Green River: Franklin to Auburn

On this day, the flow was 1,280cfs at the Purification plant near Palmer.  

The ledge just below the put-in, though said to be 3rd class, was an easy drop.  The one capsize that occurred was several hundred feet downstream.  There the channel splits around a very large rock.  The left channel has a large rock that projects about 1.5ft above this flow.  One paddler when over this rock and capsized.  I would discount this as an anomaly except that on a previous trip with flow at 2,800 two paddlers capsized in this channel.  So, beware the left channel

On a previous trip the flow at Palmer was 312cfs.  On this trip we stopped and scouted 2 drops where the main channel carried paddlers toward a rock.  At higher flow, these channels wash out.  At this flow, many of the drops were fun boulder gardens, technical with opportunity to maneuver, but not pushy.  We did bump over the bottom at several places but not a significant problem.

In 2020, I ran just the upper part of this section at flow of 2,800cfs.  This was a

312cfs:  a little bony.  Technical but not pushy drops.  Watch out for two drops with small channels leading to rocks.

1,280cfs:  Well full of water.  Drops getting a little pushy.  Class II+

2,800cfs:  Fast rapids, harder to eddy out.  Drops will hold more power.  Still within the AW runnable range.