Sprague River in the Spring

Becky asked me to report on the trip that Lee and I (Mary) took down the Sprague River with our whitewater canoeing friends Cecil and Marianne.
We put in below a bridge near where the Williamson River Rd takes off the Sprague River Rd to the left. The flow rate was 1,680-1710 cfs and the trip was approximately 10.5 river miles long. The first few miles were flat with a nice current. However, shortly after we passed the old Bray Mill site we entered the Chiloquin Narrows which is VERY rocky, but with the river at this level all but a couple of the biggest rocks were covered. Since there was not much gradient, but plenty of flow, the rocks on the bottom created A LOT of turbulance - resulting in a mile long stretch of Class I and II waves, some of which was medium size "chop" (off-set waves - "off-set waves are concave and large waves can be violent, tossing the boater from one wave to the next like a hacky sack." ) - It definately felt like this a bit in one spot - not much control.  Even with the spray skirt, I took on water, not sure how other than the waves may have peeled the lip of the skirt back momentarily.

At this flow, the stretch we usually do from the substation down to the take out also had bigger waves than we have experienced before. The most the Chix have done is about 1010 cfs. It was a fun trip through our old paddlin' grounds at this flow rate.

This was the fist time I wore my new dry suit. It is actually an Anti-exposure Navy Flyers Coveralls that I purchased new from the Switlik Parachute company for $325.00. It is made of Goretex/Nomex and slightly customized for me. The suit kept me perfectly dry but a bit cool in spots (forearms primarily) because the outer Nomex layer did not shed water well, but rather asorbed it. The breeze across this damp fabric caused me to be slighty cool in those areas. On this 40+ degree spring day I was never cold, but neither was I toasty warm. At that temp and with a breeze, another layer on top and bottom would have taken care of the problem. Our hands froze. This was the one thing we found rather unbearable. Lee had Chill Blockers and I had regular Seal Skin brand gloves and both pair got completely soaked and left us with really cold hands. Our new whitewater paddles do not have drip rings so wet hands were inevitable. We'll have to figure out a better glove solution for use in spring-time paddling.

Total trip time was about 4.5 hours including lunch break. I would do it again, it was a lot of fun.

I have uploaded a spreadsheet containing kayaking trip data for the past two years. You can access this trip data through a link over in the right-hand column. I plan to continue posting trip data such as flow rates, put-in and take-out locations, as well as specific information the paddler may need to be aware of. - Mary