Anybody paddle the Chickaloon? I would love to see this river…can you hike in, or just hike up the river from town??? If so, anybody want to do it? Sounds like a classic run.
The Chickaloon is a pretty tough class III-III+ river at higher flows. When you are at the bridge by the Glenn highway look at the river below it. If it is not in a single channel on the river left side with a gravel bar on river right it is flowing good, and will keep you very busy. If it is muddy and close to the river right bank you are in for a ride, decent waves, holes, and pourovers, for miles. It is steep above and below Hotel rocks, and is continuous whitewater for miles, no pools, no letup. What you can see from Chickaloon road, including the Ledge, is not as hard as what lies upstream.
At any flow above low medium, I would not advise this river if you are not a solid class III boater…, your swims could be fairly long.
Hotel Rocks can get kinda ugly in the eddy lines at higher water, (scout on the right before you enter) plan your route and just run it, avoiding eddy hoping…
In all honesty, I think the water between the noted drops is harder than the drops listed in the books. Pretty steep for a river with no notable large ledge drops.
You can fly to 30 mile strip for an adventure, 16 mile for just whitewater, and can hike almost to Hotel Rocks on a trail. My friend had a couple of kayakers who had to walk out after losing their boats in Hotel rocks, so I know you can walk at least that far.
Have fun,
Mark
Nice. Sounds like fun. I would want to avoid the plane ticket though…does anybody know exacly how far up the chickaloon river trail goes? It would be nice to have a safty boat (hard shell flown in) or at least 3 packrafters that are up to it. I have been down many many rivers in my yak, talkeetna canyon included, anybody out there feeling up to it?