well did something yesterday with 2 other open boaters that we had not done for some time. Pulled off the river. Not just walked a rapid but the entire river.
We went to Paddle the Tutshi River and turned out it was way high- spring like levels. Very small river that was full, continuous grade3-4 and a few good grade 5 drops. A bit of a hike in and we paddled a grand total of about 1/2 km, scouted first drop and which was pretty gnarly. I decided to bail then and there. A swim would have had big consquences.
It was interesting to observe the process and once i laid down my intentions my other buddy was pretty quick to. That left 1 who saw things like us. So we took our own advice that we give to our students the river will be there another day.
Wonder how our decision making process would have gone if we had been with a few kayakers. Another thing was we are getting a bit older, 2 of us have kids and the risk did not seem to be worth the reward. it would have been high survival paddling that was pretty wet.