Southern California Update

A mid-night shot of El Capitan by Justin Patt we showed up late at night for some moon light photos.

We continuously lapped Hospital Rock for a few more days before getting a little interested about what's upstream of the put in. The Upper Middle for the Kaweah, which was first D'ed by The Kerns and Polk Deters, not Lingren and his crew in the summer of 2001. A little fact not told in Burning Time II.
The road was closed from H.R. up to the Buckeye campground so we hiked a short 1.5 miles up above Chuck's drop and put in after hiking threw a massive forest with a ground layer of poison oak. The first drop we hit was a cool slide with a auto boof at the bottom, followed by another 1/2 mile of fun steep drops. We walked Chuck's drop, that thing is burl at any flow. I thought it might look better than it did last year, 2000 cfs @ Three Rivers, but to my surprise it looked possibly worse. A lot less padding for the rigged rock.
After Chuck's the valley opens up for some cool sliding drops down to the put in of H.R. The best drop on this section is called "Takin it to China" a slide into a seam which will send you deep if you hit it right.

Entering takin it to China with some afternoon light. Photo@Justin Patt

Polk right about to try and take it to Asia. @ Justin Patt

After getting down to Hospital Rock we picked up Glenn Daggle and routed down the classic one last time before heading down further south to Kernville. We almost ran 0 to 60 in the dark but luckily we went fast and got to the take out right as darkness fell.

Kernville was a bust. We did Brush creek at the lowest flow ever, which did nothing for me. The group also did a class III-IV section of the Kern river at low flows as well. The only good part of that was hitting the 80 degree weather down there by LA. It didn't last long. Before we knew it flash backs of China came with the falling snow and we packed up and headed for the Tule. That was a bust with only a 100 cfs we opted out of running it and drove to Yosemite to enjoy the freezing temperature and a day of hiking.