Playin in the Backyard

Brett making the most of the day under the rising full moon

Paddling alone on the Potomac gives one an amazing sense of freedom and oneness with the surroundings. It is a great opportunity to reconnect with nature and align one's senses. Just the thought of the perpetuality of rivers flow carving its way from the hills of the Shenandoah valley, from the feeder streams of the North River where I remember falling in love with the water and just learning to negotiate its intricacies with the edges of my kayak and the blades of my paddle.

The days are getting longer and lighter, the air and water are getting warmer and the Potomac has some good water in it. A few weeks ago center chute was in for almost a week, that was a nice surprise, a few days of wave, then a wavehole, then a great hole at 5.3ft. Days like these make sitting at work very very difficult. Its also days like this when I am so thankful to have such a resource as the Potomac so close to home and my office. I have been out paddling 5 of the last 7 days. After work and before work kayaking keep my sanity in this otherwise barren concrete covered wasteland.

Curt at Center Chute hole Photo: potomacpaddlers.com

I spent lots of time today reflecting on the last year. Many good times come to mind. One of which being the local run. The Potomac will be missed...long summer days on the Falls. 80 degree water, 95 degree heat and 95 degree humidity. It was truly a great feeling crawling up the scorching hot rocks on the flake to get in another lap on the Falls with you best buds.

Yesterday we had a crew out at the Overflow Chanel that was recently cleared of wood in the high water last month. Its been years since this has been cleared enough to run. Scott ran it this weekend and after watching him bang up his new boat and Geoff break a paddle I wasnt too psyched to get on it. Not to mention I was trying out a boat from Scott and was not at all fitting me right. The drop looks fun and runnable, I just want to wait for a bit more water to pad things out and get my boat dialed in.

Ian shreddin it at Center Chute Photo: potomacpaddlers.com

Great Falls around 5 feet

Another Weekend in the Woods

Wonder Falls

The levels were dropping last week from the lack of rain and or snowmelt so Ian, (currently the jobless wanderer) and Brett, (the highschool teacher on spring break) were able to get out of town a few days earlier than Billy or I. They were able to get two beautiful days out on the Lower Big Sandy and a run on the Top Yough before I even got out there.

Tyler and I arrived at the Jenkinsburg bridge takeout around 11pm to a small shanty of vehicles and tarps. I added another vehicle and a tarp or two to the mix and we had a nice shelter from the drizzling rain. Friday night was a fun evening that involved wine, beer, Natural Light, Cuban Cigaritos, beer funnels and 12 frat kids. Thats right we were sharing the woods with 12 frat pledges from WVU who were wielding one of everything from the Wal-Mart camping section including an axe, a 12-gauge, 150 hotdogs, 12 cases of Natty Light, and 2 handles of cheap vodka.

We were slow getting going in the morning which was fine because we were waiting on some of Brett's friends to join us. We ran shuttle in my truck and has 7 boats, people and gear in my poor little rig driving out of the Cheat Canyon, it was great!

Tyler at the Lip

Billy enjoying airtime. Photo: Brett MA

Saturday turned out to be a very nice March day complete with sunshine and laps on Wonder Falls. We took our time and enjoyed the run, some of the folks had never been on the Lower Big Sandy.

Men in Skirts...lots of them Photo Brett MA

Billy scouted Big Splat for about 2.5 to 3 hours, but finally bucked up and ran it in his playboat. Nice work dude!

Waiting and scouting in anticipation

Nice work Billy!

Jeff from Roanoke had an interesting swim at the Big Splat seal launch and his buddy pegged him in the head after he had emerged from the cave and was relatively safe.

Tyler and someone else at First Island

After running shuttle we poured a sip out on the gravel road for our fallen comrade, Johnny Haddock, in hopes that tax season might soon end and he may soon have his life back.

We met Scott at Perkins for some quality eating and then headed to Pine Ridge shelter to camp. Billy got all cynical and Buddhist for a while and Ian added some depressing Avett Brothers tunes to the mix.

Scott, Tyler and I made another fire in the rain, and drank a few brews to wid down the evening.

We awoke Sunday morning to and inch of snow and fridged temperatures. Bouldering was out of the question so Billy, Brett, and Ian headed back to town, while Scott Tyler and I hit the laundromat in Friendsville to dry out some gear. I blew my neck gasket which sucked, but I actually got a loaner drydeck from John Mason of Mountain Surf for the day, which was really killer and a life saver.

