Escanaba, M.Br.

USGS lists a sampling site with drainage area of 164 square miles at our listed/preferred put-in. You'll have ~1.6 miles of flat/flowing water (no rapids) to the first major drop.

These falls are now surrounded by private property. This falls is just around the corner from the put-in (or 1.6 miles from the Co.Rd.CG put-in). You may encounter very aggressive (non-boater-friendly) landowners taking issue with your presence even when not on river-left. Do not dally any longer than necessary here!

The lead-in is pretty straight-forward. The lip of the falls is seriously 'notched' on river left, up against a wall of rock at left shore. A significant hole and boil will exist at medium-to-high flows. The right wall downstream in the pool is undercut, and the boil is likely to push you strongly in that direction! There is a bit of a 'room-of-doom' in the eddy near the falls, so you probably want to try to angle left off the lip and drive out through the boil and downstream.

Running White City Falls

These falls are now surrounded by private property. In some ways a bit like a bigger, meaner version of the first falls. There are a few good diagonal waves in the lead-in (to trip you up if you aren't careful). The lip of this falls has a big boulder left-of-center. There may be a (theoretical) line to one side or the other near this boulder, but most runs are more center-to-right, to come off a bit of a tongue of water. The landing seldom seems too 'keepy', but again, there is an undercut wall downstream right.

As the river encounters an island, the left channel spills across a couple of ledges. They are generally quite straight-forward, and could offer some play (other than generally we have never been in a 'play' mode on this long run). (My first run on this, we encountered an inner-tube on a very extended surf in this ledge/hole!)

Private property along both sides of this entire stretch. A 'guard rock' or 'guard ledge' confuses the entrance to a half-dome hump of rock. The recommended line (usually) appears to be attempting to ride the top of the hump (to avoid the aggressive holes left and right), but that is more easily said than done.

Running Half Dome 1

Running Half Dome 2

A brief pool separates this drop from the preceding drop (Half Dome). A line of rocks splits the flow into a number of pourovers. More rock downstream left tends to funnel more of the flow to river-right, through a short series of waves and holes, before it smooths out to a swift runout into a good pool.

After this feature, there is nearly three miles of flatwater (punctuated only by a few very minor riffles or rips) until the next significant features.

After a long (2.9 miles) flat stretch with only one minor rapids interrupting, you finally get to a significant narrowing of the river. A (sometimes) quite juicy pourover/ledge lies in the narrows. Flow heads toward a large rock island, and is diverted to the right, into a large pool. Out of the pool, the flow trips across numerous waves and holes, some of which can be pretty sweet looking. Play may be possible on a few of them, though (again) we've typically been more intent on continuing downriver on this long run.

This is followed by very nearly a full mile of flatwater, again with only minor rips interrupting.

A few different routes are available/viable here, so some may opt to carry up to try more than one. To extreme river-left, a small pourover drops into a 'sluice' between shore and a line of rock parallel to it. To extreme right, a wider channel (or sluice) leads to an often grungy exit. Partway down this route, one can veer left to head to center stream. Down the middle there is generally considerable less flow (obviously at low-to-moderate flows for the river). Overall, generally not too difficult, but you can find/make some more technical or interesting lines. The runout often has a small surfable wave. Scouting is advised (particularly for river-right lines) as this area has been known to accumulate jumble piles of wood (hence the rapids name).

Following this you'll encounter the second longest flatwater stretch, with ~1.8 miles to the next significant feature.

After nearly 1.8 miles of flatwater, some minor boulderbed rapids are encountered. The river takes a right-angle bend (to the right) and a horizon line awaits. This is a sweet sliding drop, into what can be a rather sticky hole (at some flows). Generally best just right down the center, but occasionally boaters may try a line more to the left, to avoid the 'meat' of the hole, and drop a little bit of a 'boof' which can exist off the end of the slide to that side.

The hole can (at times) look really sweet for play, however, the right side of the outflow pool has much rock, generally fairly smooth but also generally fairly shallow, which will hamper access and generally inhibit most interest in risking much play. A LARGE pool (almost a lake!) follows, before the river twists left to continue.

(Note: Rating this rapids is a bit tricky. It is such a simple smooth slide (with no complexity to the approach, and a huge pool below) that it could be called barely class II. However, good boaters have gotten 'worked' by the hole at the base of the slide, which would suggest that it can deserve the class III or higher rating. YMMV.)

Following this, you'll have ~1.2 miles of mostly flatwater to the next significant feature.

Just beyond a good jig-jog right and then left, the final rapids/falls of the 'upper' reach is encountered. A short pourover/wave/hole traverses center-to-right, causing boiling swirly water preceding the main action here. A huge rock lies just left-of-center below. Water flowing between the sloping bedrock of the left shore and this 'middle finger' tends to funnel into a really aerated boil below. Best outflow is tight to the left wall, since a ledge of shallow rock lies immediately behind the 'middle finger'. To the right of the 'middle finger', flow drops across a couple smaller ledges/rocks (possible hole or two) before meeting the pool below. Often the sweet/semi-gutsy line (to avoid the potentially tricky boiling pourover at the top of this drop) is to start at river-left shore above the drop, drive powerfully toward the right, on smooth flow (which heads toward the 'middle finger' and drops down the left line), keeping your boat upstream of the rock, to drive into the right channel as previously described.

From this feature, it is just over a mile to our listed take-out, or (if continuing with the lower section) about 1.4 miles to the next interesting feature.

Running Middle Finger 1

Running Middle Finger 2