Great Spring paddling week to the Cumberland Plateau
| River: | Other |
| Skill: | Intermediate |
| Trip Date: | 03/26/2017 |
There are still openings for the April 9 – 15 week of this activity (the last week it will occur this year). If you miss it this year, there will be three weeks of this trip on 2018. Contact Kirk at one of the links below to enquire about participating.
Cumberland Plateau Paddling
This was the first commercially guided trip I have taken in almost thirty years (http://www.wwsouthernapps.com/week-of-rivers ). April paddling weeks on the Cumberland Plateau have been run by Juanita Guinn for decades. This year Juanita is in the process of handing off the trip to Kirk Eddlemon (https://www.facebook.com/kirk.eddlemon, http://www.wwsouthernapps.com/ ), so we had both of them as our guides.
The price of the trip, $899.00, covered comfortable lodgings and good updated southern meals (breakfast, packed lunch, and dinner) at the homey Grey Gables Bed & Breakfast (Rugby, TN: https://www.facebook.com/greygablesbedandbreakfastinn/ ) from Sunday evening, March 26th, through Saturday morning, April 1st; shuttle service by van + boat trailer to and from the river; and the on-river company of Kirk and Juanita (for other, less experienced groups, the “on-river company” would be more accurately described as “on-river guiding and rescue”).
The participants were Juanita, me (Richard Hopley, AKA Oci-One Kanubi), Kim Buttleman, Courtney Caldwell, Ron Knipling, Ed Evangelidi, and Doug Willenborg in open canoes; Kirk, Jenny Thomas, Fred Dalauro, and Jim Walters in kayaks; and Ann Dalauro not boating.
Each morning a hearty breakfast was served at 8:00 AM, always including coffee, orange juice, eggs, bacon, sausage, and fruit, and always including some combination of: hash-brown potatoes, grits, pancakes, and/or french toast. We would then get dressed for paddling and do any necessary boat-rearranging, to be ready to hit the road by 9:30 in a 15-passenger Econoline van with our shuttle driver Stephanie. Juanita carried the provisions in her boat — a sandwich, baggie of fruit, and a couple of cookies for each of us — and when we reached the takeout Stephanie was there with the van and boat trailer. Back at Grey Gables we usually had a couple of hours to deal with wet gear, shower, and change for supper at 7:00 PM, then we sat around swapping lies or playing cards for a couple of hours until we toddled off, one by one, to bed.
I left Winston-Salem, NC at 1:00 PM on Sunday, because I like the CNN Sunday-morning news programs: Global Public Square, Reliable Sources, and State of the Union. I reached Grey Gables with time to unload my boat, find an unoccupied room, and install and inflate my airbags, before dinner.
Monday, March 27th, we ran Clear Creek from Barnett to Lilly at 400 CFS on the Lilly gauge. This is a Class II run, and I imagine Juanita and Kirk chose it to calibrate the skill levels of all the participants. Clear Creek is a beautiful run; in the past I have put in at Jett bridge, between Barnett and Lilly, and taken out farther downstream at Nemo on the Emory River, so I had the pleasure of seeing a new stretch of river between Barnett and Jett. Unfortunately, Jenny strained a muscle picking up her boat at the takeout. After loading up the trailer, we drove less than ¼-mile to Lilly Pad Hopyard Brewery, a new micro-brewery for a tour and sampling of the wares (http://www.lillypadhopyardbrewery.com/ ). A heavy rain thoughtfully waited until we got back to the B&B before beginning to fill up all the creeks and streams for the rest of our week!
Tuesday, March 28th, we took a longer drive, west to the West Fork of the Obey River, another PFD for me. We ran from a put-in where TN-85 crosses Puncheon Creek in Allred, TN, just a hundred yards from the confluence, down to the TN-52 bridge, at 850 CFS on the Alpine gauge when we put on, but dropping steeply. This was a wonderful run, quite easy again, but with simply spectacular scenery; dozens of waterfalls pouring down the adjacent cliff-sides, many of them from underground streams pouring right out of the sides of the cliffs. Jenny needed to rest that muscle, so she spent the day hiking with Ann in the Big South Fork National Recreation Area. This time I was the unfortunate one, and got severely car-sick on the trip back to Grey Gables.
Wednesday, March 29th, I was still experiencing vertigo from the previous day’s car-sickness, and I was not about to get into that van again, so I didn’t boat. The group paddled the Class II North White Oak Creek into the Big South Fork of the Cumberland, from Zenith to Leatherwood Ford, at 600 CFS on the AW virtual Gernt gauge. Reports were that this was a fine level, and that the creek is still boatable with considerably less water. I went with Ann to hike the Twin Arches Trail within the National Recreation Area. The trail was not terribly interesting, but the two arches were as spectacular as anything in Arches National Park, just harder to view properly because in the East we have, like, trees. With leaves (even in late March). So we were never able to get a full vista of either one of the arches. Afterwards we drove through “Historic Rugby”, getting off the main road onto a gravel road passing many of the historically-accurate (from the outside, at least) dwellings.
Thursday, March 30th, I was feeling better (and the drive to the river was going to be very, very short) so I rejoined the group to run White Oak Creek from Rugby to Leatherwood Ford on the Clear Fork River. We had 1050 CFS on the Robbins gauge of the Clear Fork. <sigh/> Yet another spectacularly beautiful run down a deep and rugged gorge, with waterfalls pouring in on both sides, this one with several rapids approaching Class III-. That evening we all loaded up into two vehicles and went to Juanita’s house for a wonderful barbeque dinner.
Friday, March 31st, we split into three groups. Two of the groups put in at Jett Bridge on Clear Creek at 550 CFS (Lilly gauge). One group took off at Lilly and spent the afternoon lolling around Lilly Pad Hopyard Brewery and one group proceeded down to Nemo, running several Class III and Class III+ rapids along the way. Jenny, Ann, Ed, and I went hiking in the Nat’l Rec. Area on the Gentlemen’s Swimming Hole Trail in Rugby. This was one of the more beautiful trails I have ever hiked once we got down to riverside, helped greatly by the recent rains which had all the little falls running, and many of the mossy cliff faces dripping onto the ferns.
And on Saturday I drove home.