Friday, July 17, 2009
Cool getaway
Chilly Roaring Run in Botetourt County offers a respite from summer's heat.
Mark Taylor
Mark Taylor's Outdoors column and notebook appears regularly in The Roanoke Times.
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ORISKANY -- In terms of wet rock-sliding readiness, Bert Reid had an advantage over Lynn Tyrrell.
Reid was wearing a pair of tough, cut-off jeans.
Tyrrell was in a bikini, one with a leopard print, no less.
But there was Tyrrell making her way to the top of the slick slanted rock face, planting herself and sliding -- scream-free -- into the chilly pool below as her impressed friends watched.
OK. She had an advantage.
"I've done it lots of times before," said the 20-year-old from Roanoke. "We've been coming up here for years."
Here was Roaring Run, a frigid, spring-fed creek that plunges in a series of cascading falls and slides through a steep valley in northern Botetourt County.
Shaded and deep, the valley makes for a cool getaway on a hot summer day.
"It's better than being in Roanoke," is how Tyrrell put it.
Unlike plenty of appealing summertime swimming spots, this one is totally accessible.
The creek is on U.S. Forest Service land. In fact, the spot is a designated recreation area, with a large parking area and a well-maintained trail that provides good access to the creek.
And what a creek it is.
Roaring Run emerges from a strong spring that gurgles out of a plateau atop Rich Patch Mountain, then plunges toward Craig Creek.
Near the parking area sits an iron furnace that was operated in the pre-civil war era.
The creek attracts not only swimmers and splashers.
It's also a trout creek, albeit one shrouded in some mystery.
The Department of Game and Inland Fisheries stocks the lower reaches of the creek several times a year with catchable-sized trout, and the creek attracts heavy pressure after stockings.
The upper stretch is stocked with fingerling trout, and managed under special regulations which require anglers to use single-hook artificial lures and set the daily bag at two trout of at least 16 inches.
The limit is a moot point.
"In sampling this spring we didn't find a single trout," said a perplexed Scott Smith, the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries biologist who oversees the stream.
No predator, be it poachers or otters, is that efficient. So Smith is trying to figure out what else could be causing the trout to disappear.
A well-traveled path runs upstream from the parking lot, winding about three-quarters of a mile before it reaches the largest of the creek's waterfalls.
The hike is fairly easy until the end, when it gets steeper. Climbing is simplified in one section by sturdy wooden steps.
The creek's falls aren't sheer drops. Rather, the water rushes over slanted rock faces.
They aren't totally smooth, either.
On even the best falls for skidding, the sliders will endure bumps and bounces on the way down.
And then they must endure the big shocker: 55 degree water.
"The water is the worst part," said Tyrrell, smiling.
Having watched his friend take the plunge, Reid was ready.
He gingerly made his way to the top of the slide, sat down and pushed off.
Climbing back up the rock a minute later, he was smiling.
"Man that water is cold," he said.
Which was exactly the point.
