All of these rules really should be that you need to be willing to go somewhere other than the Tellico every time it rains. The Tellico is a good river but if it is running, usually something else within the same or slightly more or less distance is also running. As for why I don't like the Tellico, I'll address that elsewhere. It isn't really that I don't like it, it's just that I think there are numerous other perfectly good options that are overlooked in favor of the Tellico.

Rules of Free Flow

 

1. You cannot plan far in advance. You just have to be willing to improvise at the last minute.

Since I started exploring a variety of free flowing runs in the area and publicizing it on the Internet, I've received requests from literally dozens of people who want to join me. Unfortunately most of them want to plan weeks in advance. My answer is that planning any more than about 24 hours in advance is essentially impossible for the vast majority of free flowing streams in the Southeast.

Every once in a while I have gotten lucky by scheduling in advance some of the runs that flow more frequently, but then you lose the uniqueness and the expedition-like qualities of the adventure. There are a few exceptions but for the most part you just have to wait until the night before or even the morning you are planning to go to finalize the group and the destination.

This point has caused many people to refuse to go with me. They say they want to go but when I won't commit to actually running the river or creek discussed in advance, they chicken out and try to talk me into to going to the Tellico (yet again), which is almost always a mistake with me. The problem is that you can't always be sure something will be running before you leave. This may be due to the lack of an electronic gauge on the run, or just the fact that levels rise and fall very quickly on many runs. In the end, you don't know if it's running or not until you get there. If you've gotta be home to meet the wifey and kiddies at "dinner o'clock," then you probably can't go in the first place.

2. Get acquainted with the runs in advance, both in terms of documentation and, if possible, by driving there and looking at it.

You must review any documentation you can find about a run that is new to you before you go there. The American Whitewater website has a lot of good info but you can also fall back on guide books. Also, not everything is even listed on AW or even if it is listed, there may be no good description or gauge correlations. There are good runs around that hardly anybody knows about.

You can't run a free flow if you don't know how to get there and where the launch and takeout points are located. There are other runs that are difficult to catch at a good level because you don't know what a good level is and there's no definite way to find out. You just have to drive there and look at it.

While you're there finding the access points, you might want to see if you can deduce something about the character of the run. If it is roadside, drive up the road and check it out. If there is a hiking trail, hike along it as far as possible and see what you can learn. Then you'll know what to expect and what kind of skill is needed to go on the trip.

The handful of dedicated whitewater explorers out there will not be surprised to hear me say that I have spent many a dry day exploring potential new runs. This involves a lot of thankless driving, and sometimes hiking, on days when it is too cold, too dry, or I'm recovering from injuries. Of course, I like exploring anyway and I don't mind doing it alone because I start to get anti-social when I'm around people too much (I'm sure you never would have guessed).

See: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200303/rauch

3. Develop enough skill and patience to paddle in a variety of conditions.

The free flows often are unpredictable in difficulty. Water levels may fluctuate quickly and you've got to be capable of dealing with it if a sudden rise in level drives the run from class II up to class IV in a hour. This is especially true if the run doesn't have any roads around it, and most of the good exploratory runs are like that. This point folds in with knowing as much as possible about the run in advance.

One of the most neglected skills in terms of instruction is river reading. This is my pet peeve. I don't like to paddle with people who just blunder downriver into every hole and bad line available. There is a proper way to descend a river and you should know how to do it. I'm good at reading water but that's because I've paid a lot of attention to it. During the summer playboating season, you should practice more difficult lines on a familiar river. There are even a few easy creek lines on the Hiwassee! There are a multitude of creek lines on the Ocoee, some of them quite difficult. Take advantage of this and run them on your way to the next play spot.

You should also have enough self discipline to practice a true controlled descent. This is something else that most paddlers tend to not do on a regular basis. It could get you killed on a creek. It's important that people ahead be able to signal to people further upstream. Eddy hopping facilitates this. If everybody blunders downstream and fills up the few micro-eddies that are available at higher water levels then somebody is going to end up blundering around a blind turn or over a blind drop, which brings me to the issue of scouting.

4. You MUST be willing to scout blind drops, even if it means you have to get out of your boat in the middle of winter.

Remote creeks aren't the Hiwassee (or the Ocoee). Creeks have wood in them that may block the entire channel . . . and wood kills. There are also any number of other ways to get yourself hurt or killed by just bombing over a blind horizon line without knowing what's at the bottom. I have seen this first hand.

When I ran Clear Creek (the one in Georgia) last year, there were two separate drops that had pinning boulders at the bottom that were not visible from above until the absolute last second. One of these is truly horrific looking, even at a relatively non-pushy water level.

I scouted out a possible first-descent last winter and it has a beautiful class III slide that drops right into a river-wide log. There is also a river wide log jam in the middle of a class V sequence just below it (assuming you managed to limbo under the log at high water). Running either of these drops blind would almost certainly be fatal.

On another creek, we came upon a place where you can choose from two inviting lines, both of which flow around blind turns. I chose to go down the side that had eddies that could be caught and climbed out of if necessary. It was a smart choice. When we got to the bottom, we could see that the other inviting channel was actually blocked by a small tree that would not have been avoidable since it wasn't visible from upstream and there were no eddies in the approach.

When you come upon situations like those listed above, you've got to know what's at the bottom before you go over the lip or around that giant boulder. This means you have to be willing to scout every drop. If you can see it from your boat while in an eddy, fine. If you can't see it from your boat, then you've got to get out and scout it. Either way, when you approach a blind drop, you've got to look for an eddy that will allow you to see the bottom of the drop and get out of your boat if necessary. It's just part of creeking and you have to get used to it.

Summer paddlers can be terrifying to paddle with on a winter creek. They just can't see why you need to stop and scout. Next thing you know they're going over the horizon line. If I were you, I'd wait to see if they make it. There is a good chance they won't.