[darkbluewrangler]

Hey Everyone, It's my first season in the area and I just wanted to ask about some flows. From what I have heard the Ark shuts off on the 15th.. I'm guessing this means the play holes in salida and BV are toast as well?

I have two friends coming out on the 15th who are both confident class IV boaters. I'm currently located in Colo Springs however we are willing to drive. I'm looking for some reliable river running and some nice play holes to show them that are within a 4 hour drive, and will have somewhat reliable flows in a week.

Thanks for any help you can give...

 

[darkbluewrangler]

can someone at least tell me if the salida and BV holes are toast when the ark shuts off?

 

[COUNT]

Not completely. There's still play down to 300. But nothing worth traveling for.

 

[gh]

the numbers is still low water fun after it drops and sometimes the water takes a bit to come down. tell em to come in on the 14th and go paddling

 

[drewboater]

Perhaps you should check the southwest CO gauges... the Animas and Vallecito have been going off from all the rain!

 

[Id725]

Royal Gorge will be at a fun level into October. It's good at 300 cfs. Seriously - IMO better and harder at 300 than it is at 700 or 1000. Sunshine and Sledgehammer get technical but still fun.
Pine Creek is a nice 5-minus at like 500 cfs and it's fun IV-plus at 300 cfs.
Numbers is okay at 500 cfs and still okay at 300 cfs.
Pueblo WW park may still have decent water.
Of course, Bailey and Gore will still be going --- Don't do Bailey without a Bailey veteran in your crew (I might be interested in any of these).
-Mike

 

[AlexT]

BV Playhole

Not sure if folks haven't been out to BV recently but you would be hard pressed to find a feature that plays better than this anywhere in the country right now. You've got 7 days of 750cfs+ still to go (gauge sez 1100cfs right now today)...and from 750 to 1300cfs the BV playhole serves up vertical blunts left and right, hands-free cartwheels, massive air wheels and head-dry air loops. It may run a bit past the usual august 15th cutoff because they've had big rain for 3 weeks and are draining clear creek rez to effect repairs on the dam this fall. I would highly recommend a visit down there. As an FYI AT&T / Cingular cell service was MIA last weekened due to some problem with the antenna after the storms and ...ahem... bullets... no kidding...

So go get some!

AlexT

PS at below 700 the feature gets scrapy and yes, it has shifted so that at present there is only good eddy service from surfers left.