Potomac, S. Branch

My adult daughter and I ran this section on April 30, 2011. We put in when the Franklin gauge was at 3.9 (about noon) and took out at Big Bend Campground about 5 PM when the gauge was at 3.77. We were in a 14' Dagger Caption designed for whitewater, with kneeling pillars, thigh straps and flotation bags in front and back. We were in wet suits and helmets. I'm a well-seasoned amateur; my daughter has been down 3 very easy rivers, so still a novice. I read a guide book online that said 'the first rapid below 220 is the best' and described it as a class III. Fortunately, someone at the campground warned me about it (Landslide rapid). We walked around it. It looks like a mankiller to me, definitely a class V. I think a world class kayaker could do it, but anyone less is taking an unreasonable risk with their life.
The portage 'path' on the right is simply awful--high sharp boulder, thorns and brambles, etc. But I'm still glad I portaged.
Not too far above the low water bridge at Smoke Hole the river splits--where an old dilapidated brownish school bus sits on the left. We scouted (as we were driving to the put in) and ran the left side. There is a very large boulder near the left bank with a very heavy flow of water over it and to the right of it. It looks runnable just to right of the boulder, and we tried, but I think a cross current caught us and we swamped, got bashed up a little bit. (If you swamp here, you need to get out fast, because there is another very heavy rapid right ahead where the river re-converges and you don't want to swim it.)
The low water bridge looked deadly--about 6' of daylight between the top of the water and the bridge, with heavy water flow. I could find no good place to get out above the low water bridge. The water is very swift and heavy along the entire length--no eddies, sandbars, banks, etc. We ended up grabbing saplings on the left bank and that finally stopped us, but it was not pleasant.
Otherwise, we had an awesome time. We encountered LONG stretches of non-stop class III waves. We shipped some water in some of the waves (had to pull off and empty out). There were actually not a whole lot of turns to be made--main challenge was picking the right spot and keeping the boat absolutely straight when hitting the waves.
We viewed the river one day before when the Franklin gauge was at 4.34. There were a lot of REALLY ugly looking waves (backward bending whitecaps) at that level. I was highly relieved when the level dropped to 3.9, and those ugly waves tamed down considerably.
We swamped 4 times. There seems to be NO 'good' place to swamp on this river--the fast, heavy flow is practically non-stop. Our flotation bags helped considerably in making the boat more bouyant and easier to pull over to a bank. (There is a quiet pool below landslide falls--for the lucky ones who survive.)
When I do it again, I'll wear a life jacket to supplement the bouyancy of the wet suit. My daugther got scratched up where her ankle area was exposed between where the wet suit stopped and her water shoes begain. Next time she'll have uninterrupted coverage there in case we swim again. I wore Frogg Togg neoprene wader booties (purchased at Gander Mountain) as socks inside sneakers and I was fine.