Anybody know of a guage or have beta for Hermosa Creek?

[Surfpimp]

Anybody know of a guage or have beta for Hermosa Creek? The bible says it is good around a 1100 cfs but I can't find a guage anywhere. Does anybody have any beta on the portages? I want run it tomarrow if anybody wants to join me.

Any info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[El Flaco]

I ran it years ago (1995) by hiking 4 miles up the trail to the footbridge. It was running high, say between 1000 and 1500, and overall I'd give it a class III+ rating- big waves but few memorable rapids. There were a couple of times when we were coming downstream at a good clip & come around a corner to find a river wide tree, and we'd have to scramble to the sides. Definitely a danger there, because you're moving at 10-15 miles an hour through that canyon at those flows.

Given everything else that's flowing, I wouldn't call the stretch I did worth the effort. But then again, I think I was in a Pirouette S; maybe a spud boat would make the hike easier and the run more fun- if you want an adventure, go for it.

As far as putting in at Purg, the word was that the woodfest made it not worth it. Don't think that's changed, unless someone spent a good month hiking the creek with a chainsaw last fall.

[Cutch]

I have a similar experience to Flaco. It was fun 3+ wave trains, pretty high, and a nice day. We didn't have many defined rapids. It was all basically one wave train. One portage at the bottom around a diversion channel. Beautiful canyon.

It was fun to do once, but I will never do it again. There is so much stuff in the area that is better. If the wood were cleaned out in the upper it might be a different story, but it would take probably 2 days of a group of chainsawers, and then some high water to actually move the cut logs downstream.

[allmighty1]

I ran Hermosa creek last year at relatively low water. I too hiked up like 4 miles on the trail to put in (I think at clear creek, but I could be wrong...) It was fun, but we had to perform 6 log and tree jam portages. This wasn't much of a problem, but a few of them were close calls as they proved to be nicely hidden around the bend. If you go, watch out! Especially at high water!!!!!!! Also, if you go too far down streem, there is a low-head dam that (at the lower water level) was a must portage. We missed the take out and ended up going under 550, made for a hoof back to the car.