Scouting Nancy Town Creek

Lately I've been looking around the American Whitewater website for some local creeks that I haven't been to yet (of which there are many) to go check out and do a little scouting. I found a section of Nancy Town Creek that flows out of Lake Russell. I have been to Lake Russell plenty of times with the family for day picnics and such, but never payed much attention to the creek that feeds it. According to AW there is a very steep section of this creek a little over a mile downstream of the lake, but no pictures anywhere. I found this spot on Google Earth and in the satellite photos you can see some big white spots along the creek. So after a little planning my dad and I decided to hike around the lake and down the stream to see what was there. The hike itself was interesting as once you get below the lake there are no trails. We eventually made it, and found a VERY steep section of the creek about 1/4 mile long just below and old dam. Here are some pictures of what we found.

The old, seemingly abandoned dam that marks the beginning of the steepness.

This is the top of the first big slide, it looks like one small drop but its really a huge slide that continues another 80 feet or so downstream

This is the slide from the bottom, I'd say it drops a total of about 60ft

This is the horizon line for the second drop

The second drop, about 35ft and unrunnable

The first slide looks good to go with some log removal and more water. After these drops there is one more clean 8 footer that I could see then it flattens out a bit. The run continues for probably another mile or two before you get to the takout road, but we didn't get to see the rest of it. I'm sure there are some more decent rapids, but nothing like this first part. As far as I can tell this has never been run before, but if anyone knows different let me know. It would take a LOT of rain for it to go also, relatively small watershed I think. Anyways, it's on the "to do" list along with many others.

Till next time

-David