Polk County Welcome Center

Goin' left at the Polk County line on Wednesday night in my new favorite hunk of plastic, the Prijon Tornado.

West Fork of the Pigeon River

On Sunday, I woke up to rain and a text from Mike N. It was his birthday and the West Fork of the Pigeon was running. I'd never done, neither had he, and neither had Mike T., who we met up with in Asheville. A quick call to a friend who had run it a few times gave me a good feeling about this one and we headed up into the Balsams above Lake Logan.

The run starts below the Garden of the Gods, and it involves a quick hike down from the road. The hike may be quick but it is also steep and usually slick if this creek is running. Mike N. and I both had to take a bath to wipe off all the mud we'd collect on our rears from slip-sliding down the slope.

Mike T. hiking in.

Your author, at the put-in pool. Some more good stuff apparently is above if you can find the alternate hike-in point to add maybe 1/2 mile of some good boogie and ledges. Don't go too high or you'll be paddling the continuous class V+/VI Garden of the Gods.

A nice boogie rapid early on. The water level was pretty good when we started out, but we needed to scout a lot and the water definitely dropped on us. It was low by the time we took out.

I'm coming into the bottom wave-hole of another good rapid early on

Mike T. on the same. Not long after, his paddle blade snapped, and since his seat was only held in with one bolt and the boat was leaking like a sieve because of it missing a bolt on the opposite side, he had to hike back up to the road. It really sucked watching him go up the hill as we headed down the river into this stunningly beautiful gorge.

Mike N. on the same.

Caleb on the entrance to a big one -- big hole to punch after a slide-in notch slot or an S-turn around a boulder. It was nice to see a couple other guys on the run. They knew it well, but were in a rush to get back to a car (girlfriend was shuttling them for a quick run), so we were back on our own after this one. Being that Mike T was paddling with a broken paddle and that none of us knew the run, we were in no condition to hang with them as they blazed downriver.

The infamous J.E.B. heading into the second pitch of the rapid Caleb is running above. It involves a slide where the left side cruises into a) a weird pocket eddy half-way down or b) a chunky undercut behind a hole that you could hit at mach 2. The right side has a hole half-way down and a bigger hole at the bottom. Stay in the middle and punch the bottom hole. It could be a very, very stout hole at high water. Portage left if you don't like it.

Your author on a fun slide with a reasonably strong hole that was fun to plug.

Our birthday boy -- Mike N. Happy 30th birthday, Mike! What a great personal first descent to catch on your birthday and I was glad to enjoy your boof-day with ya.

We were slow and scouting almost everything that we couldn't see the bottom of because we knew there was a rapid that was a mandatory portage because of a tree blocking it. Another group that knew the run caught us not too far before the tree and we all portaged it. Words can't describe the weird ways water moves through that rapid -- the tree is so old that it was there when Middle Earth still existed.

The West Fork of the Pigeon is good to the last drop, and this was one of the last drops. Caveboy (I guess so named because of a little similarity to Caveman rapid on Raven Fork perhaps?) is all about waiting on your boof and then enjoying the air-time. We hung out with Nate, Sam and Riley (the crew who caught us before Big Tree portage) and ran multiple sessions of this drop before enjoying a class III-IV paddle out with one mandatory class II portage because of a tree. I didn't portage, but should have, and Nate had to give me a hand to get off the strainer.

I can't wait until this one runs again.
--Geoff

Enjoying the afternoon on a road bike

Spring is in the air and it was time to take the road bike out since we had temps in the high 60s this afternoon. The light was stunning on the climb of Bat Cave Road as I wound my way up past Gateway Mountain, Stone Mountain and Round Mountain.

The ride has a nice 1/2 mile level area in the middle of the climb. It's a welcome spot.



I really love seeing old homesteads. Somehow it speaks to the countless generations of effort put forth by human beings to find a way to live in this incredible part of our country.

The Rocky Broad River (below), at one of its more mellow points. The new bridge my bike leans against was a nice place to hop off the saddle, take a couple drinks of water and enjoy the early evening in the mountains.

Ah, the Blue Ridges. A decent vantage point near the top of the climb on the way back home.

Long shadows and good pavement.

Cruising back home and getting ready for the blazing downhill back to our own home.

21.2 miles of after-work joy.

Finding an interesting line on the Cheoah

On Saturday, I headed out to the Cheoah with an old friend from college days at Sewanee -- Sam. We linked up with Eric and Jim, two of Sam's friends for a run down this gem of a class IV run in the very western part of North Carolina.

The river peaks with a section called Bear Creek Rapids that is a stack of a few good rapids back-to-back. Most of the rapids in here are a somewhat nondescript series of ledges, waves, holes and boulders, but the signature is Bear Creek Falls that is more vertical and taller than all of the other drops on the run.

On my second run, I ended up in the curious position below -- facing almost upstream into a crease with a strong maw and mawl and ma factor. I say that because if you go in there, the maw will mawl you, and then you'll have to head home to ma with your tail between your legs.

Fortunately, I was able to backpaddle and not tip into the crease, and I slide off the ledge beside me backwards but fully safe. The reason for that unexpected backpaddling was too good of a "boof" stroke on the rock defining the first ledge. I literally rode up and over and flew into the strange spot on the other side of the rock. Here's a photo a local photog captured of me hammering into that boof -- you can see my almost 12-foot long kayak starting to ride up and over that 10-foot-wide rock. It was one hell of a boof stroke and felt good until I saw where I was landing.

Sam was right ahead of me and got to see the full show, including the backpaddling and the backwards slide off the second pitch. Here's a pic of him from Eric's cell phone camera showing a nice, traditional line. The rock immediately over his head is the one I flew right over. 

More pics soon from today's excursion into the West Fork of the Pigeon River's upper gorge.

-Geoff