Cumberland, Martins Fork

Bear Hazard. I ran this on 01-02-11 and found a bear den on river left while scouting the Catacombs. Also, there were several strainers. Heads up out there.

This is a map of the Martins Fork area. The WMA in green, private property in grey. You can see the trail as a dotted line on the north of the mountain leading up to the ridge. The turn off the ridge down to the river is along the 83. 25'30'W lateral mark. Hope this helps.

This is the trail head and parking for the river left put-in option.

You will know when you are approaching the falls when you come around a bend and see a large rectangular boulder on river left. There are lines down the middle or river left. The two trickles seen here would be the lines at runnable flows. In the pool below on river right, there is some wood that could be a potential pin spot. Scout it out on river left.

15ft falls into deep pool.

A friend and I hiked around the martins fork today. The gauge read 1030cfs, and it looked like you could run down it without to much scraping. We couldn't make it to Quadrule Falls, before sunset, but bush-whacking through the rhododendron groves, massive rock outcroppings and ancient hemlocks was well worth the trip. This river is so pristine, like walking back in time, and has nice rapids to boot. Here is a google maps link of the trail and shuttle. http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=116794144407359062085.00049208978b5039873d6&t=h&z=14

Link to Video: http://vimeo.com/9058626

This whole ledge fills out into a beautiful boof.
Undercuts everywhere
Beautiful Place
You can see that the flow is just below the main footer for the bridge here. This was a good low flow.
You can see that the flow is maybe an inch below the main footer. This is a good low flow.
Can't see much here, and unfortunately my camera died here, at a most inopportune time.

This is the main drop of the rapid. With flow this is a big backed up cauldron with back cut lip.
This is the first of three drops. Enter center boofing and working right to the tight exit slot.
drive up and over where Tony is here, staying away from the bad rocks on the right where most of the flow goes.
This is looking back up at drop #2 of the Catacombs
Below this big boof, the creek runs through a narrow bedrock sluice with a big wall on the right before dumping into a quiet pool.
This is the biggie on the run, with a 7 foot boof lead in seen at the top of the picture before going down a 15 foot slot falls. When running the falls is not a slide like in the picture, but the lip extends further out creating a vertical drop. The squirrel water between the two drops is intense.