Too cold for any pictures on Sunday!

All photos can be seen here:

http://www.theperpetualflow.com/gallery/4530941_wzX9T#P-1-28

A Trip to the Doctor...Seneca Creek

I was not feeling well enough to go to work yesterday, which convieniently happened to be the morning after a HUGE rainfall and snowmelt in West Virginia. I met Scott, Billy and Nathan at the takeout for Seneca Creek around midnight. I have wanted to get on Seneca Creek for quite a while. It is a long, remote, wilderness run deep in a gorge running off the tallest mountain in West Virginia, Spruce Knob. It does not run very often and when it does you have to be right there to catch it when it does...and we were.


I went to bed in the back of my truck Tuesday night to the sound of bowling ball sized boulders crashing into each other and rumbling their way down the raging torrent that was Seneca Creek. We went awoke, we found that the water was still raging at the takeout, a good sign that there is enough water to put on 13 miles and over 1,400 vertical feet upstream.

We hiked about 2 miles in from the parking lot at the top before we decided we would put in. The creek was slowly working its way downstream picking up flow from all the little feeder streams. It wasn't long before the real action started. There were some ledges and fun slides towards the top. Then some boulder gardens and rock dodging. There was also lots of wood dodging. There were some rapids with logs and some logs with rapids.

Billy getting ready

Scott at the put in

Billy getting his boof on

There were great boofs and ledges everywhere.

Nice drop with a big hole

After a few miles of steeper and steeper drops we came around a corner with a big 'ol horizon line. We were pretty sure it was the 30 footer upper Seneca Falls. We got out to scout it and the left side was good to go.

Scott at upper Seneca Falls

We were all pumped to see that Knife's Edge was free of wood and good to go when we got there. What a cool rapid.

Nathan at Knife's Edge

The nature of this creek, unlike most is actually kind of pool-drop in nature, its just that the pools are hundreds of yards of continuous class 3/4 boogie water with some trees thrown in the mix. The steepest 9 miles averaged 224 feet per mile in gradient and the steepest mile was at 350 feet per mile. Not only was it cold and overcast bit it also snowed on us most of the day, which was a very cool (or cold) feeling.

Billy at Knife's Edge Photo: Nathan Sass

There was lots of wildlife: On the drive down i saw 4 opossums, 1 raccoon, and lots of frogs in the road. On the way to the put in we saw a bald eagle with a fish in its mouth. I saw a brook trout in the creek while paddling, and of course lots of deer on the drive home (both dead and alive).


Billy put it very well in a post paddle email:

"Flood conditions for sure!!! By the time I got to Franklin WV there were raging little streams crossing the highway all over the place. By the time I got to Seneca Rocks lower Seneca Creek was THUMPING, once in a while you could see it well and it would be huge. Their was one hole that was under a street lamp so it could be seen, and it was probably ten feet deep on that tiny little stream bed. You could hear boulders rumbling on the creek bed, and hear them colide with each other...it was wild. I was seriously concerned that the whole canyon that we were camped in would flash flood and wash us and our cars down into the creek...We woke up at the crack of dawn today to see tons of water still, but lower. We hit Seneca Creek. The level was perfect as far as I'm concerned, probably about a medium flow. It was a truly epic day, complete with swims, petons, lost paddles, epic 30 footers, too many ten footers to count, some of the best boofs into steep pillowed out floom slides that I have ever seen, an amazingly steep riverbed flowing through a super steep valley that was claustrophobic at times and completely bedrocked in at others...so many great great rapids....more trees down than you could shake a stick at hahaha....more sketchy tree maneuvers than I am comfortable repeating anytime soon. Some effin sweet rapids, yes Seneca Creek has the goods. Hopefully Curt and Nathans pics will show up soon, they both got some amazing shots, Nathans pics from knife edge were killer....OK I just got home and my phone is dead so I just wanted to give a quick report of the day. It was sweet, but it was also really long, about 9 hours, and really cold, and I'm real tired now but really glad I made it out there, I wish you guys could have been there it is an incredible place, defiantly one to get on at some point."

Check out the rest of the pictures here:
http://www.theperpetualflow.com/gallery/4468546_hRWhi/1/262815031_re5up

Rough day for the red Salto