Cherry Creek: Class V Rafting Without Equal
Posted July 21, 2008 by Malina
We are in the midst of one of the best Cherry Creek seasons we’ve ever had. One of the silver linings of the lower than usual reservoirs this summer is that the water on Cherry Creek came down enough for us to raft earlier than it usually does. The class V whitewater on the Creek is so challenging that when the spring snow melt is pouring tons of water into the river it’s too high to raft. This year though, we got to start running trips out there in June, weeks earlier than we typically expect to.
Creek trips are unique not only for extreme whitewater, but also because they are intimate and private–only one other company rafts commercially on this section of the Tuolumne River so your trip will likely be the only boats on the water. At the same time though, they also stand out for their reliance on teamwork. Our guides navigate with powerful wooden oars from the back of the boat but paddlers must work together as a team to manuever each boat through massive rapids like Mushroom, Toadstool, and Lewis’ Leap.
Commercially speaking, there probably isn’t a more challenging run in the United States so the guests we’ve been taking to Cherry Creek are looking for more than a fun day in a river canyon–they want to be challenged physically and mentally, share a day unlike any other with their friends, get to know our senior guides on their favorite river, and see one of California’s most striking river canyons. Get a better sense of what this river is all about by checking our our Cherry Creek Rafting video.
(Above: That shore ain’t Class II! Mushroom earns its Class V status, swamping boat, oars, and paddlers alike…)