Cartecay

Five of us put on today with the level at 3.2 and dropping around noon. There is a very large, river-wide strainer just above the put in at the Cartecay Watershed property but no other significant wood on this section as of today. Overall the river was pushy but fun with strong eddies at every rapid. Sexton's was runnable nearly all the way across, but the river-right line was still best. Rock garden was a very fast continuous wave train. Surfing rapid was at a good surfing level but the water speed made it challenging to catch. S-turn was really rolling and the usual recovery pool was gone. We all took different lines, a far left drop and, the normal river-left line, and a center slide/boof off of the norrmally exposed rock. Whirlpool certainly lived up to its name and one of us took a swim. The drop its self was a half-curl that made for a wild ride and the river-left sneak was not quite available. Blackberry was RAGING. There was still enough rock to scout on river-left but the water there was ankle deep. The haystack at the bottom was SOLID and BIG-it basically swallowed me and my CR250 (pic). There were also attempts at the diagonal line starting left-center but the middle line seemed best. NOTE: We were sure to set a river-right downstream safety to keep swimmers from being swept into the undercut downstream. The swift current here dictates that all groups should do the same. Overall, this was a really great level and if we hadn't stopped for a few recoveries/surfs, we would have probably been done in 30-40 min.