High Ridge

The phone rang. I rolled over. The phone rang again. My arm reached toward the night stand and fumbled for the phone. I pressed the 'accept' button. 'Hello'. It was Curt. I fell asleep at nine o'clock the night before. 'I'm on my way dude'.
I thought Curt was coming at seven o'clock. It was six. I shut my eyes for a few short moments, adjusting to the thought of getting out of bed.

I climbed out of bed. I put my feet on the floor. The floor was cold. I walked into the bathroom and flipped the switch. I turned on the faucet, dropped my boxers, and hopped in the shower. Warmth.

The doorbell rang. It was Curt. Kerry answered the door. He came in and took a seat. I gathered my things, threw them in the back of his pick-up truck and we hit the road.

Three hours later we were approaching Seneca Rocks. We drove too far. We pulled a U-turn and headed back south. Our eyes were peeled. We were looking for Forest Road 761. The gateway to High Ridge. We did not have any information on the creek, only tid bits of information we heard from friends who ran the creek earlier in the year.

761. We found it. We hung a left and headed up the mountain. The weather was glorious. Blue skies and sixty degrees. It was the kind of day you dream about. Perfect light, a shimmer of a breeze. Gorgeous.

We plowed our way up the muddy road, fish tailing a time or two in Curt's Nissan pickup. Suddenly, the ride was over. There was a large gate in our way. We hopped out and surveyed our surroundings. We were close to the top of the ridge. We examined the topo map and decided we should hike up the road a bit further in search of the put-in.

There was a sign warning of a natural gas well at the top of the mountain. Ridiculous. Here we were in search of a ride on a beautiful pristine piece of water and it was under siege from six hundred different chemicals being pumped under ground to 'frack' the gas out of the rock. The natural gas companies can only recover a portion of the fluid. The rest ends up in the aquifers, eventually seeping out into local waterways. Lovely.

We threw our gear on. The sky darkened. A storm lay on the horizon. The temperature started to drop. We headed up the road. It began to sleet. We passed the natural gas pad. Despicable. Minutes later we passed an ancient rusted pick-up truck. We took a picture. Ten minutes later and we arrived at a small culvert.

This must be it we thought. Not enough water. We were at the top of the mountain so we headed down. Five minutes later and we found the put-in for High Ridge. Beautiful. We were not sure what the normal flow looked like, but it appeared we had enough water to get down. We geared up, hiked in, and put on.

I snapped the spray skirt. The seal launch was memorable. I launched off of a rock that sent me sailing through the air to the other side of the creek. I settled into the river, pointed my nose downstream, and was off to the races. After a number of large drops, I stopped in an eddy and stared back at the gradient. Impressive. Curt settled in beside me a few moments later.

We hopped out and scouted for forty five minutes. The gradient was incredible. The creek was eight foot after ten foot after twelve foot drop continuously no stopping. The snow was pouring down. The wind was blowing hard. I sat in my boat trying to warm my hands. I was about to launch over a twelve foot piece of mank into more continuous mank. Exciting. I had a minor temper tantrum because I could not feel my hands. I got out of my boat. Curt meandered up the trail.

'Let's hike out'. We surveyed the scene. It was two o'clock. Time needed to scout versus daylight available - not looking good. We decided to accept defeat and try again another day. It was a major bummer. We shivered and slipped our way back up to the fire road. One mile later and we were back at the truck. Lessons learned.

After warming up we made our way toward Canaan Valley. Burritos at Hellbenders. We ate.

As we write, we are sitting in the hostel at the Purple Fiddle. A long day, but nothing a few sips of Kentucky moonshine cannot cure.

More adventures on the horizon for tomorrow.

Until then...

Brett and Curt