TR: Spring Rains hit the SE - Part 2: Yellow Creek, NC
Yellow Creek is a small tributary to the Cheoah river in far SW North Carolina. During the often crowded summer dam release days on the Cheoah I'd wondered what lurked just around the corner, upstream, deep in that Rhododendren infested gorge. Its a little creek you pass on river right - right after land of holes.. I've been trying to catch it with enough flow for the last two seasons. Its about a 4-5 hour drive from me, and with about a 12 hour window after a good rain this makes it nearly impossible to catch.
The week long onslaught of rains continued last Saturday night and I decided to give it a shot again, after getting skunked on it who knows how many times over the past year and a half.
Before doing anything I drove down to look at the gauge and it read 1.4, rumor was that 1 ft was the minimum. Its pouring rain as well. It was just before dark so I had to hope it would hold for in the morning. I talked to some guys at the takeout who informed me that the 20 footer was no longer clean and that they believed 1.2 was probably a realistic minimum. They backed up their claim for the "not so clean" 20 footer by showing me the destroyed bow of a Pyranha burn, and another in their party claiming to have "glanced a rock in the landing". This was not what I wanted to hear, but I got some info from them and decided I could figure it out tomorrow.
After setting up camp about a mile away and listening to the on and off overnight rains in my tent I woke up about 630 and drove down to the gauge to find it surging between 1.3-1.4. The creek had held due to the overnight rains but would drop fast today.
Yellow Creek is a classic scene of a Southeastern Micro Creek. Rhododendren vines, riverwide strainers, and a small shallow riverbed that made you wonder if it was possible to kayak down this creek you were about to slide into. Then you pass a few tributaries and small feeder streams, eventually come around a blind corner somewhere and these creeks open up into impressive little gorges and its full-on from there.
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This went on for a while, pushing through Rhodo, ducking logs, and portaging a riverwide beaver dam in the very lush poison ivy forest that lined the banks. Finally we came around a left bend in the river and were treated with a view of what looked like a small slide and there was a visible eddy below.
I felt comfortable catching the eddy so I ran the slide so I could begin scouting the next horizon line. Looking back up from the eddy:
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The next drop was a huge slide with two tiers to it. The entrance slide went down a tongue and through a hole, then you had to limbo under a log, then angle right for the fast ride down the bigger section of the slide which was fast, bumpy, and long.
Jeff finishing the log limbo maneuver and heading down the second drop of the slide:
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Looking back up (you really can't see the top half of the slide):
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Around the next corner was an interesting boulder garden that ended with a few short, low angle slides that were good fun.
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The next clean eddy downstream had a huge horizon line behind it. This left no doubt that the "not so clean" 20 footer was just downstream. I'm not sure what happened but this drop has been called "clean" by guidebooks, and the AW page. People used to hike up just to huck this drop. The conversation with the group at the takeout the night before and the destroyed boat had me concerned that it wasn't clean anymore. Maybe they just penciled in way too deep and the drop was still "clean" as long as you didn't pencil straight to the bottom. Well, easy to assume but when you're looking at 20 ft to rock its hard to trust an assumption.
I knew there was a clean line and that it was to the left of where the second guy in their group ran -as the third said he had a clean landing there. Somewhere near the center of the drop but obviously not the rocks on the left.
I finally decided that I would run just left of center and aim to land just missing the exposed rocks on river left. That would keep me far away from whatever those guys hit in the pool on right/right center. The nature of the drop makes it very, very hard to maintain a boof so that wasn't a reliable option.
A look down from river right:
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The entrance reactionary didn't push right as much as I expected. I ended up angling right in order to get where I wanted to be at the lip and had to take a last second adjustment to the get the left boat angle I wanted going off. Unfortunately the scramble at the lip to be where I wanted to be completely killed any chance of good form for photo-slutting going off the drop, but the most important thing was my angle and boat placement....assuming I hit the spot I wanted and the landing was clean. I went off the lip where I wanted to be and the landing was fluffy and I resurfaced hard to the left.
Going off still making adjustments:
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Resurfacing safely toward the left:
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Jeff went off the drop maybe 12" or so to the right of where I was and angled right. The underwater rock quickly destroyed his paddle:
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Clean 20 footer? I think not...
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A look back upstream from below, this is the type of view that keeps you coming back. I doesn't matter how many rhododendrens you bushwhack through, poison ivy you brush, or how many times you bust your ass on steep muddy portages...when you sit on a rock and look up at this its all worth it:
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Below the 20 footer the pace picked up quickly, there was a little boulder garden drop, then three 10-15 ft slides which were a lot of fun:
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Right after these slides were what looked like a couple of fun drops that ended in a sieved out chute/slide with no eddy above. This looked pretty nasy, take your choice - strainer or sieve. (The sieve is just under the boulder I'm standing on and you can see the water going between it and the smaller boulder). There is also an underwater piton rock guarding the left line, even if that strainer wasn't there.
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There were a few more class IV ish drops before it emptied into the Cheoah. But the water level seemed to have dropped on us a bit and while these drops were completely "runnable", it looked more like boat abuse than fun. We were already on the trail after portaging the sieve and the last few drops didn't look "worth it" to walk back down and run. So we walked about another 100 yards down the trail to our car parked where the creek goes under US 129 and into the Cheoah.
A couple more shots:
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Yellow Creek was definitely worth the adventure. I've been wanting it for a long time, probably ever since I've gotten into class V creeking. I want to go back though with a medium-high flow as I think those last couple drops will clean up really nice and you could bomb right into the Cheoah after running them all back to back. I'm thinking 1.6-1.8 would be a nice fluffy flow for this creek, probably starting to get a little scary above that as I'm sure eddies would be very scarce.
We probably should have ran the last few manky drops, but with all the recent rain and good flows we've paddled on it just didn't seem worth it. Especially since a high water Cheoah run waited just below. Which was great fun, that river should always release at 1500+...its completely different and actually has the miles of continuous big water character its known for.
What a great week, hopefully the rains continue into the summmer. Its about time this drought ended around here. :D
