Ozarks - Who is Going?

[Roger]

Just wandering, Would a hybrid kayak make any of yalls trips. I have a Commander 120 and a Pungo 100 I just never know if the trips discussed here are over my skill level. I mainly float fish but I like to float fast water too.

Dusty, probably not for the runs these guys are talking about. Really need the right boat for this stuff.

[shelbyjohnson]

Assemblige of various sorts gathers at junc of hwy 16 & 21 AKA Edwards Junction. FIsh et al swore up an down Beech was near bone dry, too low. I would have put money on it being runnable.

Discussion ensues...., rain continues, Umbrelllas erected.... discussion continues. Plan albeit weak hatches. One shuttle rig to ELFB takeout, erst-while Fish returns north down the hill to check Beech once more... Rally poitn at Swain turn off to EFLB takeout. Watches synchronized - ready set break.

Shuttles ... 4WD - more 4WD. Return to rally point. Meet other paddlers. Fish is white-eyed - swears Beech is runnable now.

Discussion ensues...., rain continues, rain strengthens.... discussion continues. Ah the agony. Largest contingent set shuttle on ELFB. Group splinters. Fish, Ryan and Dave are self contained and head for Beech.

Remainder of contingent head for ELFB putin. Rain strengthens, continues. Discussion ensues.... Group dynamics, and fear interplay on wishes, desires, capabilities.

Partial strike force heads down putin trail for EFLB. EFLB flush at putin. Not monster level of 2009 floodstage but meat-a-licious healthy meaty. Actual putin time somewhere south of 2PM planned putin high noon. - 2 hour delay - typical - first flash flood of fall season. Gears not greased and group dynamics rusty.

Great day - sun broke late near 5pm. All safe and returned.

[shelbyjohnson]

Awaiting news of the Beech Trip report. I'm confident they had fun and plenty o water.

[Lazer]

The early crew got a Barberry run then joined our later crew for a phat EFLB run. Fish and crew headed to Beech. Nice to have good water and warm weather!

[A Savage spanke]

Fish and Ryan Center both got skunked on beech. Water never came from what I was told, or it came to late

[canoe]

OK, I was the whimp, who decided that with the takeout already up to the road, driveing thru and setting at Lance's cabin thru a moonstoon, that the creek would flash. Decided to check on Richland, river right,was , no airspace at3:30pm. Will run Fri(I'm working.) Dale

[Fish]

Why I Am Quitting Paddling in Arkansas

The last big inland hurricane we found the one creek that flooded so big we didn't make it to the take out. So I guess we were due for something like this. Can you really make so many wrong decisions that you don't even get on the water in a tropical storm? Apparently so.

Everywhere we drove that day the water went off big - right after we left. Crawford Co. early, no water in the creeks but heavy rains. We move on. Franklin Co. 8:30, no water, moderate rain. We move on. Horsehead/Spadra area, no water, VERY heavy rain. We move on. Why? Because these creeks were still dry and Boxley rain gauge had 3+ inches and rising already - surely a sure thing...

But the Hailstone is dry enough to walk across without getting wet. Beech is merely trickling. Obviously there's got to be more water coming soon. So we go up the hill and run into Shelby and report. Shelby is in denial - there MUST be water in Beech. The Ft. Smith bunch arrives (they drove away from Franklin Co. too), and from the massive jaws of indecision a feeble plan is snatched. Ryan, Dave, and I head down to Beech for another look.

Hailstone is still dry. Beech has a little more flow. Smith Cr. has a fairly healthy flow in it. We watch rocks for 20 minutes and see that Beech is creeping up. We drive back up and when we cross the Hailstone, it has about 50 cfs of brown water in it! When I manage to get a cell signal on top of the mountain I get a gauge reading on the Hailstone: 1000+ cfs just 1.5 miles above the bridge! We just missed seeing the mythical "three-foot-wall-of-water" coming down!

Making contact again with Shelby et. al. I tell them Beech is rising and 'Stone is going off. Shelby has a familiar faraway look in his eye but he's committed to staying with the rest. Team Stupid Lite heads down to catch the surge on Beech. But back at the bridge, Beech is not much bigger - very slow rise. Hailstone looks to have topped out. Still, every little creek near Beech is running. So we drive up the hill with a gear bag full of hope to hike down to the put-in and check it out.

