Ran it last Saturday at 2.10. Although it was low all the drops were still good to go. The drop
right under the bridge had a really shallow landing and one member of our group pitoned pretty
hard. If you're running it at this level just make sure you use good paddle signals to make sure
you dont land on your pitoned buddy. At this level it was more of a class IV plop and drop, but
with the absolute must make eddy before the unrunnable big one, it deserves respect. I think next
time we'll set someone with a line at the final must make eddy just in case.

Guage at 2.47 steady today. Newbie run for two of us. Taken down from the top by veterans Jeff
Ackerman and Wayne "GMan". Perfect 1st time level. Just the right amount of adrenaline without the
extreme.

Here is a Description I put together based on information I have gathered over the last 5 years of
kayaking the Raymondskill. The Take-Out is located on SR 2009 off of Rt.209 N. You cross the creek
on 209 and take an immediate left following signs towards Raymondskill falls. There will be a
parking lot on your left a little ways up the hill and a walking trail from the parking lot leading
down to the falls. Drop a car at the lot, and then continue up the hill on SR 2009 crossing the
creek once, passing Silver Spring on your right eventually you'll come to a stop sign. Make a right
at the stop onto SR 2001, cross the Raymondskill again; keep going until you see an auto-parts
store on the left and a little further down you will see a guard rail on the right and a gravel
road immediately following. Turn right here, the gravel road ends in a parking area. From here hike
your boat in to the creek, paddle down about a ј mile to the first drop, "Hackers Falls". This drop
is one of the most fun drops on the run. It's a two step 25 ft slightly off vertical waterfall. The
top move is the crux, a 3 foot boof over a pourover angling left to set you up for the 80 degree
slide, best run down the left. Scout on the left. At the end of the pool there is a small ledge,
run center. Then the creek meanders through some typical placid Pocono boogie water, and you are at
the top of the "Super Slide" a.k.a. "Crack in the Wall". It's about 60 yards dropping about 40 ft,
really fun, run down the right. You can also catch an eddy on the right ѕ of the way down in front
of the "crack in the wall". From here it's a cool ferry out of the eddy back onto the slide.
Continue downstream through flat water where you'll see an occasional downed tree, best to portage
these, use good judgment. Right now there is only one that is easily ski jumped in the middle.
After a little more flat water you will come to the bridge on SR 2009. Here begins the continuous
steep section. The "Bridge Drop" has a couple different lines. You can enter under the bridge on
the left or the right. The left side slopes down a small slide, similar to the right, and drops
through a slot, angle right. Following the slot you want to set your boat up with right angle and
drop over a horizon line about a 3 foot drop onto a chute that slopes out the remaining 6 feet of
drop. Or you can boof straight off and hit the ledge, double boof, and head back right. The right
side is a bit easier, run down the right, about 5 feet off from the notch in the middle of the
drop, set up on a near vertical 10 foot slide. Immediately after this drop is another drop with an
8 foot sloping entrance slide, run down the right, followed by a 3 foot pourover hole at the
bottom, boof right. The next drop after a pool is called "Graham Slam". This is a bouncy slide run
down the right, stay upright! The next drop is called "Iron Staircase". This drop can be run far
right, far left or center. The left is pretty sick, often a big deep hole at the bottom. The
standard line is a double boof run right of center over a 4 foot ledge onto another ledge dropping
another 6 feet into a pool. Now you are at the main attraction of the run, "Flirting with
Disaster". It is a 20+ foot drop onto a sloped rock slide ramping 15 feet over a 6 foot drop at the
bottom. This drop deserves a good look for it has been portaged by everyone who has ever run the
creek for the last 7 years, until this year. Scout thoroughly, lines have been run down left of
center at the top. After this big boy the stream mellows out with two great 6 foot boofs, the first
one called "The drop after the Carry" boof center angle back left, followed by "Blue Angel" big
boof off the left corner. A boogie drop brings you to "Z Turn" a slide ending with a 3 foot boof
over a hole with water slamming into a cave/wall on the right, boof left. Then you come to the
"Happy Couple", two 4 foot back to back pourovers, 1st one run center, keep your bow up, 2nd one
run a foot off the left, boof with your bow up and catch the eddy on the left! This is the
take-out. It is imperative that you catch this eddy because below is the first drop on Raymondskill
falls, for all intents and purposes this drop is unrunnable, a 40 footer slamming into a wall at
the bottom left. However, the drop right after this has been run a number of times, and is actually
quite fun! If you haven't gotten enough vertical for the day you can hike down the right side,
around the first drop, and lower your boat into the pool between the two. Put in here and run down
the right. It's a big 40 foot near vertical double bounce slide into a deep pool. Take out and walk
up the trail on the left.

