River Description:
The top of cascade brook is about 1.3 miles upstream from the basin. In the previous years a bridge was wiped out that crossed from river left to river right and continued the trail however, it will be obvious when you get to this spot as there is a man made bridge of rocks across the river. At runnable flows these rocks are partially submerged but still an easy and safe spot to cross. Continue up the trail until you come to rocky glen falls (call this drop a 5.1 and the area below it continuous class 4 to 5 boating) a two tiered 30 to 40 footer (each drop is 15 to 20 feet) with a large pool inbetween them. From there down to kinsmans falls (.5 miles up from the basin) is a series of ledges and boulder gardens. Make sure you scout as there is one section that is full of sieves and is pratically a mandatory portage.
You should know when you approach Kinsmans Falls as you should have seen it on the trail up. It consists of two ledges droppping about 10 feet between the two into a narrow slot (only 3 to 4 feet wide) followed by a 20 to 25 foot vertical drop into a deep pool. If I was going to attempt to rate this drop id call it a 5.1 to 5.2. Following Kinsmans Falls is a series of ledges non bigger than 6 feet, where you will then arrive at the start of the big slides.
There are 5 distinct slides. At levels above 5.3 feet these will start to blend together into big long slides. Scout these slides well as they are fast and steep and the bottom two slam into nasty undercuts on the river right wall with pockets forming in the undercuts that nasty pins have occured in. A flip or pin on any one of these slides would at the very least result in broken bones. Make sure to take out above the sixth slide at the bottom as this one slams into an unavoidable rock.
For video footage check out this link: Has kinsmans falls footage and down, will update with footage from further up as soon as i get there. https://vimeo.com/108572362
Directions:
From I-93 (south or north doesnt matter) there will be signs directing you to the basin, follow the exit at the signs park and follow the signs to the the start of the trail (this is all very obvious). The signs of 93 for the basin are located inbetween exits 34A and 34B. If you have a GPS you can also imput the coordinates either way it is hard to miss.