17th of September We arrive at the Stikine River at approx. 7pm. At this point the river looks really high. The gauge under the bridge is either gone or most likely under water. We spoke with some moose hunters at the put in about the river. They report that the river is higher than they have seen it in the twenty years that they have been hunting in the area. With that knowledge we headed for a small town about 35 minutes away called Dease Lake for a good nights sleep in a hotel.
18th of September We are back at the put in (bridge) at 6:30am (still dark). We start packing our boats (Excel & Freefall) with all of the gear that we would need to do this 3-day expedition. As dark starts to turn to morning dawn we are able to see that the river is still very high, actually higher than the night before. Big trees and logs floating by as well as the water being up in the brush were a good indicator of this. Understanding that there was a chance that we would have to hike out, we decided to put on and make our decision about five miles down stream at a huge rapid called Entry Falls. So, down the river we went at sometime around 8:30am. As we traveled the first few miles we were in awe of how much water we were traveling with. At about mile 3 the river started to narrow up into a small canyon. At this point the river seamed really high but we keep thinking "well, this is the Stikine, a river like no other". So on we went. As we cruised through the first canyon we couldn't believe the size of the boils in the water. They were already bigger than anything that either of us had ever seen and the rapids hadn't even begun. Somewhere around mile five we entered a canyon that had no escape. It was the canyon of Entry Falls, and we had failed to stop in the slower water up stream to scout. Now committed to running one of the biggest rapids that we had ever seen without being able to really see it, we knew that we would be lucky to avoid disaster. We were trying to get to the side of the river but because of the vertical walls and the huge boils next to them we had no chance of finding slower water. So with a quick read of the river and a lot of luck, we paddled into a rapid of enormous size. We both barely missed a terminal hole at the top and then dropped into the biggest hole that we had ever come in contact with. The only thing to do was hold on and know that you are about to take the beating of your life. So that is exactly what we did. After a very serious spanking we both flushed out just in time to get a little bonus working in the 8-foot boils coming off the river right wall. Scared to death and lucky to be alive we decided for some crazy reason to keep going. I am not sure what really possessed us to do such a thing other than a strong adventurous spirit which we both contain.. The river slowed for a while, but still contained huge boils and eddy lines that sometimes seamed to come from nowhere and swallow us in our boats for 5 seconds at a time.
At about mile 9 the river began to narrow again and the beatings that we had taken up stream began all over again. We got beat along like this for a couple more miles running lots of weird white water. Then we ran a huge rapid called Three Goat and caught the first available eddy about ¾ of a mile down river where we stopped to reevaluate our situation.
We hiked up the canyon wall so that we could get a view of what the river was doing down stream. Eight hundred feet up on the canyon rim, all that we could see down stream was the water getting bigger and moving faster with even more commitment than what we had just experienced. So after a few minutes of weighing out the pros and cons of hiking out or continuing on, we decided to hike out. It wasn't that hard of a decision because we both honestly believed that if we continued down river the chance of death was very high. We hiked down the cliff back to our boats to recover our gear and prepare for what we knew was to be a serious hike out. Leaving our boats behind we climbed the eight hundred feet back to the top of the canyon rim to start
"THE HIKE." At 12:00pm we started the hike back up stream with the hope of reaching the put in before dark. It wasn't long before we knew that we were in for some serious work. Hiking overland in the B.C. wilderness was turning out to be harder than we had thought. We found no trails, just bush whacking and walking through moss beds that we sunk to our knees in. After about a mile we came across a small game trail and we were overjoyed until we saw our first grizzly track, which seemed about eight inches across and sunk into the mud another eight. Once again scared to death, no gun, no where to run, in the food chain, we felt the full severity of our situation. We hiked over and around ridge after ridge through grizzly territory, not knowing when one would jump out and put us out of our misery. After eight hours of non stop hiking we decided that there was no way that we where going to make it out that night, so we made our way down to the river and were lucky enough to find a small flat spot along the water to camp. It was a cold night, which made for very cold temperatures. We started a fire with a candle that we had brought for a small candle lantern. Zipped up in our sleeping bags and bivy sacks we settled in on our beach for a long cold night of sleep. It seemed as if the night would never end.
