Silver Creek, OR.

Dustin Stoner and Crisler Torrence below Silver Creek Falls.

Our crew (Dustin Stoner, Chris Shehab, Martin Belden, Crisler Torrence, and myself) arrived at silver Creek campground after a long day of driving, highway accidents, unexpected surprises on Sweet Creek, and just as it was about to rain.

After a night of off-and-on downpours the team was ready for another day of waterfalls! Because of the fact that I forgot our guide books we had to drive to an area of cell service to get directions to put-in and take-out. As we were getting directions via Ryan Scott, a Christmas tree farmer was nice enough to show us to the put-in and explain that just upstream was a massive waterfall.

The drop up stream ended up being a clean 65 footer that both Martin and Chris fired up! Due to low flows however, Martin and Chris Both were slowed down and at the lip and as they went vert. there sterns drug over the grabby volcanic basalt sending them over the bars and head first from top of the impressive drop. This ended up with Martins paddle breaking, Chris being ejected from his boat “Like a bar of butter” and making for the most impressive and comical photos of our trip!

Martin Beldin about to Land on his dome from 65 ft! What a savage!

From this drop the river meanders for about ¾ of a mile before plunging over the 126 ft. Silver Falls. The portage around Silver Falls is really easy but takes a little time since you have to walk on a well defined hiking trail that traverses back and forth and eventually goes back behind the waterfall.

Once we were put-on after the portage our team rolled up to a blind class 2 corner, about 2 miles from silver falls, which turned out to be an awesome 15 foot slide to vert drop. When running this there are two options, at least at low flow, run right or portage the top and run the left slide.

Crisler Torrence running first.

Martin Beldin draw stroking to perfection.

This turned out to be the best drop on our trip since we had low flows and there was wood and axis problems for all the nicer drops. None the less this trip still revealed it’s epicness in the form of us missing the take-out and eventually getting lost. Since we missed take-out, which is supposedly the south fork confluence, our group floated farther and farther downstream until we finally came to an old logging road. Beings that this was the first sign of anything remotely resembling a trail or axis point we decided to hike out instead of paddle further.

The hike consisted of about 1 mile uphill and during which Dusty and I found a sweet cart to push our boat in. Once at the top of the climb a friendly Mexican tree farmer gave us a three mile ride back to Silver Creek campground were Chris, who had decided to hike out early, was driving around looking for us. Once back at the campground everyone enjoyed the complementary warm showers and heated bathroom that Silver Creek Campground offers!

Orion Meredith in the "Were the hell is take-out section"

It should be known that paddling Silver Creek is Illegal. We got lucky and when a ranger asked us soaked to the bone, covered in paddling gear kayakers weather we had been paddling Silver Creek, we simply replied “no” and drove away with a kayak on the roof and everyone inside without problems : )

Note: Silver Creek has several benign looking class 2 rapids that lead into either huge-ass drops or rapids that are well worth a scout. Many of these drops have wood in very un-ideal places, which results in a bit of a portage fest on the manicured trail system that stays just far enough away from the creek to make axis a real bitch at times. Still this run is worth doing once to see the massive waterfalls. Out of state Boaters should know that Liquor Stores in Oregon Close at 7 pm!

-Photos and write-up by Orion Meredith

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