Stekoa Creek
1- Upper: Highway 23 to Rickman Airfield Road
| Difficulty | IV-V+ |
| Length | 1.9 mi |
| Avg Gradient | 125 fpm |
| Reach Info Last Updated | March 18, 2009 |
River Description
This run from 441 bridge to Rickman Airfield Road Bridge is 2 miles in lenght with a very easy shuttle. The creek at the bridge is flat with one rapid in the class 3-4 range for about .2 miles then picks up as it drops about 200 feet in a mile long stretch where all the big drops are. The river then flattens out for .80 miles of class 1-2 wave trains to the takeout. This is a very fun run if you have the skills and desire to run this beautiful, but very poor water quality gorge. The hardest part of this run is getting your boat to the put-in/portage of Clayton Powerhouse rapid. Once you get your boat to this point you really only have to portage one more time if you have the skills to be running this creek. After putting in below Clayton powerhouse the action starts out with the second hardest rapid on the run. It is a slide that drops about 15 feet then makes a right hand turn down a steep 20 foot slide with a bad piton rock in the center and a hole that can be pretty grabby. When running this try to catch the eddy on the left side above the steep 20 foot slide. After leaving this eddy get as far left as possible to avoid the piton. The river then has some good boogy water, but watch out for trees. There were two riverwide trees down, but I was able to get by both without getting out of my boat as of March 7, 2009. When you come to a distinct horizon line it is time to get to the bank, cause 20-20 is the name of this waterfall and the top 10-15 feet is a vertical drop that lands on a rock shelf. Scout on the left side to see the whole waterfall. If you are portaging the whole waterfall carry on the left, but it is very difficult. If you are going to run the bottom half of 20-20 portage the top half on the right and put in below the first ledge then run the far left side and try to boof cause landing is about 6-8 feet so try not to pencil. After that is a nice class 3 rapid slide then comes the final three drops. The first is Double crack run it
...River Features
Put In
Warm-up Ledge
This is about a 5 foot ledge that has a sieve in right of center. Run either far right line next to bank or center. Hole may get bad at higher water. There is a huge nasty 35 foot waterfall about 100 yards down river. Get out before it goes around bend to scout/portage the next rapid.
Clayton Powerplant
This is a nasty 35 foot waterfall that used to be the site of a hydroelectic plant for Clayton many years ago. There are many sieves and dangers in this waterfall. If you are running it you don't need me telling you how.
You can skip the the first small ledge and some flatwater and make the portage a little easier if you park at the pulloff in the curve of road before heading down the mountain and you can put in below this waterfall. It is a tough place to portage or putin, but if you can get into the river below the run is very fun below.
Plunge
This rapid has a sliding entrance that drops about 15 feet, then has a high angle 20 foot slide. The hole at the bottom is bad at low levels, and I am sure it will get worse at higher levels because of rock wall that will back up the hole. There is a piton rock at bottom middle, so when running it try to get as far left as possible.
The Clog
This rapid is not really that difficult it just always seems to have trees in it so you have to portage.
Log Jams
There are two log jams in a row about 100 feet apart. Two large trees have fallen causing this log jam. They were to big for me to cut out. Luckily the creek is flat here so not a horrible place to have to get out. When I ran this last I was able to sneak over one and under another, just beware of new wood in the creek when running it.
20-20
If only the top half of the waterfall had a pool like the bottom half. The first 15 foot of the falls all lands on rock so if you like your back then portage. The rest of the waterfall is runnable. To portage the whole rapid portage left down small pig trail through the rhodo. To run the lower 3/4 of the falls portage either right or left and put below the first 15 feet of the drop and go down the drop into the short pool and paddle to the far left side down to a 15 foot boof into abouta 6 to 8 foot deep pool. There is a cave on the left side.
Bottom of 20-20
You can run the bottom 2/3 of the waterfall by portaging on the right and putting in after the first 15 feet or so and run the bottom 25 or so feet of the drop. The landing is only about 6-8 feet so don't pencil, it also has high water potential of a cave on the right.
Little Floom
Nice little Floom before it starts dropping fast again.
Double Crack
This is about a 12 feet drop that has two sieves in it. One on the right and one on the left where most of the water goes. Do a seven foot move here where you try to stay on the high right side of the rock without going into sieve crack on the right.
Mean Holly Tree
This one drops about 12 feet. It has bad sieves on the left side, and has a huge Holly tree on the right where a nice boof would be. The line is down the center, but there are still some hazards as there are some small potholes down the center. The hole on this one will probable get bad at high water.
Clayton's Scream Machine
This is a very fun rapid. It drops about 20 feet or so, and is very fast. At low flows it feels like you are going to fall off the side of the rock you are flying down.
Take Out
Trip Reports
Log in to add a reportThe Plunge on Upper Stekoa @ 0'
BBB
Here's a Trip Report from -2' I posted on Boatertalk:
Having Gotten a late start today, I decided that it would be a good day to check out the Upper Section of Stekoa Creek from 441 to Rickman Airfield Road in Clayton, GA. The only beta I have heard until recently was that it was all flatwater with big portages. Recently I noticed that Logan James had been in there and posted some pictures of it at very low water on American Whitewater, and I decided that it'd be worth checking out.
