- Joined
- Oct 26, 2000
- Messages
- 6,104
The Coosa River below Jordan Dam hosts some of the best spotted bass fishing in the country(though I didn't fish any yesterday), multiple sets of class II rapids with lots of flatwater in between, and is home to the US's southernmost class III rapid at Moccasin Gap. Paddle a mile, rapids, repeat.
During most of my trips, the water flow was at the normal weekday morning 2-4000 cubic feet per second. They jack it up to 8,000 on some weekends, and 10,000 for whitewater events, but yesterday the dam was running two turbines with a discharge of ~8900cfs(I called the 1-800# again to check the dam's discharge after seeing how much more water there was than normal), so I got to see Moccasin Gap as a real class III for the first time.
No pics of the better rapids because I was busy. Long class II with a very fast wave train on the other side of Moccasin island that is a lot of fun, but I hit Moccasin Gap on the wrong side and couldn't cut back to the eddy behind the island for extra attempts.
Trying out this image resizer, and all these are cut down to 640x480, so the quality isn't special, but it was pretty out there.
I flipped that cat over a few times, but she was done for. Must have been from someone's trot line..
Ran into some guys with rental kayaks messing around at one of the last sets of rapids, and the pic with the blue kayak is the successful attempt of three after he saw me wipe out in the same place. There's a lot more to that rock than what you can see, and with the water up, there's no escaping hitting it. I pushed off the rock when I got pinned against it, instead of leaning into it, and got instantly flipped and banged against a shelf below. Those guys had rentals, but were obviously more skilled than me. We all went swimming there, though.
My lesson for the day-secure the boat. I left the nose in the water, and the current was strong enough that my kayak got away. First time I've seen other people there during the week, but I was thankful I didn't have to swim after it.
This is a beautiful place for anyone in the area to check out if you like fishing or a first taste of canoeing/kayaking. There's almost zero powerboat traffic because of the multiple sets of rapids dividing the river into sections.
During most of my trips, the water flow was at the normal weekday morning 2-4000 cubic feet per second. They jack it up to 8,000 on some weekends, and 10,000 for whitewater events, but yesterday the dam was running two turbines with a discharge of ~8900cfs(I called the 1-800# again to check the dam's discharge after seeing how much more water there was than normal), so I got to see Moccasin Gap as a real class III for the first time.
No pics of the better rapids because I was busy. Long class II with a very fast wave train on the other side of Moccasin island that is a lot of fun, but I hit Moccasin Gap on the wrong side and couldn't cut back to the eddy behind the island for extra attempts.
Trying out this image resizer, and all these are cut down to 640x480, so the quality isn't special, but it was pretty out there.
I flipped that cat over a few times, but she was done for. Must have been from someone's trot line..
Ran into some guys with rental kayaks messing around at one of the last sets of rapids, and the pic with the blue kayak is the successful attempt of three after he saw me wipe out in the same place. There's a lot more to that rock than what you can see, and with the water up, there's no escaping hitting it. I pushed off the rock when I got pinned against it, instead of leaning into it, and got instantly flipped and banged against a shelf below. Those guys had rentals, but were obviously more skilled than me. We all went swimming there, though.
My lesson for the day-secure the boat. I left the nose in the water, and the current was strong enough that my kayak got away. First time I've seen other people there during the week, but I was thankful I didn't have to swim after it.
This is a beautiful place for anyone in the area to check out if you like fishing or a first taste of canoeing/kayaking. There's almost zero powerboat traffic because of the multiple sets of rapids dividing the river into sections.
