High Falls Creek
Ringing Rock State Park to Rt 32
| Difficulty | V+ |
| Length | 0.8 mi |
| Avg Gradient | 500 fpm |
| Reach Info Last Updated | February 3, 2025 |
River Description
Pull out your A++ game if you want to run the 7 Steps Of Death (first run by Nils 2/08). Dropping huge vertical on to slab rock with tons of piton and pin potential. Its a very manky series of connected moves. Watching Jared and Graham run this on video can load you up with a lot of false confidence.
This run is mean, wrecking many phenomenal boaters plans for a good day out. Its the hardest creek locally and some are saying its harder than the Green Narrows, Blackwater (WV) as well. Expect pins to occur to someone in your group.
The real concern is that listing this run (in the Geddes, Wick, Lock area) will get those types of paddlers interested in running High Falls. Its only been run by the best boaters...creekers that go out all the time at all water level, flood conditions, all over the state, region or internationally. At this point its only been run completely on a couple days. One of those boaters emailed me:
Its pushy and you're maneuvering over partially submerged undercut boulders without pillows to bounce off so your slamming into them banging off sh*t and paddling hard like its a high volume creek (real weird). At low water that rapid gets less crazy and more manageable but everyone still gets pinned all over the place and has problems. the rapid above the falls (30ft unrunable) is stuff you can get pinned up on as well and I've seen another real good paddler pin in the middle of the rapid and have to get roped out, so we usually sneak river right. This is an angry creek that could easily kill someone don't take it lightly, swims are serious matters, and rolls are bad too.
The run starts off with fast fluming slide to a must portage 30 foot waterfall (make sure you hit the eddy). Some say it will be runable some day but I just don't see the line. Calling it class 6 is a stretch for me. Next up is the 150 Yard long 'Luge'. Again make sure you know where you are getting out to scout the meat o
...River Features
Put In
High Falls
30 foot unrunable falls. Portage very carefully on river right.
Luge
Just below the 30 ft unrunable waterfall is THE LUGE, 150 yards of steep fast slides blindly dumping into the 7 Steps Of Death. Scout your exit eddy well.
7 Steps of Death
The first step is about 10-12 ft high to give you some perspective. On the river left side is a wicked piton and bow entrapping v notch. On river right it drops completely on to flat rock and moving flow. No pooling, only pillowing at best.
The next series of corners and drops are not so bad if isolated but together they are a formidable gauntlet. Pitons and broaches are typical and can greatly be reduced if you scout at low flows to know the riverbed character.
To this point the 7 Steps have mainly only been run by full on creekers that have run all of the hairy 5+ drops locally as well as across the region. Think twice.
Exit Rapids
Boat much harder than the scout would lead you to believe. At least class 5. Pinning potential all over the place.
Take Out
Trip Reports
Log in to add a reportThis is a shot at the flow when it was first captured on video.
The last 4 steps of death in the distant background lead into the class 3-4 section in the forground. Eventhough the flow is great for boating it does not look it. Several runs on the sisters this day with a mixed bag of results but no real injuries. Top entry lines into the steps were sweet. Check it out on Jared's Utube account -wg
7 Steps of Death at an unrunable flow
A extremely steep creeking drop in the 5.2 range of class
Showing some of the steepness. The first drop is about 10-12 feet.