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Onion Valley Creek
Onion Valley Creek is a tributary to the
Middle Fork Feather River in Northern California. It has, yet has not,
been on the radar for a first descent for many years. Who knows,
maybe it has already been done, but we don't know anything about it.
Onion Valley Creek comes into the Devil's Canyon run at the first
harder rapid of Franklin Canyon. It flows downstream into the river,
right when you're making a move to avoid a gigantic sieve. Because of
that, it often goes by unobserved. Yet it has been observed by several groups, but there
is another major obstacle to Onion Valley Creek; and that's access.
It's technically road to road, but the put-in is closed when there is water
in the creek. Hiking in would be no small challenge, about nine miles,
on a road, probably in the snow.
Onion Valley Creek is also nothing more than a trickle where the road crosses, and filled with willow bushes. The one positive is no matter how terrible the creek, the paddle out is one of California's most classic multi day adventures; the Devil's Canyon of the Middle Feather.
In 2010 we're camped on the South Feather and looking for something new after a few laps. We decide it's time to drop into Onion Valley Creek and see what it has to offer. Chris Korbulic, Cody Howard and I make plans for a quick one night trip. In our minds it's just a steep, short little tributary of the Middle Feather. We have about 1,800 on the Middle Feather at Milsap bar. Good thing for us that logistics fall apart; Onion Valley Creek has an average gradient just over 250 feet per mile for the entire 12 mile section, and is actually a bit longer than the standard put-in to the three day run.
Fast forward six years and we're finally ready for Onion Valley Creek,
thanks to Seth Dow. He and Cody Clayton hiked a good part of the
canyon, and reported that it essentially did not look as bad as one
would expect for a low volume creek with high gradient in a thickly
forested area. At least he wasn't overselling it. We're expecting
nothing classic, but all kinds of adventure. Seth has also solved the
real problem; his parents have
snowmobiles, and will shuttle us to put-in. Flows are 3,200 at Milsap
Bar on the Middle Feather. We'll drive up the night before, all packed
and ready for an early start.
Pat Keller and I carpool up from Three Rivers. Let's say the LL company rig isn't exactly fleet of foot, and we end up sleeping on the drive north as we hit hour 12 of driving. We finish the last hour of driving in the morning.
Good morning Quincy, Ca.Onion Valley Creek is also nothing more than a trickle where the road crosses, and filled with willow bushes. The one positive is no matter how terrible the creek, the paddle out is one of California's most classic multi day adventures; the Devil's Canyon of the Middle Feather.
In 2010 we're camped on the South Feather and looking for something new after a few laps. We decide it's time to drop into Onion Valley Creek and see what it has to offer. Chris Korbulic, Cody Howard and I make plans for a quick one night trip. In our minds it's just a steep, short little tributary of the Middle Feather. We have about 1,800 on the Middle Feather at Milsap bar. Good thing for us that logistics fall apart; Onion Valley Creek has an average gradient just over 250 feet per mile for the entire 12 mile section, and is actually a bit longer than the standard put-in to the three day run.
Pat Keller and I carpool up from Three Rivers. Let's say the LL company rig isn't exactly fleet of foot, and we end up sleeping on the drive north as we hit hour 12 of driving. We finish the last hour of driving in the morning.
Ok, Pat and I are not quite ready, but
we throw plenty of food into the drybags and at 7:00am, this is pretty
much an alpine start for boaters.
You know it's serious when the duct tape is pre-applied. Seth Dow finalizing preparations.
Connor Herdt
8:30am and we're at the gate putting drysuits on.
Connor Herdt, Tim Dow, Seth Dow, Pat Keller, Darin McQuoid
The shuttle proves to be quite cold and entertaining.
Patchy snow conditions.
After a long stretch of pavement we stop to survey our equipment. Good thing for that Prijon plastic.
Nice views into the headwaters of the Middle Fork Feather River.
Seth Dow leads the charge as we cross into Onion Valley Creek drainage.
Our first glimpse of the watershed, and about half a mile from our destination. Here the snow has drifted over the road and is too dangerous to cross, so we'll walk the final leg.
Onion Valley proper, and the tiny creek flowing from right to left under the snow. With the shuttle it's now 10:00am.
Cold, but all smiles from Connor and Pat. We try and stay warm while Tim shuttles Seth up to us.
The chance of sliding off the road with a snow machine is too high, thankfully the snow has compacted and makes for easy walking.
A smiles as we don't really know what we're getting into, but we'll do it with good attitudes.