19th of September As we finally peered out of our sleeping bags in the morning we could see the result of the nights cold. All of our gear was frozen solid. We sat inside our bags and joked about our situation for a few minutes in an attempt to keep up good spirits, but that was soon to end. Still lying down inside of our sleeping bags we realized that a big moose was standing in the river just down stream. It was just standing there making a woofing sound so we thought the situation okay and didn't think much of it. The moose then started making its way up the river toward us until we began to feel uncomfortable and threw a rock at it. The next few seconds were kind of a blur. There was some yelling and scrambling as the moose decided to charge us still in our sleeping bags. We ran bare foot through some trees and onto a huge boulder. Luckily the moose decided that he hadentertained himself enough and went onto do better things. Back to our camp we went to quickly get dressed and grab our gear, as we had no desire to hang out in the woods any longer. We had both agreed that we probably had about a 3-hour hike back to our car at the put in. So with our tails between our legs we began the day with a huge hike back up to the top of the canyon rim. At this point the idea of seeing any kind of wild life was scary and the fact that we kept walking down bear trails so heavily used that there was hair deposited on the branches, did not help the situation.
Twelve hours later, as it turned dark, we were still hiking. Dehydrated because of a broken water filter and exhausted from a lack of food we kept moving, trying to believe that we had to be getting close. Just as we sat down to find our flashlights we heard an exciting sound; It was the sound of a car driving across the bridge that we put in at. Excited and barely able to walk we made our best effort at charging up the riverbank until the bridge was in sight. As we walked onto the bridge and began to cross, the realization of what we had just done began to set in. For the first time we where able to let down our guard and feel all of the emotion of what we had just been through. We felt lucky. Lucky that the only injuries that we had were a few lost toenails and some very sore body parts. We were lucky to be alive.
We had gone up knowing the river was going to be high but hoped it would drop quickly to a runnable flow. We flew it in a helicopter on Thurs morning (9/21). It was still around 25,000 cfs so we bagged it and headed south.
For those who would ever consider the Stikine, realize you need a low level window for an attempt to be successful - 10,000 or below. We all poo poo locals who say it's pretty high or sure death around the corner but for this run you've got to be cautious. I recommend going up there with a plan to fly it first just to know the reality of what lies downriver.
There used to be a gauge at the Hwy 37 bridge but it's now gone. There is an island gravel bar downstream of the bridge on the right and it should be well out of the water for an attempt. Sept/Oct is both the time for low flows and extreme pulses - some of the highest flows of the year. I plan attempts from Aug 20th to Oct 1 and watch both the weather patterns and the Wrangell USGS gauge. Realize that gauge measures a lot of area below the canyon so storm paths are important. If a storm tracks directly over the Spatsizi Plateau, that water will go thru the canyon. Any water extra that time of year is probably too much.
What Jay and Taylor describe about the hikeout is very accurate as to how large and threatening the country is. One bit of info which might have helped during the hike was there is a vague trail on the river right side down as far as Site Zed. They got out on the left and were faced with total wilderness bushwacking the whole way. Of course there were no feasible eddies on the right for a long ways upstream.
If you are faced with such a hike out, you have to be prepared. Think lowest level of equipment - ie what's left if you swim. You need bomber footwear - I advise the Patagonia/Lotus Playboot because it won't come off in a swim and gives great support and traction during the hike. A Goretex drysuit is a real insurance policy - the water usually isn't too cold - 53 f norm - but that extra tech advantage is worth the money. If you do swim, you'll want to swim some more if you plan to recover your boat because getting out and hiking downriver is virtually impossible. Also have a compass, map, whistle, lighter and energy bars on your person - preferrably in inside PFD pockets. And on group size, I now prefer a larger group - ie 4-6 just because it gives you more options for safety and it eases the tensions.
I'm sure we'll be hearing more about the Stikine in the years to come. Taylor and Jay can just be thankful their skill, equipment and eventual common sense were up to the challenge and they weren't the first fatalities knotched up to the GC of the Stikine. They are great paddlers and will run it successfully in the next year or 2 I'm sure.
Rob Lesser
Middle Fork of the Salmon River June 20 – 29th, 2000 A maximum size group of 24 people including 5 kayakers, 1 C-1’r, 6 paddle rafters, 8 oar captains, and 4 raft riders
Tuesday June, 20th (Travel Day Little Rock to Boise via Dallas and Salt Lake City) Fantastic start to a great trip. Everyone made the flight on time. All gear and flights were on time. Kim, Paul and Ron were scheduled on the later flight out of Salt Lake but actually got to go standby on our earlier flight. It all was coming together just like clockwork. All of the land crew made it up with no problem too. Our flight got into Boise at 7:30 PM. Walter, Cowper, Lance, and Dave picked us up and we went to the hotel to check in. Quality Inn is very near the airport and very convenient. We drove a few blocks to a pizza joint and met the majority of the rest of the group. Stuffed ourselves with very good pizza. Went to buy beer for the trip then back to the motel. Marcel and I shared a room for the night. We noted that it does not get dark until after 10:00 PM.
