McCloud

June 2 2023

McCloud at put in 0.6 miles below Lower Falls to reservoir

CFS 1350

Wood frequently seen in river.

(2.2 miles below put in) At 0.2 miles below Big Springs wood across most of the river. Easy to see. In hard shell kayak narrow sneak on right.

(2.4 miles below put in) At 0.4 miles after Big Springs wood across most of the river. Easy to see. In hard shell kayaks ran a fairly wide route on the river right.

It seemed closer to Big Springs than this. Miles are according to AllTrails (3.6 miles below put in) At 1.6 miles below Big Springs MAJOR hazard. Wood across the entire river. From river level it looks runnable on the left. However there is a second tree 10 feet down river. We portaged on the right. Two kayaks stuck in the river in this area.

At 0.2 miles below the bridge there is significant wood in the river. We ran it, but I'm not sure what line to take once the water level goes down.

Two of us packrafted this and were very wood-alert given the recent snowmelt and flooding. A rare chance to paddle this above the ~700cfs that it usually is due to the springs. We didn't do Lower Big Springs or even the section right below due to high water and lack of eddies right from the get-go. Putting in at Fowler's, there were 3-4 portages around wood, one of which wasn't very fun – even for light packrafts. Otherwise the run was as described – mainly continuous class III.

There is an new shop in McCloud which offers shuttle services for this run. They are very cool. The shops name is McCloud Outdoors & Gear Exchange. I found them online at www.mccloudoutdoors.com

Boated two days in a row on this pretty river. Launched near the National Forest boundary to minimize the distance to Little Springs. Probably 20 cfs above Little Springs and maybe 50 to 75 cfs below. Big Springs added several hundred cfs to fill out the river. Several more springs came in along the way. Side creeks added minor amounts of water. The long sections of continuous water were super fun, but tiring.

Paddling across the reservoir was hard the first day as there was a strong headwind. On the second day, winds were light and usually behind me.

This is photo op time! We set up the camera on tripod, burst mode and hit the shutter just as we hit the lip. This is a collage of a single run from burst mode...Mick

'Nother shot in the series showing HerrBoater's style. We ran this over and over trying to get the good shot...Mick

I skipped running this on two separate solo runs, as there was no safety for me. It looks like a class III+-IV rapid with a decent line on river right but a recirculating hole on river left, especially at the flow shown.

Higher flows on the McCloud River. I want to say I haven't run from Middle Falls down, but only from below the Horizon Line rapid you'll see as well.

Please note this section is above the Fowler's Campground and Lower McCloud Falls and could be an option to run as well. Just takes a healthy walk up from Fowler's Campground.

A zoom-in of this stout-looking rapid. This is not the normal run. It is above Lower Falls by maybe more than half a mile. One would probably wish to go river right. The entrance to this rapid looks tricky.

Maybe 2000 feet upstream of Lower McCloud Falls. Class III

About a half mile or so above Lower McCloud Falls. Unnamed stuff, class II-II+ in my estimation.