Willow Creek, NF
2. Chilkoot Campground to Bass Lake (lower)
| Difficulty | V |
| Length | 3.6 mi |
| Avg Gradient | 300 fpm |
| Gauge | N Fk Willow Ck Nr Sugar Pine |
| Flow Rate as of 21 days | 12 cfsstale data |
| Reach Info Last Updated | April 15, 2010 |
This lower run is better than the upper section because it has a lot less junk, has more big drops and has many bigger drops. The run starts off with a 7' waterfall into a small pool.
Chilkoot Falls
From there, the river is tight and technical rock bashing. One must negociate dozens of rocky rapids that often have wood in them. Most of the drops are read and run, and generally the cleanest line is where the most water is flowing. After a mile or so you will see granite on the right bank, you will want to boat scout here, for this is the first large drop.
Cave Man
After the aforementioned drop, the run opens up into small slides and boofs.
Dead End Slide
After a few fun rapids, you will see a bus size rock on river left. This rock is the midway point of the run. Following the rock, the creek flattens out and the scenery is quite pretty. In 2008, there was one log portage and several log limbos, before the creek opened into the gorge section.
Halfway point
The Gorge section consists of several slides and small drops. The entire gorge can be scouted on river right. None of the drops are bigger then 5-7' but the entire section is boxed-in, so swimming would be bad and rescue would be tricky. Below the last drop of the Gorge, the current dies down and you can slowly paddle into the last eddy. This is a no-stress move, but don't miss the eddy. The drop that follows is big and can be scouted on the left or the right.
The Willow Gorge
The following drop has been dubbed Mike's Drop. Partly because a Mike got the first D, and another Mike sprained his ankle in the pot hole. If you run it on the right, you will slide 20-30+ feet and land in a large pot hole. Then you come rushing out of the pot hole, hitting a rooster tail, and slide into a small pool. The rock wall on the bottom right looks sketchy but generally is not in play. Other lines can be run on Mike's
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First Rapid of the day
River drops several feet into a shallow pool. Rock is slightly undercut on bottom right.
Slender slide that takes you into a wall unless you turn left halfway down.
Multiple drops and slides over a 200 yard distance
Large slide into a pot hole. Height is around 65 feet according to Google Earth.
Huge drop. Class VI. Possible class V option is to seal launch into the last slide in the sequence.
Big slide into a small pool. Be careful not to wash into the next rapid, it is likely to cause bodily harm or worse.
This drop starts with a slide, into a 8-9' drop, with a hole at the bottom.
Flume slide on river right. Beware of the concrete walls.
Feb 18, 2009
A group of us visited Willow creek when it was running at 187 CFS. We hiked up to Angels Falls and checked out the last 4 drops. At this flow, I would rate the river at 5++. It may be boatable, but the margin for error is zero. I think the max flow for this run should be lowered. 200 cfs may not be possible for this creek.
May 19, 2008
This is the Sieve on Toilet Gorge that is deadly. A large majority of the creeks flow pours into this hole. When the creek is flowing, this sieve is not obvious, but it is there. Better just to skip this portion of Willow Creek.
May 11, 2008
Dan Hogg reports:
Well Paddlers,
Another great Adventure with Evan and Daniel. No injuries, not counting sore thumb from previous weekend that I hit on a rock again, good paddling, good rapids, and great company capable of rescues. Evan says there were no swims on the lower run, but he's not counting the hike up-creek to run the final drop of upper run. He didn't swim, again, but I did. And since bad things run in series of three's, I should be done( at least for a while; final score...Dan-0, Willow creek-3).
The writeup is correct. There is less 'junk' on this run and the rapids we ran were beautiful with some technical & tight lines. We had approx. 4 portages due to logs, and 4 due to potential bodily damage from gravity vs. rocks. Once we reached the 'Devils Slide' area. Recongnizable by ; nudists, fence on river-left side w/easy trail, horizon line with only tree tops in the distance(biggest hint), continuous granite slide/rapids to last pool, with an eddy and view of Bass lake. Unfortunately, we didn't get to paddle too much after that. Each time we made it to the creek, we didn't get far w/o having another portage. Plus time/fatigue (at least for me) was becoming a factor. After Devil's Slide, there were two more big drops/slides. We scouted the first and after seeing logs/rocks in the last drop of three(once you did first drop, you were committed to run all three) we easily portaged. Once on the trail down( we knew from hikers that we were close to the road) we basically didn't stop till we reached the road, took a swim, and just I hiked down the rest of the way w/o kayak to save time/energy to get the car.
Without a doubt, the gem of this run is a 200-300 yard granite gorge with 25ft slide into and 8-9 more drops before smooth narrow deep chanel ending with our 2nd portage of the day due to big drop/slide with rocks, and tigers and bears, OH MY! Well, actually it was about a 40-50ft slide with drops mixed in for good measure! Evan and I were really thinking about this one, but you know what they say about 'the longer you look at a rapid, the more time you'll spend in it when you run it'. The deciding factor was lack of rescue points, which were about nil. So we hiked.
The scenery on this run is awesome. In a few tranquil areas, you felt like you were hours from civilization. The lightning and thunder as we were leaving for home was incredible as well.
As with most of my recent trips, I will be sore for a few more days and ready for more adventure real soon. Thanks again to Evan and Daniel for making this another successful run. Without them, my kayak would still be bobbing around behind the waterfall of Chilkoot Falls at the end of the upper run. What a way to start your day, a swim and tough boat rescue on the first drop!
Happy paddling all!
Dan
June 25,2006