6/21 Drive to the River (Boise to Boundary Creek) Got up early and ate breakfast in the motel. They had a complimentary light breakfast. After breakfast we spotted hot air balloons rising in the distance over Boise. Before we left the motel we must have seen 15 or 20 hot air balloons! Very cool. The weather today is perfect! The food and gear packed into Walter and Gale’s room was a sight to see! Tons of stuff packed into massive ice chests. The dry ice gave the room an odd smell, kind of like dirty socks. We loaded up the vehicles and trailers with remaining gear and food bought in Boise and took off to the river. The drive to the Boundary Creek access point was incredible. We drove up hwy 55 along the Payette River and turned at Banks, the confluence of the North Fork and the South Fork of the Payette river. We then drove along the South Fork of the Payette. It looked awesome. Lance, Ted, Cowper, and Greg were behind us and stopped to paddle this fork on the way to Boundary Creek. I must paddle this river some day! The lower portion appeared to be solid class III in difficulty. We stopped at one of only two convenience stores that we saw for about 100 miles. We bought snacks and Walter quickly had a slow leak on the trailer fixed. The scenery was just awesome. The mountains still have a little snow capped peaks and the weather couldn’t be better! We arrived a Boundary Creek (elevation about 6500 feet) campground about 1:00 PM. The last of the ground crew, Dave Smallwood and Bob Wiley met us there. Each of the campsites had little signs posted that said "Welcome Gordon and Arkansas crew!" Too funny! We checked in with the rangers and discussed river conditions, camps etc. We started the boat rigging process about 2:00 PM. At 3:00 we got with the ranger to request trip campsites. We got lucky again and got what Walter called the "A" list for campsites for a big group. Walter was real pleased with the sites. A number of us drove about a mile up river to Dagger Falls. It was very impressive. A huge Class V or maybe even Class VI double drop waterfall. All but unrunnable!! We saw 3 Salmon leaping up river in the rapid trying to ascend the rapid. We had an excellent dinner of spaghetti , salad and bread for dinner.
Thursday June /22 Launch day!!! (Boundary Creek to Joe Bump) Got up early, drank coffee, had breakfast and started prepping for launch. This is a massive job that requires many many trips up and down the hill at the Boundary Creek put in. Hauled gear and boats until about 11:00 AM. We had our "talk" with Ranger Julie where she gave us the lowdown on what we could not do and could do on the river. We were met with no surprises from her. We also had a talk from an Indian "interpreter" named Hobie. He gave us a neat Indian perspective of what we were to experience over the next week. His talk was inspirational and touching. He showed us some Indian artifacts that were native to the area that had been handed down to him from his grandfather. We did last minute futzing around and then waited about 1 hour for Cowper who was still up in the campground moving pretty slow. The loading process was a hassle but less than what I expected. Finally we launched a little after 12:30 PM. Even with the delay it appeared that we were making very good time for a launch day! The water level at launch was about 3.1and it stayed very close to that or a bit less the entire trip. About a perfect level for a kayaker in my opinion. The first rapid is an easy class III but I was rusty and made my worst move of the trip right away. I slammed a rock sideways and could have pinned my boat had I been very unlucky. I warmed up a bit after that and starting getting back into the groove. At this level the river appears to be solid class III. Everyone is paddling great. The scenery is awesome! Simply one of the best days of my life!!!! I have a nearly constant grin!! We stopped for lunch at Gardell’s Hole Camp on the right bank. This is my first experience of how the meal process on the river will work. Everything is real organized and clean. The first major rapid is Velvet Falls. It sneaks up on you because of the noise made by the easy class II just upstream. Indeed I was headed right for the meat of the hole when I saw the horizon line and eddied out just upstream on river right to boat scout it. Drake had noticed where we were and waved me over to river left. I made the ferry and slid through the falls clean. Dave Robertson was right behind me and flipped and rolled upstream of the falls and surprised everyone watching by rolling up and still making the right slot. Great recovery! Some of us stopped at Trail Flat camp and hit the first of many Hot Springs. It was very warm and soothing. Power House rapids at mile 11.2 was fantastic! Long and a wild ride! Lots of holes to dodge and the water is pretty big. This would be very tough at much higher levels. I was thinking that if this is an easy one then I’m in big trouble!! I ran it without a lead boat in sight so I had to find the right lines on my own. Fortunately for me it wound up being one of the harder ones! Most of the crew was just downstream taking pictures as we came through…luckily no carnage! We camped just downstream at mile 11.8 at Joe Bump Cabin camp. The campground is extremely pretty. Just across the river from the mouth of a roaring Soldier Creek. Lots of timber and plenty of room. Maybe the best or second best campground of our trip in my opinion. Drake and I walked up the trail and saw old prospector Joe Bump’s cabin. We also saw a couple of mule deer near camp. Had chicken spaghetti for dinner. Also very very good. Drank beer and sang around the campfire with Dave and his guitar until about dark at around 10:00 PM Just a Hell of a day!!
