After some guys hit me up on BoaterTalk; I have written this to help fill in some gaps on the First Descent of Big Panther Creek:

 

 

Big Panther

Trip Report ; Circa 1902

 

 

I have to go with an ole man’s memory, it’s been a long time, and a lot of water has passed under the bridge so to speak. For better or worse I remember more of what happened to us, then the actual run. The trip was a good vs. bad trip. The good was we thought we had a knocked out a first D’ and found a kick arse run. The bad was that we had a two near misses, some busted gear, and the worse was the shuttle, more of that come. I had some old pictures of the run, but my relational experience with my previous significant other took care of that ….but enough of that...

 

Here are some pictures from Alex Harvey’s website to give you an idea about the run. I want to thank Alex for his use of the pictures it was very nice of him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m thinking the time frame was Late June 1993???, A tropical storm/hurricane had come through the GA/SC. area, and everything was up for grabs. Section IV was running good, the Chauga, Stink-ola,, and Overflow had the water, and the Chattanooga area creeks, were drying up, it was past May and time to hit the road unless you wanted the Ocoee ,and the Green was being released at a 100% and sometimes less, so it was to be run only when the others dried up.

 

 Bill “Bull” Thornton; had been looking at some T.V.A topo maps. He had Big Panther inked in, and I was starting to run around with Justin Howard who was from Rome GA; also and he knew Bill. Hence, how we found out about Big Panther. My partner in crime back then was Steve Smith from Hot-lanta, he could boat just as good as anybody, and had b*lls of steel, he was the first that I knew to run Gorilla Constrictor on Johnnies Creek in Alabama and ran it in a Prijon Hurricane. You still couldn’t pay me to run that drop in that boat.

 

So after a long early morning drive from Chattanooga for me, we meet up at the Trail Head for Big Panther, man am I glad I found it, I hate new shuttles; I remember more of the shuttle then the run after all of these years, it seems you remember the epic stuff. So there I am waiting ….Steve Smith shows, then later Justin Howard shows, with some “dude” from Rome, with a Hurricane in the back of the truck….ut-ohhh. Man I don’t know this guy, why did he bring that boat??? We already broke our rule; no playboats. So we wait around a little longer for Bill. Besides that, we have to wait, he has the topo map right….Meanwhile I ask Justin, “who is that guy?”“ (I don’t remember his name) “He is a really good playboater from the Ocoee, he says he creeks”…

 

Man it’s getting on, and we are burning daylight and Bill still hasn’t shown, and Panther is dropping fast; so we make a command decision and start the muttle, I mean start the shuttle. We have sh*t for maps, so we start digging for road maps, Steve finds one in his Jeep; a state map with not much detail (remember this was before you could go to Wal-Mart and buy a topo atlas, and a GPS yeah right, you had to go to the bank first….), and now were off, Steve driving/leading while looking at the map, driving/blasting down roads to dead-ends, stopping, turning around, spinning tires, giving paddlers bad names, and asking locals where we are , and where we need to go,…..finally we find it…..we leave the cars at the lake…..and if you have run Big Panther…..

 

Here is a video of Big Panther( it started the Boatertalk questions)

 

 

 

So the shuttle is set, Bill never shows, the water is now scrapy, but hey beats the Ocoee, and were OFF……we paddle for a little bit, and we come to a turning right turn , and the water is going into a cheese grater rock wall/bluff/slide on the left with a boof in the middle. We are scouting and looking, and I look over to Justin and he is putting on some skateboarder elbow pads. “Hey MAN” WHAT ARE THOSE? Well from then on, the rest of the run, we keep passing back and forth a pair of pads “THESE THINGS ARE GONNA CATCH ON!!”

Remember I told ya circa 1902.

 

So we move on, knocking out eddys and rapids, it’s not really picking up, but it ain’t bad either, and it’s so pretty it’s worth the trip alone, and the hiking trail makes you look like a hero with people looking at ya….why hike when you can boat I wonder to myself.

 

 Now the trees start, and “dude” is shaky, he is missing eddys, and now we are nervous just watching him. During a tree portage, I asked Justin, “What the h*ll” before I get it all out…he states, “yeah, yeah I know, he told me he could handle it”…so from then on, we baby sit him……then around the corner it hits the fan. “Dude” missed an eddy…. we got out because of more trees and he is stern squirting a strainer and about to go under. Steve and I walked the strainer, and kick him out of it, with him in his boat, he flushes and pops up. This happens one more time and he is clueless to the sh*t storm he was in ….I want to choke him, with that cheesy grin he has on his face he has after he pops up and even easy going Steve is reaching his limits.

 

We start running some harder rapids now and it is picking up, this is a nice run, and we are starting to get in the groove, time to stay focused…… but now it is getting flat, oh well it’s pretty and “Dude” is safe for the moment, and we just knocked out the run. Time to think about tomorrow’s run and how to ditch that guy, Overflow sounds good to me, and I’m wondering what I can find to eat in Clayton.

 

 

What’s that noise…..”Dude” stated……Justin, Steve and I don’t say a word….we got that look of immanent doom……”What is it” . asks “Dude” We turn the corner and it’s the end of the world, it’s so damn steep, we don’t see the tops of trees in the Horizon line or for that matter any mist…..end of the run my a**…end of the world is more like it. This MOTHER #$%%^^ IS BIIIIIGGGGGG . ….Steve, Justin and I are beside ourselves, giggling like little school girls, we know if it gets too bad we got the trail……. “Dude” is having a bad day and I think he going to sh*t in his pants…..we get out, it’s low enough to were we can scout/walk beside the falls on river right, we look up and see hikers looking down on us….damn kayaking is cool……..why would you hike?

