Sixmile Creek
Rt 79 to Brooktondale
| Difficulty | IV-V |
| Length | 5.1 mi |
| Avg Gradient | n/a |
| Gauge | Sixmile Creek at Brooktondale Ny |
| Reach Info Last Updated | March 10, 2023 |
River Description
A note on the rating: Strong class IV boaters could likely handle this stretch, but especially at higher water the difficulty in places can be V. As always, make sure you're prepared and make good decisions.
If you put in on Rt. 79 in Slaterville Springs you have a couple miles of strainer choked class I-II to deal with before you find anything interesting. We wound up walking around 6-8 woody messes. We've also tried putting in on a side stream at the highway departmet in Brooktondale. This made the strainer dodge shorter, but I don't think it was any quicker. It's definitely worth it to ask around to see if someone will let you walk across their lawn just upstream of Brooktondale. It would be better to put in just upstream of Brooktondale where the creek first comes in view of the road, but the legality of that is questionable. In Brooktondale there are four waterfalls. They all have some sliding and some verticality. At low levels you can easily stop and scout all of them. Take out downstream of Brooktondale.
Sorry for the lack of names, maybe somebody will contribute monikers?
Putin Latitude: 42,23,59N; Putin Longitude: 76,26,16W
Finger Lakes Area Runs
Bowman CreekCascadilla Creek Canandaigua Outlet
...River Features
Put In
First Falls
First horizon line you come to is an old dam that's best run down the slide on river right. Watch out for the manky rock on river left in the runout. Looks like a good place for strainers to hang out.
Second Falls
Another old dam. We walked this one because it required a boof of about 10 ft. onto wet rock. With more water it could be doable. Walk's probably easier on the right at low levels, but above 200 cfs. it gets sketchy and the left becomes a better alternative. It's followed by a long low angle runout (see picture).
Third Falls
This one's interesting. 3 ft. ledge on the lead in. Probably an 8 ft. drop. Deep in the middle, but looks sticky, shallow on both sides. There's a bit of metal in the center of the leadin to look out for. Lot's of fun because it's constricted, but definitely be wary of this one. Cleanest line is to start right over the 3 ft. ledge, then boof off of the curler.
Fourth Falls
Run this one on the right. Long slide in the area of 15- 20 ft. high with an autoboof at the end. Kind of scrapy until you get to the autoboof. This one would probably be a lot of fun at high water.
Take Out
Trip Reports
Log in to add a reportHas anybody run/scouted those drops that are in Ithaca? I know that it's illegal to be in the creeks but that doesn't stop the locals from swimming and jumping and, let's face it, it's never stopped kayakers from doing what we do. -Dan Cash
I've been down to that third drop at low water and there isn't a cave under the curtain. There is a piece of rebar sticking out at the top (you can see the rooster tail in the photo on the rapid page). The 'landing' zone is only about 5-6 feet wide at the bottom. Hope to nail this one next spring.
This reach is listed as in the Lake Erie basin but is actually in the Lake Ontario basin.
Kyle running the first drop down the scrapy, junky slide on the right.
Drops about 10 ft. onto a slab. I've seen it at 1000cfs and it still didn't appeal to me.
Center line on the third drop, it's shallow in there, but you land on a nice pillow.
Kyle launching a decent boof off the third drop.
Kyle Stury heading for the autoboof on the fourth drop backwards.
The first slide below the runout to the second drop. The notch at the top of the slide complicates it.