From Red Slide Park in Haw River you’ll likely think you’re in for a rollercoaster of a paddle. And you are — for the first 50 yards or so. After putting in, you have about 20 yards to figure out how to attack a frisky Class I-II set of rapids that drops three feet within 30 feet: the result of a dam, now decommissioned, that once helped power the old Granite Cotton Mill just across the river (which once produced 10 percent of all cloth made in the United States). That the mill located here was no fluke; Red Slide Park occupies what was once, dating back to the 1700s, the most popular ford along the Haw- Piney Ford.