Posted: 01/07/2014

by Kevin Colburn

American Whitewater has played a leading role in negotiating dam releases across the southeast. While the vast majority of opportunities we've helped restore are suitable for beginner and intermediate paddlers on rivers like the Tuckasegee, Nantahala, and Catawba, we've also worked on advanced Class IV and V opportunities. We have built up this 9-month series of advanced releases starting with Tallulah in 1997, the Cheoah in 2005, the Upper and Cascades of the Nantahala in 2012, and the West Fork Tuck in 2013.

We remain involved with the scheduling, implementation, and monitoring of these releases. We recently put all the 2014 releases on one list and found it so inspiring we had to share:

February 22-23 - Cheoah

March 15, 16, 17 - Cheoah

April 5-6 - Tallulah

April 5-6 - Cheoah

April 12-13 - Tallulah

April 12-13 - Cheoah

April 19-20 - West Fork

April 26-27 - Cheoah

April 26-27 - Nanty

May 3-4 - Cheoah

May 17-18 - Cheoah

May 17 - West Fork

May 24-25 - Cheoah

June 7 – West Fork

June 21 - Nanty

June 28-29 - Cheoah

July 2 - Nanty

July 5 - West Fork

July 19 - Nanty

July 26 - West Fork

Aug 9 - West Fork

August 16 - Nanty

Sept 27-28 - Nanty

Nov 1 - Cheoah

Nov 1-2 - Tallulah

Nov 8-9 - Tallulah

Nov 16-17 - Tallulah

Remember that all of these opportunities are the result of partnerships between AW, paddling clubs, the power companies, and others, and are made possible in large part by your AW membership contributions. Most importantly, be safe and have a blast out there on some of the Southeast's most incredible restored rivers.