"Dam Hetch Hetchy!"

The Tuolumne River at the end of the Grand Canyon runs into a structure that has nearly defined a generation of environmentalists. The O'Shaughnessy Dam holds the Tuolumne back in Hetch Hetchy Reservoir and completely floods the Hetch Hetchy Valley. Formerly as magnificent as Yosemite Valley to the south, all of Hetch Hetchy Valley now lies under water, and even with many activists lobbying for its restoration, will likely forever remain drowned. 

The feasibility of dam removal has been topic of discussion since before construction even began, but now more than ever is there a movement towards restoration. 

Check out this timeline from the beginning of the process to today. 

"Dam Hetch Hetchy! As well dam for water-tanks the people's cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man." - John Muir

These were taken in the early 1900's before the O'Shaughnessy Dam was constructed. 

You can see much of the valley and Wapama Falls cascading in on the left.

Wapama Falls is the smaller looking one on the northern wall. It cascades for more than 1100 feet before meeting the reservoir and is probably still the most powerful falls in Yosemite.

Hm, can you guess where the high water line is?

 Proponents of the dam replied to environmentalists like John Muir that the valley would be even more beautiful with a lake. Muir was right, and now the valley, drowned by its own waters, looks sick and damaged. Consistent with other environmental devastation, you'd never see this and think "you know, it's actually more beautiful this way."

Poopenaut Valley

Anyway, below Hetch Hetchy is the Poopenaut Valley, which also happens to be strikingly impressive. After a few hours of sleep and some cold jambalaya following our Grand Canyon mission, Ben woke Darin and I excitedly reporting perfect flows for the 'sneak of the century' down through the Poopenaut.

Poopenaut Valley.

 

We rose quickly and hiked down below O'Shaugnessy Dam on a service road that eventually crossed the river. 

"It looks low, but that could be my 6 a.m. motivation speaking."

We worked down through some mank and a few portages before reaching a couple more miles of mank and portaging. There were a few good rapids, but not really enough to make all the funny business worth it. With a name like Poopenaut, it's hard not to draw parallels between the name and quality of the whitewater. 

Ben filming me getting my poop-schmeer on.

Ben using the same technique on the schmeer rapid.

'Like it came out sideways' was our throw and go portage where my attempt at the infamous corkscrew throw failed, leading to an uncomfortable sinking/swimming/paddling experience to below the vertical walls. 

Still in good spirits after running a couple good rapids and having relatively easy portages in a very walled in gorge, we continued downstream and were quickly turned off again by a mile or three of low flow mucky-muck.  

Just when things were feeling really hopeless, around lunchtime, we got to this great mini gorge with an almost-redeeming-but-not-quite ten foot boof into a swirling little toilet bowl with a tight exit.

Preston Falls was the 'marginal' 'thirty footer' on which we had limited beta. I think the 'exploratory' 'kayakers' we heard that from had limited experience actually seeing the Tuolumne River below Hetch Hetchy.

Life on the edge: running the highly marginal Preston Falls. It is rumored that soon after our descent, small children with only water-wings for craft successfully navigated the falls. 

If we would have known that this was the last slide before the final couple miles of mank and meadows, I think we would have taken more time to enjoy and appreciate how much better rapids like it are better than flat pools and manky boulder gardens.

The final verdict on the Poopenaut section of the Tuolumne River was that the name was indeed fitting and that our flows were too low, but that we probably wouldn't even go back with more water. 

Thanks again to Darin for the photos. 

Day By Day: GC of the T

Day 1: photo log from Darin McQuoid, in case you haven't already seen them...

Grand Sneak: Updated

Busy loading boats at the confluence of the NF Kings and Dinkey Creek we met up with Darin McQuoid and Stookesberry as they were scheming a plan to pull a sneak on the Grand Canyon. Hardly convinced that it was going to be good, but still eager to see what was in there and put all the myths to rest, I was torn between all the great paddling options. West Cherry and North Kings or the GC? It was a tough call, but with shuttle arranged and a plan in place, I decided to join the boys on the GC. 

Not convinced, Evan and the Southern boys went the other way and hit up West Cherry and the put-in slide. All five in the group ran it with probably one of the biggest huckfest showings ever. Shows what a fired up crew can do. 

Dealing with the logistics of the Grand Canyon is tricky to say the least. Not sure of the legality of what we were trying to do and with both a very high profile put-in and take-out, we made every attempt to be covert on all fronts and avoid any unnecessary contact. Throughout the trip we did our best to stay off the popular hiking trail, though it did provide the easiest and fastest portaging, of which there was very much. In the end we decided that portaging fast on the trail and getting back on the water was the best way to avoid contact. We only saw a couple hikers and they didn't seem to think anything of what we were doing, other than wondering how we had survived all the massive falls. 

California falls.

Ben scouting a rapid with typical scenery.

Scouting the Muir Gorge. The sieve rapid was looking dubious as ever, so we went for the dome portage in the heat. It was great. 

The rumors of the amount of portaging are indeed true, as we found ourselves spending much of our time on the banks walking massive cataracts or slightly less massive rapids. 

It is in there if you really want to get it though. 

What seemed high turned out to be almost the perfect water level for a quick and fun trip. A little less water and the in-between would slow down and not be fun, but the bigger drops would probably become slightly more manageable. 

After the Grand Canyon we continued on down through the Poopenah section of river to complete the sneak. We had a backup plan of exiting Yosemite if Poopenah didn't have the right water level, but a break of dawn level check by Ben got us on the water soon after 6 in the morning and far from the eyes of any possible ranger sighting. 

As it turns out, Poopenah is a fitting name for this section of river. It looked like an amazing gorge from the road and we had heard tales of big drops in the committing canyon so we were surprised to find many boulder choked slot drops formed by massive slabs of granite that had separated from high on the canyon walls. There were some redeeming rapids and incredible scenery, but much of the day was spent groveling about chunky rapids and slow moving water.

 
 

Late Update: South Fork T

Searching for something to do after Dinkey Creek and before the GC of the T when we were left with a couple days to figure out shuttle and rest before the portage of the grand canyon, Ben, Darin and I opted for the South Fork of the Tuolumne. Just outside of Groveland, the south fork joins the middle fork, drops over a chunky little slide, then plummets off a huge slide that we had heard was portagable by jumping. The slide may have been good to go but was just so big and menacing nobody really thought about it. A little more water and it's for sure good, but terrifying.
On our ropeless first attempt, we saw there was clearly no way to jump the big slide so we turned straight back upstream and climbed right back out of the canyon. Not an easy task, but the five of us made it without incident.

Ben dropping in on the first try.

Not turning around again. Me dropping in on the second try. The rope was barely long enough for us to get onto enough of a flat to walk. You can barely see me in the upper right corner.
Scouting the big slide that turned us around.

Roping the boats back up the first rapid we ran. I hope I never get turned around like this again.

Finally in the goods. This is the final part of a fun triple drop.

Ben on the slide above the next portage.

Ben dropping off the last rappel.

Finishing up one of the rappels in the bright Cali sun.