Friday, June 23 (Joe Bump to Marble Creek) Slept real well and woke up to see a mule deer just a few feet from my tent. An awesome first sight for the morning!!! Just unbelievable! Ate French toast for breakfast. We launched early because we had a long day and a couple of stops we wanted to make. We stopped at Sheepeater hot springs first and spent about 30 minutes lounging in the springs. Paddled lots and lots of class II stuff today. We spotted some bikini clad chicks hula hooping on a bluff above the river at Pistol Creek. They apparently were doing a layover day and were drinking beer and had a game to see who could drink and hula hoop without falling off the cliff into the water. It was pretty funny! A couple of the guys with them drug their kayaks up the two story high cliff and launched themselves off into the water. Not to be outdone I hauled my big ole boat up there and did the same. Reminded me of the joke….Last words of a redneck…."hey….watchis!!!" The rest of the group got a real kick out of it and there should be some neat pictures! They gave me a real hard time for showing off!! Since the hula hoop gals had Pistol Creek taken, we had to paddle down to the Indian Creek air strip campground and launch site for lunch. I went up and took pictures of the landing strip. This is where a number of the folks on the 1999 Arkansas trip flew into and launched due to the high water upstream. After lunch we paddled on down to Marble Creek camp and set up camp for two days. Marble creek is a huge camp at the base of a mountain. There was a big surf hole or two just down stream for the playboaters. Walter and Mark Brown cooked up a fantastic Cajon barbecued shrimp dinner with a bed of white rice. It was simply to die for!!! We sat around and joked with the Bubba’s (mainly David Thrasher and Newton "Newt" White.) At some point in the evening I shot off my mouth off (beer pressure) and said I could climb the mountain behind camp in 40 minutes. The rest of the camp died laughing and said basically go for it big boy! I got a little toasted and waited until it was too dark to find my tent. I wandered around the big camp for like 10 minutes before I could find the tent! I was laughing so hard at myself by the time I found it I could hardly see because I had tears in my eyes. Damn what a good day!!
Saturday June 24 (layover day at Marble Creek) Woke and drank coffee and started thinking about climbing the mountian at some point. Stone sober now, I revised my E.T.A. to a more likely 50 minutes. The early risers still said no way in Hell! Dave Roberston hopped out of his tent got his boots on and said lets go bubba! We had not even had breakfast yet! Off we went to climp what we later learned was a 1000+ foot peak. The climb was extremely hard and steep with no trail. Actually it was a bit dangerous to be honest considering I didn’t even have good hiking boots. We were on our hands a feet a lot near the top. The view from the summit however was breathtaking!! We took some great pictures and mooned the camp below, even though we knew full well they could not see us! There was another 1000-foot peak right behind the one we climbed! The climb back down was very tough too. We had to take it very very slow. The entire hike took us around 2 hours. We ate breakfast of oatmeal and bacon. Rested for a couple of hours and paddled down to the surfing rapid below Marble Creek camp. I had one decent surf and paddled with Drake, Ron, and Ted to Sunflower, the next campsite downstream. We lounged in the hot springs on the bluffs overlooking the river. Incredible view! (we later learned from others in our group that a fat naked man was lounging there right before we arrived for all the world to see…glad we missed that show) We stashed our boats near the bank and hiked the mile upstream back to camp. Ate Beef Stroganoff for dinner and sang with Dave until sundown…10:00ish.
