Sultan

Before heading out on the Sky for the day my buddy and I decided to take a quick dip in the Sultan. I had only done this run once before ~450cfs and it was too low for my liking so I was stoked when I saw the gauge a little over 600 that morning. To keep the shuttle easy and to make the run a little longer we floated down to Sportsman's Park in Sultan. Our group was one kayaker and one packrafter.

We put in at the powerhouse, the first rapid exiting the pool is by far the easiest rapid until you exit the gorge so don't be fooled. Around the first corner comes the first real rapid, the river splits roughly halfway through the rapid before rejoining and slamming into the right wall, take the left side going in and the right side around the island. There is a short pause before another rapid that is fairly straightforward but should be checked for wood. After another short pool is Last Nasty, which I think separates into three sections with eddies to catch along the way. The first section squeezes to the right of a big midstream boulder and then pounds into a cave on the right. Don't go left of the big boulder and also don't go into the cave (we actually pulled into the cave to stop and scout at 450 but any more water makes this option sketchy. The second section is a little manky and we ran through it on the right side too before catching an eddy above an obvious horizon line at the third drop. There is a flaking ledge on the river right side that creates a perfect boof into the pool below and could be lapped with some effort.

After Last Nasty the river cruises through another mile or so of fantastic class III/III+ boulder gardens with countless chutes, boofs, splat rocks and surf waves. A huge midstream boulder marks the beginning of the end of the gorge and the fun rapids, with only a short section just below before the river significantly changes and flows through wooded gravel bars. First island go either way, second island the left side fans out really bad and gets super shallow. Right side has a sketchy log to go around and then some dumbfuck landowner strung a rope across the river to the island from their property. Be careful of this as it's hard to see and is roughly at chest level. There are several other similar rope features on smaller river right side channels as you make your way down to the takeout. Takeout at the 3 bridges that cross over the Sultan just above the confluence of the Sky. Entire trip took roughly 2 hours but could be shortened if the gorge is pre scouted and you boogie out the lower stretch instead of dinking around.