 

 Here's an idea of the falls.

 

 

 

Justin , Steve and I are looking and looking and looking, “Dude” has that far away look at stays at the top……this thing goes on forever, “Man I ‘d run it if weren’t for that rooster tail looking rock” and more  conversation goes back and forth between us…we keep looking. Well, I look around no “Dude”….  So I go back up to check on him , he gotten some cuts on the way down the run, meanwhile I’m getting the itch…..I spot something…..Justin left his pads in his boat……hee hee (I got the following from Steve later at the takeout)……WOOOSH… …….”what in the H**L was that”   Steve looks over at Justin…….” I THINK IT WILL GO, WHAT YA THINK?”  I looked back up at them with a Possum grin…what a nice drop….and I didn’t knock my head off or make my head a Piñata….So Steve runs it next, then Justin ,we keep swapping elbow pads ,”Damn that’s one fast ride” , Justin is grinning from ear to ear. “Dude” looks at it…starts to grab his boat….in unison we all said it at once” WALK!!!!!”

 

It was low enough to where there was a good break between the falls and an undercut drop. Steve and I are looking at it hard, yelling back and forth “Looks easy” …” Yeah” ”But look at that rock!!!!”  “You think it’s got any trees in it???”  “The more I look at it, the harder it looks!!!!” I don’t know man, whata ya think?”

 

(We are trying to push our limits for a First Descent, and I’m getting past my comfort level.)

 

So Steve and I break out our ‘tried and true” probe method……it worked every time……rock….paper……scissors ……with two out of three…

 

Here's an idea of the drop with the undercut.

 

 

 

 

 

I think I won….or did I lose??? Cause Steve ran it first, scrapping the bank on hard river left in his Crossfire, and he still barely made it away from that rock, it looked a hella of a lot bigger with him beside that rock, that did from just scouting “Man that cut is big” yelled at Steve …”I don’t know man” he yells…….I’m thinking that Crossfire is quicker than this Matrix…I’m thinking well, we did do this fair and square….damn……I gotta go…….so I knocked it out next with a much uglier run, and closer to the cut…. ……..definitely harder than I thought it was. …………Where is “Dude”?

 

“Dude” is catching on and he is walking the dog now…life is good.

 

So we continue on , and now it’s flat again, paddling some flatwater, now we see necks by the water with their kids swimming in their underwear…….man where is the Jeep? I paddle back upstream , and talk to the redneck, I assume to be father of this horde. Where is the dam?…I ask...he points through the trees while holding a Budweiser. I see it…..so we get out, and start walking it’s not like we remembered and why didn’t we just park by the creek?…..up…up….up   the dam we go, out of breath when we reached the top……”WHAT THE H$@L?!?!?! Where is our car?…..and for that fact where is the parking lot we parked it in?…….

 

“HOLY SH*t WE ARE AT THE WRONG  FU#$%KING DAM!!!!!”   Steve has that look, of well you know….oooops my bad, sheepish grin . So we get back in our boats. The lake is so backed up by trash and garbage from the previous storm that we have to pole through it like breaking ice with our paddles to break to the open water. I am so whipped from the drive, the paddle, the hike up the dam, I’m out of water, no food and now this, I’m getting sick just thinking of paddling a lake. Bill at the moment is not on my Christmas Card list.

 

We paddle upstream for about 45 minutes to an hour, and with all the rain the lake has some current, and it’s going the wrong way, and then we come across two guys bass fishing, I paddle up to them and ask, how much further to the dam. He states” Oh bout 4 …four and a half maybe more”…… I’m thinking suicide now……between the lake paddle and “Dude” ( imagine Sponge Bob Square pants wearing on Squidward….Baaaahhhhhaaaaa) .I look at the guys fishing…..”Say Man I got 20 Bucks in the car and these guys here will pay 20…..right guys”……..well you could have heard crickets chirp. They weren’t gonna give it up…..I said ” right guys”……still nothing…..Then I stated…..and pointed to “Dude”……”and he’ll give a B.J. for a ride”…….the two guys fishing started to laugh…..and then the rest piped in “WE GOT TWENTY !!!”…..

 

Picture of Drew Dekle  Picture by Alex Harvey

 

 

 

Well we finally made it back, it was a long boat ride, we paid the guys for the ride ……worth every penny…. And hey we got a First D’!!!!!

 

So a few weeks past, and there is going to be a party for AWA ,(now AW) for the rodeo at the Ocoee….Even though I despised the rodeo thing, it was a good social event, I’m not much on crowds but was a good way to catch up and network runs….. So I’m there seeing old friends and B.S. is being slung everywhere, paddle story after paddle story is being heard from it seems almost every paddler. I’m thinking “Where were these guys when we needed someone to boat with, do they even boat?” The music is loud. I turn around and bump into Doug Wellman, ahhhhh a friendly face, we start talking, and I mention Big Panther….he goes” Oh Yeah… Kent Wigington and Russ Killmar ran that bout a month and a half ago said it was good, suppose to have a big drop, they loved it”

 

 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!..... What a bitch………I get bumped from the crowd again, and spilled a drink and I turned around and it’s “Dude”………………………I think I’ll take up hiking…….

 

Mark Cumnock