Pingston - Middle

Contributed by Michael Reeder
What It's Like
Excellent quality class 4 with a few bigger rapids near the end. Continuous without being pushy, clean read and run for the first 3/4 with reasonably easy scouting and portaging options for the bigger rapids
Class
IV with a short V section at the end
Scouting / Portaging
Lots of eddies and reasonably easy scouting/portaging at river level (no canyon sections)
Time
2-3 hours (more or less depending on your boat scouting comfort level)
When to Go
Early July
Gauge
1.9cms↓ (Nov 21 00:10)
The middle Pingston is a very high quality class 4 run in its own right and serves as an excellent consolation prize if the upper is too high. Runnable flows are from around 5 to 25 CMS on the cranberry Creek gauge. At high water this run has countless midstream boofs and a good amount of catch on the fly surf waves. At low water the run channelizes quite well creating more eddies and a slower paced class 3/3+ feel with a few class 4/4+ rapids.

The river starts out with lots of continuous boulder garden rapids that stay consistent in difficulty and quality to what you see from the put in for at least half of the run. Eventually you get to a slightly harder rapid that can be boat scouted from the left eddy with a beautiful midstream boof. Another kilometer or so down there is a longer/harder rapid that can sneak up on you at high water. The hardest part of the run is marked by an obvious large logjam on river right with orange bouys stuck in it. From here down scouting and portaging on river right is recommended.