Nine miles of quality (mostly) wilderness Class III-IV river thirty minutes from Riverside?! It does not happen often but when it does it is quite a sight and not to be passed up. Murrieta Creek and Temecula Creek join to become the Santa Margarita River and then within about a hundred feet enter the dramatic (for southern California at least) Temecula Gorge. Despite uplift of the Santa Ana Mountains and Santa Rosa Tablelands from
the Elsinore Fault, the Santa Margarita River has persevered, matching
the uplift with vigorous downcutting to create the thousand foot-deep
bedrock gorge. The first kayaking descent was in 1998 and it has received relatively few descents since due largely to the fickle nature of the river. Windows of boatability for this drought-stricken region can be years apart (last running in 2010?) and last hours or days at best. Mine was likely the first packraft descent of the gorge.
The stream gauge peaked at nearly 6000 cfs the night before from the second of three storms and Keith and I watched its descent with careful interest. In the morning we awoke to find it running at 578 cfs and dropping 87 cfs/hr...fast. We quickly mobilized, set the shuttle, and met Chris from San Diego (who would be joining Keith and I) at the put in: a muddy park-and-ride lot next to the highway next to an Arco next to particularly trashy stretch of foamy creek. Humble beginnings I suppose. I tried not to think too much about the contents of the foamy water which drains a sizable chunk of the Inland Empire.
The creek was at about 400 cfs when we put in with no sizable contribution from Temecula Creek. Fast moving water took us from the Arco to the gorge mouth in a minute or two. Nearly every willow and thicket had flood debris and trash several feet overhead, marking the previous day's high flow. Right off the bat we found the woody debris choked several of the channels, requiring swift thinking and careful route finding to avoid unpleasantness and danger. Many of the ways through were just over a boat width with branches partly blocking the way. At one of the first major drops I managed to catch the pool wrong and executed the first of three flips. My newly installed thigh straps and seat system worked beautifully and I really appreciated the added control and dexterity.
The vegetation also impressed me. Here was a rare view of preserved southern California: rocky outcrops coated in native dudleya succulents and prickly pear cactus, the river's edge coated in sycamores and oak trees (marred only by the foreign willows and regretfully native poison oak). A couple waterfalls dropped to the water's edge. We even saw beavers! We had it all to ourselves to enjoy.
We made steady progress and generally worked well as a team, jumping
eddies and alternating our scouts. This creek was steep! Occasionally the view downstream was of a distant
and much lower river, with unknown drops and debris in the foreground. Because of the low flow and woody
nature we ended up scouting quite a bit (perhaps a dozen times) and
opted to portage about six times. Since I had canyoning shoes I made many of the longer scouts and got to lead many of the more fun runs.I also made a few of the bolder read-and-runs, usually ending up where I wanted to.
The deeper we got the more bedrock, steeper the rapids, fewer the
graffiti, but equally abundant the stranded floatsom trash- clothes,
suitcases, tarps, golf bags seemed especially abundant. Occasional we would see hints of the old railroad which ran through this gorge, briefly, before its inevitable demise. It's really quite telling how dynamic this gorge is based on how little evidence for the railroad is still left today.
The boulder pile we decided to portage
Three photo sequence below:
The gorge was excellent- really great continuous fun. Unfortunately we were
beginning to notice the drop in water (it would be nearly 200 cfs by the
time we took out!) and all were hungry but did not really have the time
to stop. So we powered on, around the sharpest and deepest corners in
the canyon and the final stretch of the gorge to where it opened up with
views of citrus and avocado fields.
A few more sizable rapids followed but Class II stretches predominated, and so did willows and woody debris choking the channels. Occasional we were lucky with some narrow side channel that just barely went through. Other times we were not and had to fight the hard way by portaging around long unpleasant stretches. I made a crucial error and took a lengthy swim through a debris filled channel that would have been dangerous with more wood or water. Good, humbling practice I suppose.
Eventually (and with the water continuing to noticeably drop) we started seeing graffiti again, and then families out walking the riverbank, a sure sign we were getting close to our takeout. Once there I was amazed to notice a barely recognizable river. With most of the remaining river in a channel towards the north, we walked boats across a dry channel at our takeout that only hours earlier held a raging river. We made it and not with a drop of water to spare! We got to enjoy a remote place of southern California in conditions few people get to see. It was beautiful, it was fun, and it was a satisfying run, as good as some of the creeks in the Sierras. So much of southern California has been altered by man. It's great to see a place that can shed attempts by humans to tame and stay wild, even if only for brief moments in its long history. Thanks to Keith for leading the way and Chris for joining us. I hope to do it again at higher flows and maybe to tackle some of the interesting canyons along the way.
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