Rottenwood Creek

Thought I'd share a hurricane Ivan story.

Meeting up with Jeff Larimer and Neil Quinn it starts at

the put-in where the creek is roaring underneath

Inerstate North. I'm not quite sure how

much rain we got that day, but it was enough to bring

the creek over 10' on the bridge gauge. Now, i have

10' left us speechless and shaking our heads . Neil

was the first to grab his paddle, and without anydone

some runs on this creek at pretty high flows but

words we got dressed.(For the first time we could not

paddle under the bridge, we had to put in below) I

knew from previous runs over 7' that we would have

to walk the first rapid, and that day it was espeacily

nasty. After the riverwide death hole all the water

smashes directly into the trees on river right. We

actually had to walk about 30 yards down stream

before it was safe to put in. Trust me, thoughts of

walking back to the car were sounding pretty good,

but we pressed on. For those who know the run the

following rapid that feeds under the next bridge can

get pretty hairy, and that day was no exception. To

our suprise the lines stay pretty much the same, and

the eddies are still there! GO LEFT, there is a HUGE

hole on the right in this rapid. Then for about 3/4's of

a mile till akers mill just hold on, we are talking big

waves and big fun and plenty of time to get out and

look at Akers Mill rapid. There's really not much to

worry about here, the holes all gone and everything

turns into a huge waves all the way to the river. Even

the rapid further down which normaly has two big

holes is now three incredible surf waves! Now the

only thing in the back of my mind was spotting the

pipes to carry around, but they never came. Somehow

we paddled right over them without knowing, and

when we reached the river, still speechless, we all

agreed that we have never been as happy to see the

Chattahoochee as then.

This has to be my favorite run in Atlanta. Unlike Sope,

which is solid class V+ in these types of rains

Rottenwood keeps its lines and eddies, just a lot

bigger! Not sure of the CFS that day but Sope was

running 7,500 CFS and you could hear boulders

tubbling underwater from about 300 yards away!

See you next time!