Clackamas Milk Run
By Teresa Gryder
Working my way back into river running after a hiatus, the Clackamas at low water seemed like a friendly place to go. I didn't post the trip to our group until late Thursday night, but on October 29, 2022 we ended up with a crew of seven diehards including Ed B., Audrey B., Bary B., Samu T., Ted H., Will G. and me. The water was low (under 1,000 at 3 Lynx), but not as low as it had been a couple weeks earlier when I did the same run with Denny. We launched at Roaring River next to the sign for the defunct campground, and took out at Moore Creek Boat Launch.
We had sunshine and blue skies for most of the day. Later we learned that it had remained misty and socked-in all day in Portland.
I had avoided the Clackamas for a long time after the fires....there's something sad about scorched forests. But this time the Clack looked prettier than I remembered. Rocky outcrops that we couldn't see before the burn made for fantastic skylines especially around Big Eddy, and there is enough green remaining and returning to make it feel hopeful. We stopped at Big Eddy to carry a couple of picnic tables up higher above water level.
There were two dangerous pieces of wood in this section. I had scouted them all with Denny so I knew where to look. We also scouted Carter Rapid. One log is at Lockaby Campground, not far downstream from Armstrong Rapid and a bridge, and upstream from Carter. I'm told someone was cutting down trees in the campground and one fell off the cliff to where it is now dangling off the cliff into the main outflow of a small rapid. It's a bad spot.
The other dangerous log is across the main channel at Nemesis near the end of the run. While you could go right over it, if you happened to flip over in the tricky rocks above it you could be in dire straits. At both of these spots we took far right alternative lines and avoided any risk of us getting hung up on a tree. There were lots of other big logs on the banks that could easily get pulled into the current and stuck somewhere new, so we will need to remain cautious on the Clackamas forevermore.
My favorite part of this trip was watching a coyote move as we floated downstream. Ted spotted him on river right above Slingshot. The wild canine sprinted downstream along the bank as if he thought he could lose us going that way, but he couldn't. He bounded to the top of a giant log and posed, looking upstream to see that we were still coming toward him. We couldn’t keep watching him though, we had to focus on the rapid. Samu flipped over in the swirly water downstream as if he did it on purpose.
In the calmer water below the rapid I saw something swimming ahead of me--it was the coyote crossing the river. I motioned for the boaters behind me to look but they didn’t notice or understand my signal. The coyote was a good swimmer. He landed on river left, ran downstream to a creek cascading down, and disappeared into the brush. What a quick and athletic animal!
Our only (other) swimmer of the day was Willard. He is almost as good a swimmer as the coyote. He tried to catch one of those fast little waves in Bob's Hole rapid. Bob's Hole is not actually there anymore, so maybe we should rename the rapid to Bob's wave? There is a surf wave that comes out there at 3,000+ CFS, but on this day the main wave and the "son of Bob" wave were not in evidence.
At the takeout we hung out for a long time just talking. The weather was mild and someone had brought cold beers. Samu got out his "orgasmatron" (I'm not joking) and we enjoyed playing with it. Finally our drivers headed up to get the cars from the put-in, and those of us left behind went over to chat with the other crew that had landed after we did.
It was a delightful day on the water, with wonderful social time at the takeout. We are lucky to have so many wonderful people in our boating community, and beautiful rivers to share.