At the put-in trailhead, our plan appears to be crumbling under the crushing weight of reality. There is no water in the ditches anywhere on Cave Mountain and the road looks to be drying out. We have now driven back and forth so much that it's late in the day - we have only a small margin of time to complete the run. So we talk about it, making it even later. If we hike down and find a low level, I'm not sure we have time to make it out. Finally, we pull the plug on Beech and head back down in total and utter defeat. I don't even want to see the take-out bridge again. But Ryan insists.

Just a little more water now - still not up to the gauge on the bridge at all. But creeks to either side of Beech are chugging. In fact, it appears to us that we've managed to try for the only creek in the Ozarks that didn't go off big. We consider a drag-up run of EFLB's lower gorges - the 3rd time this year I'll have done that - but it's late, Dave and I have a 5.5 hr drive back home, and we're all just too d*amn depressed to boat. There are no dissenters. We pull the plug and head back for Fayetteville, tails firmly between legs.

Man, I've spent more than twenty years chasing elusive water around the Ozarks in search of very occasional paddling and much more occasional glory. But it's days like yesterday that seem to be trying to tell me that it's just not worth it. I give half my lifetime to creekin in the Ozarks and what does it give me? A day of driving around looking over bridges at creeks that need just a little more rain... All those bridges we drove away from reached legendary levels that day - just after we were too far away to make the runs. I would not be surprised at all to hear that Beech came up... right after we left it.

So I'm quitting paddling in this fickle, masochistic state. I'm not putting myself through the rollercoaster ride of "It's gonna be big!!! ... Why isn't it up?" again. I'm not trying to paddle in the Ozarks again...

Until the next big rain, of course.

~~~

- Fish

[prophet]

for the FS crew that left White Rock and joined you, L. Mill ran for a while

complete these sentences

a bird in the hand..

the grass is always greener...

[panicman]

Well, sounds like the FS crew made the correct call by leaving franklin county and hitting the EFLB at a nice phat level. Next time at that phat level I'm running johnson falls.

[Wildwood]

Thanks for a terrific report on a dismal day, Fish! Reminded me of a weekend I spent this summer. Put over 700 miles on my Jeep, driving all over the northern half of the state. It was really windy. I never was able to find water to float, when I had someone to go with me, where the wind wasn't so bad, and where there was a decent put-in and takeout spot---all at the same time. One place, I actually got my boat in the water, for about 15 minutes. Then a dozen or so bassboats showed up for a tournament. Wake city. And they were just the first of many.

Thanks again for your post.
Here's to better days.
Jan

[Ryan Center]

Two words.........Kayaking Sucks!!!!!!!!!

[prophet]

Fish & Ryan- the FS crowd out thought you?

[paddledog]

Not to rub it in.....But
We sat on the side of W. Cedar for over two hours
waiting for it to drop 5 feet down to a boatable level.
Did you guys not look at Google Earth?
it had the Beech watershead area in a weird 2-4 inch island surrounded
by 6-8 inch oceans.


If you guys realy quit paddling I want to come to your next garage sale....

[shelbyjohnson]

Postscript information on EFLB.

Failed to note this the other day. There are now two very large logs jammed in the notch of Johnson's Falls. It will take a monster flood or a chainsaw for them to get moved.

The result is a damming effect just above the notch causing the water to potentially pool up a little more than normal. Over the course of the coming season if these two logs catch additional drift wood and debris it could create more damming effect pooling even more at mid to high flows.

The result then would be the river right high-side of the falls could become more runnable in the future at mid to high levels. In the past this river right side has only been runnable at extremely high flow.

Since the levels for a run of the notch are very fickle medium-high to high and there is a very short list of paddlers who run the notch anyways, I'd propose letting nature take its course with these logs blocking the notch and see what happens to the river right option.

On Thursday our group had 4 capable boaters run the right side line clean. I've a habit of portaging this drop for years. With the increased potential of being able to run the right side I might be able to check this one off my bucket list.

[okieboater]

Hey Fish and crew,

Reading your post on chasing water brings back lots of memories of
"The Old Days before cell phones, radars, gages, all sorts of weather web sites etc etc".

I remember very well watching TV news weather here in Tulsa, leaving work on friday, driving to the Richland camp ground " or fill in the blank name of several other AR creeks like cossatot etc" and waiting for water flows that never happened.

I thought with all the tools we now have those days were gone.

You guys experience, make me think that plain old fashioned luck is still a major factor in getting to boat Arkansas Creeks.

Till next time it rains ------