Seth Dow soaks in the watershed. We'll follow the ridge down to the creek and hope it's large enough to run.
After
an hour total of hiking, we're at the creek. It's tiny, and very steep.
To continue walking looks terrible as it's traversing through deep snow
on a steep hillside. We confer and decide it will be safer to kayak,
and of course, more fun.
Connor Herdt enjoys a nice boof for lunch.
Photographs
can be misleading. In the above it looks kind of classic, which it kind
of is. It's also full of brush and really small. As it happens, Seth,
Connor and I don't do a whole lot of low volume paddling. Pat is in his
element, but I think that would be true for any volume.
What's around the corner? It's a scramble for small eddies.
A quick log portage and we're into a nice sequence. We're all kind of laughing that it's such low volume yet shockingly good. Thankfully we're dropping a lot of elevation and will be below the snow soon.
Conner Herdt enters the first nice sequence.
What's the line? Just go where the boat will float.
Connor Herdt illustrating that it's not all glory.
Pat Keller with the true Oregon Tuck. This is all in our first ten minutes on the water.
Then she gets really steep, and drops into the first gorge. A nice twenty foot slide at the entrance. Is it wide enough? Seth Dow and Conner Herdt scout.
It's just not wide enough for a kayak to squeeze through the ten foot crack.
The gorge also ends in a twenty foot falls onto rock. Thankfully the portage is quick, and we wrap it up with a lunch break at 1:00pm.
Downstream is a nice little set of slides into an eight foot ledge. Conner Herdt.
The joy of low volume kayaking is that I can just walk across the creek to get a different angle. Seth Dow in the non-stop descent.
The
river canyon opens up a little as the creek falls through a mini-gorge
that drops about a hundred feet. The slide is tricky, with a prominent
high speed piton taking up a huge portion of a thirty foot slide. The
portage looks easy. Seth, Connor and shoulder and setup for Pat to give
it a go.
Fast and this image does it no justice, Pat Keller in the run out of a steep section of chunky bedrock.
Around
the corner is another mini-gorge. Rather manky too, and again an easy
walk. We make quick work of the fifty yard portage and put back in,
only to run a couple rapids before the longest gorge yet. This one does
not look easy to portage, and the entry slide does not look good. We
scout around a ninety degree corner and it looks...ok. Not good
necessarily, and we can't quite see all the rapids, but it looks
survivable. It's hard to get a scale of size on a creek this small. I
keep seeing things as bigger than they are, and wider too. We decide to
walk the entrance slide and run the rest of it.
Looking at the corner in the gorge, a twenty foot slide followed by some drops of unknown height, and some tight spots.
Looking at the corner in the gorge, a twenty foot slide followed by some drops of unknown height, and some tight spots.
Go left, go left and uh, go left?
Down in the gorge it's tighter than we imagined. Pat Keller gazes back upstream.
Thankfully it's possible to get out and scout this one; it's the first of the go left series and has a rock hidden on the left side. Tight and technical. Connor Herdt.
The
gorge doesn't let up. A few manky boulder gardens and we're at another
tight crack drop. Connor, Seth and I hate crack drops and start looking
for a portage. Then we look at the rapid again, watch Pat run it and
look at the portage again. Well, you will come out the bottom for sure
and the portage looks that bad.
Conner Herdt gets some crack love on Onion Valley Creek. It's now 3:05pm.
It's
only April so the days are short and light is fading fast. The river
turns to boulder gardens and we focus on downstream progress, stowing
cameras in the boat for the day. Will there be flat ground for us to
camp on? We hope so but don't see much of it. Two hours of grinding
later and we see where an old jeep road crosses the river, and find a
large flat campsite. There is also downed wood everywhere, perfect for
what's going to be a chilly evening. It looks like we're in the
vicinity of an old mine. If you have an ATV and a keys to the right
gates, it's amazing what people still access out here, although the
last time someone was down at this site looks to be five or ten years
ago.
We've only made it three or four miles, but we have enough food for three nights out in a pinch, but our shuttle is scheduled for the day after tomorrow and we have at least twenty five miles of whitewater before take-out. As darkness closes in we reminisce on how surprisingly good the day was, all things considered.
We've only made it three or four miles, but we have enough food for three nights out in a pinch, but our shuttle is scheduled for the day after tomorrow and we have at least twenty five miles of whitewater before take-out. As darkness closes in we reminisce on how surprisingly good the day was, all things considered.
Getting some good coals going before any rain sets in.
We use a large fire to dry out the gear as much as possible before scurrying into our shelters for the night.
On to Day Two