Dinkey Creek – The Waterfalls V-V+ (P) [North Fork Kings Tributary]



Dinkey Creek has made the transition from hardcore expedition paddling to a modern classic. This once rarely paddled run has become a marquee destination for both out of state boaters and local paddlers. With warm weather almost guaranteed due to low elevation and a somewhat southern Sierra location, Dinkey Creek is a true gem of California.

I’d heard great things about Dinkey Creek, but the southern location deterred me, until cold, wet weather at the start of a week and a half road trip motivated a journey down to the Kaweah, eventually planning to work our way back up to Mt Shasta. Devin Knight, Ryan Knight and myself got off the East Kaweah, gave a few phone calls around and found perfect flows and good friends were waiting for us at Dinkey Creek.

Now just to fit it all in one vehicle….Dave Garringer, Ben Coleman, Devin Knight and Ryan Knight near take-out on the Kings River.


Loaded up we embarked on the two and a half hour one way shuttle. Dave and Ben had done the run before, but Best Whitewater only gives a vague “follow your instincts” for shuttle directions, but after only one wrong turn we were searching for the start of the trail. There isn’t much to mark the start, but eventually we found it and started carrying our gear through the forest. Cutting through a meadow we found a trail that thankfully some one cut out through the unbearably thick manzanita, I can’t imagine the hike without the trail. Ten or fifteen minutes later we came into view of Dinkey Creek.

This is why you don’t put in at the Ross Crossing bridge, this cascade is somewhat reminiscent of the South Branch’s Seven Falls cascade.


We followed the plateau to the left, where eventually it turned into granite slabs leading to Ross Creek, where we more or less followed the creek to it’s confluence with Dinkey. Nice warm weather had us resting in the shade, the hike in is a bit of a slog and we only had a mile and a half of river in front of us, so we weren’t too stressed.

Dave Garringer and Ben Coleman crossing the tributary creek.


“If you’re not ready to fire, you may as well hike back out” – Ben Coleman.

Dinkey Creek doesn’t have any warm up at all, the first rapid is a slide that drops over thirty feet, and this is just the beginning!

Devin Knight on the first rapid of the day, runs don’t start any better, and it’s a lot steeper than it looks.


It's no surprise that a section of river named "The Waterfalls" is characterized by waterfalls and slides, but it also has perfect swimming pools of water between drops. Some of us portaged this next drop because it looked shallow, but Devin styled it without taking a hit.


The inbetween drops on Dinkey are awesome clean slides or falls, some with nice punchy holes.
Taylor Robertson and Corey Boux on a return trip at slightly lower flows.




Unfortunately the rapids on Dinkey are named after people who have had carnage in them, which is quite a shame. Willie’s is the largest mandatory rapid of the run a superb boof onto a slide, with a thirty to forty foot near vertical slide to finish it off.
Little Dave runs the entrance of Willies.


Ryan Knight styling the final slide of Willies, this slide is epic…


A perfect pools leads into a nice twenty foot waterfall that requires a far left line, Little Dave shows how it’s done in tough lighting conditions.


Ben Stookesberry running the same drop on a later trip at slightly lower flows.


Yet another twenty footer lies downstream, this one is perfect except a sieve is at the bottom of the pool below it. We had flows on the higher end of the flow window, and it was pushing pretty hard into the sieve, but Devin Knight probed it with a good line.


Still not convinced, a few of us chose to portage on the right, almost lost a boat downstream and the whole thing ended up being a lot scarier than just running the drop and portaging the sieve on the left, which we did on our return trip.

We were worried about the boat almost getting free because just a hundred yards downstream is a large mandatory portage around a gigantic sieve. We found that the portage can be fast and clean, or slow and scary depending on how you have to handle it. At medium to low flows it’s best to throw your boat in off the forty foot cliff and jump in after it, but at high (good) flows you’ll need to get someone seal launched from the lower rock. Getting down to the lower seal launch requires delicate friction climbing on highly polished granite. The first time I was absolutely gripped and had to collect myself while down climbing. The second time I had learned my lesson and looped my throw rope around a rock to give me something to hold to while down climbing the highly polished granite.

There is a large pool below the mandatory portage, and downstream is another large drop that was once the most technical portage of the run, requiring exposed friction climbing and making kayakers pendulum their boats across the slab. Thankfully a few years ago the bad rocks moved and the rapid is now relatively friendly and good to go, although the entrance is still often portaged.

Ryan Knight at the bottom and Devin Knight in the meat of Pendulum.


Once known as the Pyramid Rock rapid, the dissapearence of the pyramid rock has made this drop fall into the cliché role of another “triple drop”. Multiple lines entrance lines exist on this rapid, but there is only one way to go at the bottom, far right. After an initial fifteen foot drop, fast moving boils lead into another ten to fifteen feet of vertical drop into a massive pillow hole formed by the water refracting off the left wall, and then one more drop into a sticky hole at the bottom. This one isn’t easy to style, and at some flows you can surf out of the bottom hole…

Ryan and Devin were the only ones fired up about it on our first trip, and neither made it through the bottom hole upright, but one got lucky and flushed through, and we had one swimmer into the large pool below.

Viewed from above, Pyramid Rock Rapid, Ryan Knight in the entrance.


Viewed from below, Ben Stookesberry styling his way through the rapid at lower flows.


Corey Boux on the same day, showing that the pillow hole packs a punch!



Just below the rapid another small drop leads right to a large flat slab on river right, the most popular camping spot on Dinkey Creek. Proximity to the water is great, but early morning sunlight and the low elevation warmth of Dinkey Creek can lead to some early starts on day two.

Does it get much better?




Ben Stookesberry's TR and video from Dinkey.