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Whitewater timing varies with scouting, portages, and group pace. Use as a planning baseline.
Description
The Shohola is an odd river. It begins with a runnable (with multiple lines) 50ft waterfall/cascade. Then goes through a box canyon with class III to IV water for most of it's 1/2 mile length. Then, after another 1/2 mile or so of good whitewater, it goes through a very flat period where relatively slow moving flatwater paddling is interspersed with a ledge occasionally. Finally, it finishes with some good slides and another box canyon with a good drop at it's entrance. The scenery is beautiful at times and nice the rest of the time. It's a fun creek, but if your plan is to run the whole thing, it can be a longish day, so get on early in the winter, when the days are short.
It can pick up wood (and ice in winter), so keep your eyes ahead and scout the box canyons from the rim (if possible) before entering. This is easy on the first one (there's a trail along the rim on river right), and not too difficult from river right on the second one. Hiking out from the middle of this run if someone gets hurt could be tedious, look at the map before you get on.
Nowadays most people only run the top box. It's the most bang for your buck. Just carry up the trail on river right and repeat offend. (It takes about 15 minutes down the river and about 15-20 minutes up the trail to complete a lap, depending on how fast you paddle and/or hike.)
There is also a lot of private land around here so be careful when scouting. Once a group of us was paddling on a rare, warm sunny day in April and we came around a bend to find a man lying naked on his lawn, sunning himself. He was a little surprised to see 7 of us paddle by.
There is now an online gauge on the Shohola itself, at Knealing Rd., above the last gorge, so that's the gauge to use now.
The gauge on the Bush Kill at Shoemaker used to be the main online indicator for this run. It should be over 2.5', and gives a good correlation, but the Shohola drains a large swampy area above the lake and will generally stay up longer than The Bushkill. Sometimes for many days longer. If it's at 2.4 and dropping slowly, the Shohola will most likely still be up.
**Put-in:**
Put-in is
typically on river right below the dam (to run the falls) or below
the falls to run the top box. If you don't want to run the falls, or
the top box, you'll want to put-in on river right, downstream of Rt.
6\. Park in the small gravel parking lot on the upstream, river right
side of Rt. 6. Cross Rt. 6 and follow the path on river right until
you see a place where you can get to the water.
If you are planning
on running the top box (but not the falls) follow the scenic trail
along the river right side of the falls, then head down the gully
which leads to the base of the falls. Watch out for ice in the winter
and early spring.
**Take-out:**
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Taking out
can be an issue. The road which crosses over the creek just a little
ways before the Delaware would seem like a perfect place, but it is
heavily posted. You can take out a few miles downstream on the
Delaware, but a better option is to take-out under the railroad
tracks and hike up the river right bank to the little road which
crosses the tracks there. There is a turn in the road next to where
it crosses the tracks and you should be able to park there.
Difficulty Classes
I EasyII NoviceIII IntermediateIV AdvancedV Expert/ExtremeVI Unrunnable