Gragg Prong

Nathan Galbreath - Ran Gragg Prong ran yesterday (12/1/2010). It is an elusive run, but oh so worth it. It rained pretty hard from 7 AM until midnight the day before. GP level would have been perfect around 7 AM. I was not able to get to the putin until about 10:30 AM. By then, the boofing had dropped from primo to lower runnable. However, the water quality had gone from brown/flood stage to crystal clear! Wilsons Creek was at exactly 1 foot on the bridge gauge when I passed it at 10 AM. Gragg Prong was about 2 inches above the long flat concrete shelf bridge support on the river right side of the put in bridge. Leland's books says that if you can scrape down at the top, you are good to go. In my opinion, that characterization is a little too generous. Based on my experience yesterday, I think the water level needs to be at least 2 inches above the long flat concrete shelf--otherwise the run is so scrapey that it detracts from the fun. We rode the last good bubble down. There were more groups arriving when we took off around 12:30, but they were skunked. The water had already dropped below the concrete shelf at the put in.

Our whole group ran drag strip on the left and everyone had good lines. No close calls or mishaps, just a good clean run. Keep your eyes peeled for wood. There were at least 4 mandatory portgages formed by riverwide logs. Nothing sketchy. The portages were all in relatively flat sections and easily visible from upstream (2 of them were in the run out at the bottom). There were also several spots where you could just barely sneak under or around fallen wood. Stay alert.

Because this run is so far from everywhere, you have to hustle to catch it. If you feel comfortable on the north fork french broad, you will have no problem on this run at lower to medium flows. It is mostly solid class IV.