Hwy 78 to Winnataska DriveClass III-IV
Gauge Information
Kelly Creek
Hwy 78 to Winnataska Drive III-IV
River DescriptionCliff White first clued me in to this run. Kelly Creek is short, small, fun, and very close to Birmingham. The good part begins in Kerr Gap just off I20 exit 147, east of Birmingham not far from Moody. It is somewhat similar to Chitwood, but runs longer due to an upstream swamp. The swamp acts like a sponge, making flow peaks less severe. I agonized over whether to list this as a III or a IV. The vast majority of the run consists of class III's, but there are a couple rapids that are at least III+'s and may be solid IV's at some levels.There is a short warmup after the Hwy 78 bridge, then the class II and III begins. You pass under a railroad bridge, and the drops get gradually bigger. There are a couple easily avoided undercuts. The rapids are all drop/pool. Two of the rapids towards the end are fairly large and might be IV or IV-. It's hard to characterize the boundary between III and IV on micro creeks. Do yourself a favor and don't go downstream of the first Winnataska Dr. bridge. Below there lies only Gum trees and flatwater as far as we could tell. Kelly Creek sports a USGS gage many miles and tributaries downstream. It seems that about 1500 cfs on the gage is a good low/med level. We ran it with about a 2' air gap under the put-in bridge river left piling horizontal cross member. If you follow Winnataska Dr. to the next bridge downstream, you encounter Camp Winnataska. Next to the camp is a big 30-35 foot two part slide falls. To run it, you would have to do a 4 mile bridge to bridge (Winnataska Dr. to War Eagle or CR27) run because the folks at the camp are not going to let you take out on their land. I think this stretch will be quite flat except for the falls. There is something called Dukes Mill at War Eagle Rd, so perhaps there is another feature there to be investigated. We felt that 1500-2500 cfs would be a good level to run the falls. All from Alabama Whitewater. StreamTeam Status: unverified
Last Updated: 2005-07-11 11:23:20
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Kelly Creek nr Vincent, AL [ AL ] |
Current Conditions
Station Graphs |
| Level Legend: | Running | Below Minimum Recommended Flow | Above Maximum Recommended Flow | Unknown |
| State | River Name/Section | Class | Level | Rel. Level | Updated | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AL | Kelly Creek— Hwy 78 to Winnataska Drive | III-IV | 26 cfs | low | 10/7 17:30 |
| AW Gauge ID: | 1128 |
| USGS Station: | 02405500 |
| HUC: | 03150106 |
| Latitude: | 33.4475 |
| Longitude: | -86.3869 |
| Class: | 3 |
No guide books for this stream. If you know of a book that describes this stream please contact and advise the StreamTeam member for this run. No Comments
Add a Comment No rapids entered. If you know names, and locations of the rapids please contact and advise the StreamTeam member for this run. 
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