Three Rivers, Calif. – Two-point-six miles. There it was, scrawled in the guidebook at the bottom of a page titled “Middle Fork Tule River.” Suddenly, it seemed so absurd.
By now, our threesome had logged more than a thousand road miles, winding across Utah and Nevada from Colorado’s Western Slope to the southern Sierra Nevada Mountains of California over the course of eight days. Sleeping on the ground, dodging un- ruly black bears, wading through dense thickets of poison oak, dining in the bed of a pickup truck.
And for what? Two-and-a-half miles of river we never had seen and with a name we weren’t even sure how to pronounce. Only in California.
Describing the Tule as a “river” is a bit misleading. Sandwiched between the Kern River drainage to the southeast and the Kaweah River to the north, this unending staircase of granite and water is little more than a creek flowing down the steep southern Sierras at less than 400 cubic feet per second (cfs) on this particular day in April. Tumbling at an average gradient of 237 feet per mile over the 5-mile section listed in Lars Holbeck’s and Chuck Stanley’s informative guidebook, “The Best Whitewater in California,” it topped out at a staggering 280-foot descent over the first mile we intended to attempt. The book suggested five portages.
Absurd, perhaps, but this is what we had come to do: kayak California.
Kayaking differs from many other adventure sports in that there is no geographical center where practitioners congregate and push their sport alongside like-minded enthusiasts. There is no Yosemite or Jackson Hole or Pipeline. Instead, the difficult rivers and challenges sought by dedicated paddlers are tucked away in the hills and attempted by small groups on concentrated outings that spawn rumors of “classic” and “must do” runs that eventually spread throughout the community.
They exist here in Colorado – Gore Canyon, the Upper Animas, Poudre River Narrows. But California is a river-running region unto itself, home of the largest concentration of river runners in the West and a superb collection of whitewater to suit their needs. When word spreads that the California runoff is “on,” the paddling population swells right along with the rivers. Next to the Grand Canyon, an extended California kayaking trip during spring runoff is considered the ultimate prize for many American paddlers.
“This is ‘it’ for me,” said Charlie Ebel, an American Canoe Association-certified kayak instructor and class V safety boater from Eagle, during a recent southern Sierra swing. “It’s as big as you want to go out here.”
The Sierra Nevada, separating the San Joaquin Valley from Death Valley and the Great Basin, is the longest continuous mountain range in the West, as well as one of the youngest and most rugged. As such, the mountains offer the steepest rivers in the western United States, dropping from high peaks to near sea level in just a few dozen miles and typically unnavigable above an elevation of 3,000 feet. Below that level, however, the granite gorges of the southern Sierras channel snowmelt through a maze of creeks and rivers that offer the ultimate proving ground for expert kayakers.
Along with river guide Tim VanderPlas of Minturn, Ebel had orchestrated our 10-day blitz through the southern Sierras as an early-season tuneup for the Colorado runoff that had yet to get underway. The best Sierra boating, according to Holbeck and Stanley, is from April to July, although California’s complex system of water storage and distribution creates whitewater runs almost year-round. And in heavy snow years such as this one, natural runs have potential flows into September. With statewide snow water content at 137 percent of average, the California Department of Water Resources is calling this the heaviest Sierra Nevada snowpack in 10 years.
As it was, the deep snow and heavily damaged access roads proved to be the biggest barrier to our whitewater goals. Access to the classic class V section known as the Forks of the Kern River (the longest river in the Sierras) was still closed. Thus, we were forced to warm up on a 15-mile class IV stretch – with some easier class V drops – that finally makes its way into a whitewater park and kayak slalom course in the town of Kernville.
A short drive north landed us in the Kaweah River drainage that forms the southern border of Sequoia National Park at an optimal flow of 800 to 900 cfs. After a brief bear encounter and a successful 6.5- mile trip down the class IV-V North Fork of the Kaweah, we found the California dream in the 4.8-mile run through the Hospital Rock section of the Main Kaweah. There the river flows in classic Sierra pool-and- drop fashion with a top gradient of 250 feet per mile, which pushes skill levels through a spectacularly scenic granite gorge. Miles of cascading waterfalls are stacked on top of one another like a gushing fountain sculpted into the mountainside.
Two days at Hospital Rock, a broken-paddle attempt at a lower class V stretch and a “rest” day back on the North Fork led us an hour south to the Tule, the most difficult whitewater we would face in California. Putting on the river at 10:30 a.m., a long day of scouting, portaging and paddling kept us on the water until 4:30 p.m., still a tenth of a mile short. Six hours to travel 2.5 miles, with 1,000 miles of asphalt yet to come.
“It was worth it,” VanderPlas said, recounting the blurred recollection of paddle strokes afterward. “I just wish we had three weeks out here to really run some stuff. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Staff writer Scott Willoughby can be reached at 303-820-1993 or swilloughby@denverpost.com.
