Doublekill, New Jersey, US

Iron Mountain Road (NJ) to Rt 94(NY)

First Descent of Gnargarita

First Descent of Gnargarita
Photo taken 03/30/10 @ high runnable

River Description

This is an amazing beautiful remote run.  The dense old growth set in a deep and steep rocky gorge give a unique feeling especially for NJ. Come get NJ at it's best! These are the among best if not the very best remote NJ bedrock drops. Only Devil's Tea table comes close in my mind but it lacks the Doublekill's length, remoteness and stomp factor.

 
Gradient by mile:

Mile 1: 263 ft
Mile 2: 260 ft
Mile 3: 144 ft

MAX GRADIENT:  360 ft/mile, which occurs from about mile .75 to mile 1.25.\

1.9 miles of the run is within New Jersey and the last .6 miles is in New York state. Watershed is aprox 6-7 square miles.  
 

When the big rains come you can swing by this gem to see if it's up. The large marshy headwaters  with several ponds may keep the levels up more than we might expect for multiple days.  Please post runs and the amount of rain that allowed you to boat the doublekill. The doublekill always seems to have some water so I think it may go more often than one might assume.

Take care not to enter the gorge too early in the Early Spring as this north facing deeply shaded gorge acts like an icebox and holds ice in the drops much longer than the surrounding areas. 

First Descent:

Especially while the creek is strainer intensive runs should be started early in the day. The first decent on 3/30/2010 by Wayne Gman and Steve Strange started at 1pm (start of hike) and ended at 8pm just 15 minutes after dark. That day the two hiked and boated in a hard rain adding 1 inch to the 1 inch that already fell over the previous 12 hrs. The watershed was very wet before this rain event started.

the West Brook guage had spiked to 275 cfs the previous day and spiked to 400 cfs while the 1st D was run. The guage continued to rise to 475 overnight. 

All drops were run on the 1st D day except for Boof & Rally. There are many life threatening strainers on the run right now. Only boaters comfortable with running probe on class 5 creeks should consider a run. Sooner or later everyone will likely find themselves out in front on probe because they'll blow an eddy. This said if the creek flow seems low I suspect many attentive boaters can give it a go too. It's all about how fast the creek is pushing you into the next strainer.

Rapid Distances: The mile markers for the distance from the start are at best very suspect but we tried to make them as reasonable as possible. It's not like a GPS will work in the heavy cover in the gorge. Someone could record rapids' GPS coordinates when boating when the leaves have fallen.

Dry Scouting: If you want to fill a camelbak and hike the run first you should take a buddy and expect it to take 3-4 hours. The hike is very rugged.

Walking Off: If you need to walk out do so on river left before Meatball. It's very steep, you will encounter the AT trail access. Follow the trail to the right/west back to Barret Rd. You can always walk out anywhere on river Left for that matter but it will just be eaiser before Meatball. Soon after Boof & Rally there are houses on the left up high.

Rescue: Any need for extraction in the gorge in the afternoon will likely be an overnight affair if you can't get out yourself. I can't fully explain how much of a pain in the ass it is to hike in there. Everything is slippery and muddy; rocks teetering ready to shift under foot and the 250 year old logs littered everywhere on steep angles are especially difficult to negociate even in a short portage.