Names aren't really important here - I'll just refer to everyone as paddler #1,2,3,4 and myself. Now, let's talk about Yellowjacket Creek.
As we were driving to the take-out, one of the guys in our group noticed a house out in the middle of a field. Problem was, the field was actually a small lake.
"Hmmmm-I wonder if the water is gonna be a little high today?" This observation combined with high freezing levels and heavy rain all night, all morning, and
throughout the day, no doubt contributed to the kinetic carnage energy building in the creek, or should I say "river." As we pulled up to the take-out (which is
at water level), the first thing that stood out was the grey/white silty color of the creek. The water could be three inches deep, and there's no way you would
know unless you poked it with a paddle (or your head). Think "muddy, floody, swollen river," but because this is fed from glacial runoff and snowmelt, it's
"grey/white, silty, and stompin'."
One guy in our group who had paddled Yellowjacket before noted that it was definitely higher than when he had been there
last, but that it still looked doable. Hey-sometimes higher is better! Undaunted, we got ready, loaded our boats onto one truck, and smashed the five of
us into the cab of the pickup like we were about to make a mad dash for the border.
Bennett's guidebook describes the put-in for Yellowjacket as class V-I'll vouch for that as will the four other paddlers who descended close to a thousand
vertical feet into the bottom of the canyon that Yellowjacket Creek flows through. Irony would later rear it's ugly head-as we were sliding down the VERY
steep, muddy, and thickly forested canyon walls to find some water, we joked about how much it would really suck if the take-out were like this. It's worth
mentioning that all of the paddlers on this trip had paddled stout class
V water and that I had the least experience with class V water.
The American Whitewater description of Yellowjacket states that, "The higher limit of flows is unverified so use caution as once you descend into the canyon you
are committed to the run." We were about to experience the "higher limit of flows" for Yellowjacket. The Bennett guidebook rating of IV+ wouldn't apply today-we
were class V bound, and in one hell of a hurry to get there.
We were now standing on the edge of Yellowjacket, muddy and hot from the descent into the canyon, definitely a class V put-in. We stood there for a few minutes,
stretching, making sure the breakdown paddles, pin kits, med kits, video camera were all secured. As I was eating my excessively delicious yogurt
dipped power bar, I made a comment to the effect of, "This looks like it might get a bit pushy in places today." I got a response in the form of a grunt of
agreement from the paddler next to me. In a few minutes, we were all in the water and ferried across the river to an eddy on the river right side. The
paddler who had done Yellowjacket before peeled out first and I swept.
The river immediately drops around a blind right hand turn into the first rapid,
a class IV with big reaction waves and some sizeable holes-so much for a warm up. I hit an "eddy" which was more akin to a boil line on the river left side in
the middle of the drop. I yelled to one of the other paddlers in our group that, "Boy, it just really sorta starts-doesn't it!" At the bottom of that
drop, we all "eddied" out on river right in a small area of slow moving water. There was another big horizon line around a blind right hand bend in the
river. We were cliffed in now with NO scouting or portaging options aside from boat scouting and practicing the Zen art of "read and run."
Looking at this
next horizon line, what stood out was the big house sized boulder on river left with a HUGE log jam built up against it. About a third or half of the flow went
right into this log jam with the remaining water bending down to the right and dropping out of sight. Paddler #1 peels out and immediately gets pushed
out to the middle left of the river-the whole time he's motoring, trying to move hard right and away from the log jam. He drops over the first
horizon line and paddler #2 peels out, knowing that he's got to paddle harder to stay right. He manages a middle-right line over the first
horizon line and paddler #3 peels out with a similar clean line over the first drop. As paddler #4 peels out we hear two sharp
whistle blasts-he catches a surging eddy up against the river right cliff just above the lip of the first horizon.
"Looking at this
next horizon line, what stood out was the big house sized boulder on river left with a HUGE log jam built up against it."
I manage to get into a small
eddy about half the size of my boat and claw my way up onto the bank of the river. I see that paddler #4 is stuck in "brace-city" just trying
to stay upright in the surging eddy. I make it about 10ft down the riverbank before it completely cliffs out, but I'm still a good 60ft from
paddler #4 stuck in the surging eddy at the lip of the drop. He manages to hang out for about a minute-no more whistle blasts-so with no reasonable
options, he just peels out and goes for it.
By the time he peels out, I'm back in my boat and out in the flow-charging down the right side and into
a drop called The Meteorite. This rapid is a series of river wide ledges that develop into very sticky holes at this flow. I notice that
paddler #1 down is standing on a small gravel bar in the middle of the river and is signaling that I should run middle on the final and largest ledge-this
as paddler #4 is getting his rodeocreeking practice in that same hole, but on far river right. He finally flushes just as I get a good boof off
the undercut ledge that forms the last hole.
Paddler #4 and I run our boats up onto the gravel bar that the paddler #1 is standing
on sans boat and paddle. About a hundred yards down stream we notice that paddler #3 has wrangled the lost boat into an eddy and up onto a
small ledge on the side of the river. After some creative wading, swimming, and assistance from paddler #4, we get the boat and swimmer
reacquainted, pulling the first breakdown paddle out. Paddler #1 got stuck in a hole just above the big logjam with a smaller logjam making up
the river left side of the hole. His options were move river left into logjam or river right into the meat of the hole. He was trying to move
into the meat of the hole for all he was worth so that if he swam he would have a better chance at getting flushed around the monster logjam below
him. Finally he pulled and swam his ass off to avoid the log jam, got flushed around it, and climbed up onto his little gravel bar, just a little
shaken and a bit banged up from swimming over two more big ledge drops into holes.
Once the four of us are in the eddy where the boat was
corralled, I ask where the second paddler is. "He chased after the lost paddle." The paddler #4 and I decide that we should continue on
to find paddler #2 while the other two get the boat drained and the breakdown put together. The decision is agreed upon, so he and I
peel out.
As soon as we round an immediate blind right bend, we see a big horizon line. We quickly
catch a small flowing "eddy" on river left. Paddler #4 hops out of his boat and asks if I'm getting out. I say, "No, just let me
know if it's something worth looking at." Well, the river gets completely cliffed in again at this point, so he does some creative scrambling
to the top of this outcropping and takes a good long look. After about a minute of him moving to different vantage points and continually shaking
his head I decide that it's probably worth looking at, so I get out of my boat.
HOLY SHIT.
I think I said that for about the next two minutes. Alright, four parts to this drop. Top drop has a 6ft ledge that drops onto a shallow ledge on far
left. Far right is pretty much a terminal hole. Middle has a curling, surging, breaking lateral wave that dumps right into a big ledge hole which is
immediately followed by another ledge hole which is quickly followed by the BIGGEST, uniform, river wide, cliffed out on both sides, HOLE I've ever not
wanted to paddle into.
We decide we should wait for paddler #1 and #3 to get here so they don't run this blind, but still no sign of paddler #2. After
a few minutes they eddy out and join us on the bank trying to scout this marginally scoutable and absolutely unportageable series of holes that put
the word "STOMPIN'" to shame. Well, no choice but to run it, so we break out the video camera for this one! Oh, I should mention that by
the time you hit the second hole in this drop, the bottom half is completely cliffed in and continues to be cliffed in for about 100ft after the
bottom hole. NO WAY TO SET SAFTEY.
