole, in order to make it runnable. If we couldn't have gotten it out we probably would have had to hike out, or do some kind of portage from hell with ropes and rappelling, because this is one of the only real-deal unportageable rapids in the southeast.

Getting the log out

 Will coming out of the newly cleaned out rapid, and into the inner sanctum of the gorge

After bombing through the rest of the gorge, we arrived at Laurel Falls, which Mac first-descented on our last run.  He and Eli scouted it for a long time while the rest of us decided to walk. Eli went first and had a great line, he styled it for the 2nd descent.

Eli on Laurel Falls

Mac was next and I missed the shot of him regrettably because he pitoned at the top and almost went over the handlebars onto his face! But he brought it back and landed about sideways in the pool, fortunately not flat though. He rolled up and was fine, but maybe a little shaken up. It would have made for an epic picture!!

That about wraps up winter, it was a good one and I got on some good runs I had been wanting to do even though a lot of NC was frozen over the majority of the time. Bring on the warmer weather!

- Clay