Spring Valley Road / Lyons Wave

Just outside of Lyons, as the river passes under Spring Valley Road, lies the (potentially) most interesting whitewater on the river. Old maps show a dam and millpond here. For decades there was a uniformly-sloped cement slide under this bridge. Many years back, that was broken up and hauled away, and replaced with a stretch of large quarried rock.

At low flows, this will be shallow and scrapey (a real pain in the butt). At moderate or higher flows, it will may provide the biggest excitement on the trip. For experienced whitewater paddlers, there may be some relatively minor play here. At some flows, the pool at the base of the slide may have enough current to do stalls and squirts. Be aware there is a fair amount of rock which has flushed out from under the bridge some distance into the pool. Getting fully vertical or getting upside-down is likely to mean an encounter with those rocks.

This spot used to be done as a 'park-and-play', either carrying up repeatedly to 'run the dam', or just staying in the pool below to surf, squirt, roll, etc. However, this area is heavily posted against trespass, emphasizing the illegality of setting foot on dry land anywhere other than the immediate 'right-of-way' of the road.

As you continue downstream, you are likely to encounter some wood flanking the stream (though there seems to be regular 'maintenance', sawing most complete blockages not long after they occur). It is only about 0.75 mile to the city park in Lyons for the listed take-out.