Raymondskill ran at a medium high level today. The Bushkill gauge peaked at around 2.3. I ran
Flirting with Disaster and afterwards because of the higher water decided it was more suitably
named than at lower water. It was more of a "within inches of Disaster" today. Higher water pushed
me further left at the bottom than my 2 previous runs @ around 2.1(Bushkill). The wall on the left
at the bottom really comes into play at higher levels. Watch your elbows and eyes. Scout and use
good judgement on this one. It couldn't have a better name.

The drop on this run which most boaters refer to as "the Portage" in the middle of the run after
the double drop "Iron Staircase" that was never thought to be runnable, was successfully run today.
The drop is a 20ft slightly off vertical drop, pretty much freefalling, onto a sloped slab which
ramps about 15 ft ending with a 6 foot boof into the pool below. A boater swam the drop by accident
last fall after swimming above the falls and could not make it to the bank in time and somehow was
not seriously injured, which made us think that it could be done. Today it was successfully run in
a kayak twice by Eli Landis. He cracked his boat the day before and decided to risk completely
demolishing the boat by ghost running the boat over the drop first to find the right line. After
the boat cleaned the line we decided it could be done but the transition at the bottom would be too
abrupt. Eli told us he was going to run it and after all of us hinting towards trying to talk Eli
out of it, he went up and did it anyway. He made it look so good it convinced all of us to give it
a go. It has now been run 6 times, all clean lines. Eli decided to call it "Flirting with Disaster"

you can run it down to 1.9 from the top or 1.7 from the bridge. It gets scrapy but verticals
vertical especialy when nothing else is going

From 209 turn onto Raymondskill Rd.you will pass the Take-out on the left
use second parking lot {bath room changing room on site}take a look at
bottom ledge it can be a nasty hole and a mistake here it could be your
last.Left out of the parking lot you will cross over the bridge drop then
come to a stop sign.Turn right on Milford road{state road 2009 ?}.you will
cross Raymondskill{100 feet}with in a mile you will come to a dirt road on
the right{3rd guard rail ?}there is a small state park sign, follow to end
take trail on left,to top of hill then first trail to right.

Raymond Skill Rd, Milford, PA 18337 {this will get you close}

We put in farther up-stream (at the second bridge over the creek- from the falls parking lot) I
wouldn't recommend this put-in as it entailed paddling through a private resort lake and then over
a low-head dam because the property owners wouldn't let us walk around. The dam isn't that bad, but
the irate owners might make this route a bad idea.

Apparently there is another dirt road somewhere between the bridges that allows access close to the
creek but still above the two drops not described above. These drops are well worth any effort it
takes to get to them- I'd say that the first one is the most fun on the run. The drop is a 25'(ish)
cascade with a narrow (5'?) entrance sloping about 4' into a boily hole followed immediately by a
near vertical cascade into a mean looking hole that you just sub right under. Easy scouting and
portaging is available on the river left. A bit downstream is the second drop, a looonnggg bouncy
slide with a big pillowed wall at the bottom. This looks like it could be run about anywhere but be
ready for the wall at the end. Around the next bend (or two) you'll see the normal put-in
bridge.

We didn't see any reason to portage around the falls and instead took out at the nice parking lot
at the top. If you want to run the very public 40' cascade, scout on the left but ferry across to
the right and do the hike/scramble/climb down to the put-in ledge. The drop is quite runnable and
even clean (as these things go) but the put in is a nasty surging pool right at the lip with the
first drop pounding down a few feet away. Be careful and consider having someone help you into your
boat (and get it down there!) Also, the pool below is pretty large but ends with a river level
strainer followed immediately by the 50' fall onto rocks… nice…

This is a nice warm-up for Hornbecks which is right up the road and might be running too!