Cane Creek
Fall Creek Falls State Park to Highway 30
| Difficulty | IV-V |
| Length | 7 mi |
| Avg Gradient | 94 fpm |
| Reach Info Last Updated | December 12, 2025 |
River Description
Put in: Park your vehicles at the visitor center above Cane Creek Falls.
The walk to the put in trail is easy to find. Leaving the visitor center walk uphill to the stop sign. Hang a left and walk downhill untill you pass a small bridge. Right after the bridge there will be a sign indicationg Cable trail. It is reccomended you belay or lower your boats down the cable trail by rope.
Wear your helmet, sticky rubber shoes, rope / partner assist required half way down - it is a very steep trail!!!
Take Out: Hwy 30 bridge at 285 jct.
Gauge information: Calfkiller gauge correletion may the ticket, but look for Great Falls Dam 'inflow' 4000 - 7000 ( check inflow by clicking http://www.tva.gov/lakes/gfh_r.htm )
Use the Calfkiller as a signal if it is running or not, but due to caves make sure there's enough water to paddle at Highway 30 bridge. C heck red gauge at putin or takeout before you put on
Gauging information was passed from Clay Wright and Bankfull1 from Boatertalk as Follows:
Red Put-in gauge: Is on the cement 'diving area' on the little mini-lake above a dam upstream of the falls below a swinging bridge.
'-2'' would be 2'' below my personal 'not really jonezing' minimum and at 0 you don't have to walk.'
Levels were closely matched to the Red gauge at the take out when painted.
Red Take-out gauge: Under Hwy 30 Bridge on the pillar closest to river right. It is on the bottom of the pillar in the bottom righthand corner. Gravel moves so much the minimum changes often - most important is if you can paddle the last rapids easily, you can likely run the rest.
-2' Is the Lowest I've run. The flat water paddle out was slow and and we wheel-chaired the fa
...River Features
put in.
Pine Tree Falls
Crack Slot
Twin Towers
Corner Pocket
Airplane Turn
Hallway Falls
Rear Entry
Take Out
Take Out
Trip Reports
Log in to add a report12 / 18 - 6'' great level - clear of wood through Trade Center / Twin Towers and Corner Pocket but after the lull, watch for new wood in rapid right above Airplane Turn - you'll be boogie class 2 and see the gradient coming and a big tree on right but you can't see the one in the hole of the class 3 so I put flagging tape in a tree above on river left. Big obvious log below Airplane can be missed. Big obvious log in runout was sneakable river right at this flow. Smooth sailing - wide open from recent high water down below. Cable Trail harder, as more trees gone at the steep so it's hard to balance even one boat while you climb through. Consider having short rope ready to clip boats on with and spreading out on the way down.
Cable broke and trail closed temporarily as of April 4th 16.
The photos on here claiming 2'5'' by robert maxwell are the lowest I've ever seen it and likely co-ordinate to -6'' on the closer red gage.
Friends ran it at -2'' (took out at -4'') in April of 16 and it looked low medium.
clay
1/2/13 Red gauge at 1' today. Fun run down Cain. No portages due to logs. Definitely a mid-to-high water level. Calf killer gauge was at 1510. Great falls dam inflow around 8500. Most beautiful run we've done this year. :-) Did portage twin towers due to ferocious looking hole (and our first run down).
Put-in gage upstream of falls and dam, look left off swinging bridge....7'' was a fluffy, 3'' a good medium. More important is red take-out gage: -2'' minimum or you'll hike down a few islands.
New Wood 1/2 mi in can be snuck via far left crack.
New wood in Rear entry's right crack - get left or get out.
2 runs today at 0'
New red gage at takeout on r right: 0' today and
I'd say that's a good minimum to paddle out.<br
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Put-in: New red gage below swinging bridge
upstream of falls and dam (across bridge from
Cane Falls parking) - read 0' too.
All logs avoidable. Walked 'Rear Entry' since left
sneak hard to enter. Remarkably more
channelized in runout. Pushed across the last
braided area (L then R) but otherwise bumped
through fine. One bad log within sight of
takeout
Collins 1200, Calfkiller 950
1/9/05: 2.5 was a medium level - new gravel bar makes gage read higher (2.7 yesterday looked like 2x the water). If the shoal upstream of the bridge is scrapey, the last miles will be too. No log portages required - remarkable clean. Rangers friendly. Calfkiller was 5.8, collins 3000, Caney Fork 1.7
The link for the Calfkiller gauge is this:
<a href=http://waterdata.usgs.gov/tn/nwis/uv?
03419800 target=_blank>http://waterdata.usgs.gov/
tn/nwis/uv?03419800
Sounds like you should see 5.7 or above on Calfkiller
before heading to Cane
Here are some numbers I just crunched:
Falls to Piney Creek - 2.2 miles at 172 ft/mile
Steepest mile - 220 ft/mile from mile 0.3 to mile 1.3
steepest stretch - 250 ft/mile for 0.4 miles (second gorge)
Piney Creek to takeout - 4.8 miles at 42 ft/mile
Piney Creek to hikeout - 1 mile at 75 ft/mile
total length and gradient - 7 miles with 580 ft of drop
There
1/9/05: 2.5 was a medium level - new gravel bar makes gage read higher (2.7 yesterday looked like 2x the water). If the shoal upstream of the bridge is scrapey, the last miles will be too. No log portages required - remarkable clean. Rangers friendly. Calfkiller was 5.8, collins 3000, Caney Fork 1.7