When we put on at 3pm this afternoon, the gage was reading approximately -2'. Based on our day, I'd call this a Low level, and I wouldn't personally run it lower. I'd like to see it with a few more inches to pad out some of the shoals and shallow slides between the rapids. Most of the drops channelize well though. I definitely wouldn't recommend going in there with high water unless very familiar with the run, as most of the scouting is at river level and exiting the gorge would be tough with steep Rhodo infested banks. At this level we ran everything except for the Big drop at the beginning, which just looks nasty, and the top drop of 20-20, which lands on rock. We portaged around one Log Jam, which we later found was passable at the far right.
All I can say is that this run is much higher quality than I was expecting! Good drops, easy shuttle. I can't even count the number of times I have driven right by when it was probbably running. Today the Chattooga only spiked from 1.6-1.8, so it doesn't seem that it'd take a lot of rain to get it going. The water quality is bad, but bearable.
Photos from our trip are on the third page of photos for this reach.
I'd really like to get back in there with ~3-6' of water or so on the Gage.
Also, just as a heads up, I think that with the water we had today, most of the major drops are IV+ or easy V. In my Opinion, The AW page ratings currently are a little off due to being based on a lower water level. I'd compare the difficulty to that of Overflow Creek for those that are interested in trying it out.
-Tim C
2nd Drop of 20-20.
Last major drop on the upper section of the Stekoa.
Nice early drop on Stekoa Creek.
Top and Middle drops of Clayton Powerplant at -2'. It looks like it would clean up with more water
David Spotts runs the second major drop on the Upper Stekoa. Watch the right at the bottom here, because even at this level there is a toilet bowl with a decently high eddy fence... being caught here at high water would be ugly. Fortunately I think that at higher water it would be easier to avoid the Right Side.
The gorge is very beautiful if you can look past the poor water quality and the trash floating in the eddies. This tree is growing up in the middle of the river above the 2nd slide
David Spotts about to drop the 2nd drop of 20-20. Unfortunately, I was having camera issues and missed the money shot. At this level the 2nd drop of 20-20 went, on the River Left. Much Lower and I'd think it'd be hard not to dry out and fall off face first.
At this level, double crack has a clean line from Middle to Left of Middle off of the rock in the foreground.
At -2' the middle line opens up avoiding the 'Mean Holly Tree'
I painted a paddler's gage on the new Hwy 441 south bound bridge over Stekoa on 7/14/07. To see it, you'll need to park on Rickman Airfield Road, carefully cross 441 to the median between the north and south bound bridges. The gage is on the South bound bridge river right, downstream pilon. Please report your levels and low, medium and high info so we can dial this gage in and develop a correlation. E-mail info to me at h2olevelcheck@hotmail.com. -- Thanx -- Rob Maxwell
The Paddler's Gage for Stekoa Creek is on the new South bound bridge of Hwy 441. Its on the downstream river right pilon and easily seen from the median between the bridges. Park on on Rickman Airfield Road and cross 441 carefully to view the gage.
Be aware that the city of Clayton dumps it's 'treated' sewage into Stekoa. It isn't called 'Stinkola' for nothing.
Bottom of 20-20
UGLY!!!!
This is the 2nd Major Rapid on upper Stekoa Creek. It is a slide that drops 15' or so verticle. The level was -12' on the gage painted on 441, and the Chattooga was at 1.6
This is the 2nd Major Rapid on upper Stekoa Creek. It is a slide that drops 15' or so verticle. The level was -12' on the gage painted on 441, and the Chattooga was at 1.6. We ran it later at -8' and the hole at bottom was starting to get sticky, one boat got stuck in it for 5 minutes.
This is the 3rd Major Rapid on upper Stekoa Creek. The level was -12' on the gage painted on 441, and the Chattooga was at 1.6. It is a double drop of about 40 feet total. The photo is of the top part of the drop. Land on bedrock.
This is the 3rd Major Rapid on upper Stekoa Creek. The level was -12' on the gage painted on 441, and the Chattooga was at 1.6. It is a double drop of about 40 feet total. The photo is of the bottom part of the drop. Landing seemed pretty shallow. We portaged, but with more water the bottom of the drop defently look like a go.
This is the 4th Major Rapid on upper Stekoa Creek. The level was -12' on the gage painted on 441, and the Chattooga was at 1.6. It is about 10 feet or so verticle drop that had a bad crack sieve on right side and left look a little nasty with the low water. Middle is clean but might be hard to hit with lots of water.
This is the 5th Major Rapid on upper Stekoa Creek. The level was -12' on the gage painted on 441, and the Chattooga was at 1.6.
This is the last big rapid on Upper Stekoa Creek gorge. The level was -12' on 441 bridge and Chattooga was at 1.6 very low.