Week of Rivers
June 27 - July 5, 2015
by Frank Ohrt

As usual, I attended the Carolina Canoe Club's annual Week of Rivers festival in Bryson City, North Carolina. While the weather didn't come close to the Rain Year of 2013, when people were paddling in pastures, it was pretty wet and rainy. Several of the area's creeks came up, notably the Greenbrier and Santeelah Creek, and some rivers (the Tellico and Ocoee) ended up at levels that would have kept normal folks away. For whatever reasons, the French Broad remained low, but paddleable, Big Laurel Creek never came up, and the Nolichucky was only high enough for serious masochists.

I personally paddled the Nantahalla, where "experience" was recognising my mistake when I missed Micro Eddy (again), and went over the Falls backwards (again). I'm getting good at that. Likewise, I re-located the rock at the bottom of Corkscrew on Section IV of the Chattooga, and found out how fast one can decelerate at the bottom of Sock 'Em Dog. A low-flow creek run on the Cheoah was fun but un-eventful, though it reminded everyone that it's no place for a canoe.

I hand-paddled the Pigeon, where I forgot my splash jacket and devoted my run to trying to stay as dry as possible. It didn't work. I had made a bucket-list plan to paddle the Ocoee in duckies with a pal, but didn't plan on it running 3-4 times normal flow. The infamous Entrance Rapid was enough to scare me to death, but it was a 7' haystack farther down that sent me out the back end of my (vertical) ducky. Note to paddlers: Hell Hole washes out, but re-locates 100 yards downstream. It was a fast run, and a total hoot. My last run was another hand paddle on the Oconaluftee, an intermittent but lovely little river in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Other highlights were a trip to see Biltmore, the Vanderbilt mansion (it's big, alright), an appearance by Cletus, the hillbilly tuber, and a rain-free fireworks show in Bryson City. Low-lights included a muddy camp site, the table salsa at Guayabito's, and having to drive home.

The author, Frank Ohrt