September 27 meeting with River Trust

As we push forward with a whitewater park in OKC this is the latest news. We met today with the Directors of Water Resources (the people who control Lake Overholser), and Public Works (the people that control the downtown damns). As we had thought, there is no chance for scheduled release on the N. Canadian (the Okayaklahoma river!) out of Overholser for recreation purposes. They just don’t have enough water, and there is no power generation. So any features that will be built are either going to depend on normal flows as they are now. There was no stated opposition to having REP do a study, so we will plan on presenting our proposal before the river trust September 27.

Links to a few OKC whitewater videos...enjoy

Evil Otter Rapid:

Allison's first combat roll, good job:

Stillwater Creek, nice Class II:

My favorite super secret spot:

oKAYAKlahoma...where the rivers run under ground

Scouted maybe ready to run is this 150yd of culvert in the NW section of town. This is Edgmere Creek which begins somewhere under OKC. It first appears in a park in a residential neighborhood. Should be a fun run to the Deep Fork.

By the way I've 2 confirmed surf ways in OKC after 1 inch of rain. Do your rain dance

PLAY SPOT FOUND!!!! - 6 Foot Drop over 100 Ft

Good news for the OKC whitewater community. All 10 of us! There is a prime location for a sweet spot, and all it should take is some manual labor. I'm posting the pictures that show you the spot dry and after about 3/4 in. of rain. There is slab concrete which can be moved into place with a little muscle, and luckily our ancestors realized that we can use tools, so in the tradition of evolved cromags, we'll use some come-alongs, chains, and pry-bars to position the rock. It's a pool drop rapid, but gets another 20ft. higher (according to the trash in the trees). We'll have to investigate at higher water levels.

Horton's Hole Hazards

So this is one of the biggest Hazards seen on the banks of Horton's Hole. This guy was on the other side of the river when we arrived. He was attempting to take off his clothes to go for a swim. But whatever drugs he was on at the time didn't allow him the coordination to get them off. So he pulls up his pants and jumped in for a swim. I pasid him a visit as he swirled around in the eddie, like a wet rat. He was able to pull him self out eventually, and shortly later tried to back his Lincoln Town cart up this hill (with rear wheel drive). Needless to say it wasn't going anywhere. I was thinking, this hole could use an addtional eddie river right, so I began to hope. Instead of follwing my prompts to "drive through" he waited until a family of mexican folks showed up to help tow the car out. I still held out hope for a new eddie while 3 mexicans took up surfing stances on the trunk of the car as Mr. River Rat tried to back the car out.

Meeting Minutes 8-4

HI ALL,

At Pat Downes request we met with John Rhodes (Director of OKC Public Works) today. Basically we wanted to find out if there was any clear cut reason why this project can't proceed. Fortunately, there are none. But there are some challenges ahead. So, we'll be working with Pat to get the materials necessary for a September River Trust meeting. There, we will:

- present the reasons to have REP (wwparks.com) to compose a feasibility study

- provide half of the funds required to hire REP (approx. $3500)—make your contributions

- present a petition of paddlers in the area who want this project to happen

I found out some interesting information about the 2 days “Horton’s Hole” was running this summer. The level of the pond created by the May Ave. (Damn 3) was lowered for work that was being done at the Dell site. Therefore, when they were filling it back up at 2000+CFS there was a pour over. Normally Damn 3 maintains a higher water level at “Horton’s Hole” and it is flat water all the way to Overholser. This higher level is necessary for the Water Taxi’s that city will be operating starting in 07’. This seems to me to create an added engineering challenge, but that’s why we will pay the big bucks for the smart people to rub their chins and such.

We will next meet with the Director of Water Resources to discuss the viability of scheduled Overholser dam releases if this project were to be built.

On another OKC whitewater potential note: the Deep Fork river (creek) that runs through the city has a lot of good potential sites for fun (and death if we’re not careful). Has anyone heard about people running this? I need some help clearing strainers, and rebar. If you have a chain saw, or are willing to help clear out the river bed in a few spots let me know.

I’ve attached a photo of a 4 foot pour over just below Western Ave.