Sunday June 25th (Marble creek to Hospital Bar) Got up and had breakfast of eggs, toast and bacon. Put on at about 9:30 for another long day of paddling. Thrasher coined maybe the most memorable line of the trip. After loading his boat for about 1 hour at 9:30 AM he stretched out on his raft seat and proclaimed loudly.... "Newt, all this loadin's makin me thirsty!!!" He then popped open a beer and off we went!! I Rode Ted's raft down to Sunflower hot springs and hit the springs one more time for about 15 minutes. We then retreived our kayaks and took off. This is a pretty easy day. Lots of class II with maybe one class III, Jackass rapid. The best route is hard to the right. We stopped at Camaron Creek camp for lunch and had Mexican Rollups. (Very good). The river corridor is changing quite a bit now. There are lots of huge Pondarosa Pines lining the banks. I paddled Ted's Oar rig from Camaron Creek to Whitey Cox camp, which was about 7 miles. It was fun but not nearly as fun in my opinion as kayaking. After checking out the WW II soldier grave of Whitey Cox we went on down stream. We paddled more class II stuff down to Loon Creek. We got out and walked along the Loon Creek Ranch. The Loon Creek Valley was a major highlight of the trip. It was one of the prettiest places I've ever been. The creek was a class III and IV run very similar to some Arkansas high water creek runs however the water was cold and crystal clear. The trees and vegetation around the creek were very lush. We hiked the 1 mile trail up the creek to a huge hot springs easily big enough for 20 people. We went back and forth dipping into the very hot water and then going to the cold creek. Loads of fun! We walked back down and I took some more photos of the field and valley near on the ranch. Finally we paddled on down to Hospital Bar camp. As we were entering camp we passed 2 big horn sheep that were just feet away right next to the bank. This was a 20 and 1/2 mile day of paddling. Hospital Bar is another great, large camp. Drank margaritas and ate one of the best meals I've ever had of Cajon Red Fish Cubion, salad, bread and white wine. Walked a little of it off by taking a short walk down the the hot springs near the camp.
Monday June 26th (Hospital Bar to Survey Creek) Stepped out of my tent to see a group of small herd of Big Horn Sheep right up the cliff scurring along in a hurry just as if someone cued them to "Go" right when I woke up!! Drank coffee and ate breakfast burritos. Left about 9:30 for Survey Creek. Another long day is in store. Rookies are a little nervous as it appears from the guide books that the biggest rapid so far is coming up...Tappen (ie like a Tappen washing machine). Trasher is not helping much by singing "tap, tap, tappen on heaven’s door!" Fortunately, at this level I would describe it as a hard class III. I ran it like the guide book said about 10 feet from river right and had a very nice run. Dave came through next and went directly into the hole below the drop. He got hammered! He tried to hit a few rolls but had to "exit the vehicle!" He was roped out easily enough by Thrasher and Newt just down stream and thus was dubbed "Cap’n Tappen" for the rest of the trip! We lunched at Johnny Walker Camp on the left bank where a few in the group spotted a black bear! We paddled on down to the Flying B Ranch where we re-stocked beer, and ice and bought t-shirts, hats and ice cream. Flying B has their own hydroelectric power generator so they actually have electricity. I found a sweet surf wave below the Bernard landing strip and surfed for like 10 minutes, carving back and forth. Great fun! The next section of river was very fun. Lots and lots of huge standing waves that you disappear into and then reappear!! Awesome! We are entering the Impassable Canyon section. The river corridor is much tighter and steeper now and the climate is much more arid. We stopped briefly at Rattlesnake Creek camp and looked at Indian pictographs in the shallow cave. Pretty cool. Reached Survey Creek camp after the longest day I think, 24 miles of paddling. It is another great camp, Walter’s favorite. It faces a mountain across the creek. The weather is getting a tad warmer each day, so I pitched my tent next to the river so it would be cooler. I went up the hill and took photo's above the camp with Hunter and Marcel. (note to self….don’t drink two beers and hike up a cliff!) Ate prime rib, and drank now ice cold beer and for dinner! Maybe the second best meal of my life, right behind the Red Fish Cubion the night before! The toasted French Bread was very good as it has been the whole trip. While eating dinner we saw big horn ship running along the mountain across the river.. Too cool. It just don't get any better than this! Listened to the bubba's tell joke after joke until I was about the die laughing. Wish this could go on forever. To bed at around 10:00 PM, sundown... A truly unforgettable glorious day!
Tuesday, June 27th (Survey Creek to Tumble a.k.a. Stumble Creek) Breakfast of pancakes and sausage. Later I visited the toilet a.k.a. the "groover" and got a visit from two mule deer while I was doing my business! Too funny. Yet another never to be forgotten experience. Lots of big whitewater in store for the day. Really starting to notice that my paddling is improving and I’m very comfortable with the river. We had an early lunch at Elk Bar camp, a great lunch spot! Ran lots of class III+ and III- stuff today. Porcupine, Redside, Webber….all big rapids that we all ran super clean. Really getting in the groove with my paddling….feeling really fluid. We stopped at Parrot camp at mile 87.9 and walked up about 1/4 mile trail on river left to a beautiful grotto where there was a waterfall drops about 90 yards down a cliff. Simply unforgettable! Ran upper and lower Cliffside rapids clean and got to our last campsite on the river at mile 88.8. Tumble Creek a.k.a. Stumble Creek. This is a good site but not quite as scenic as some of the others. Dubbed "Stumble" Creek because of the rocks and ledge that we have to haul our gear over and up to get to the camp. However, most of the sites in the canyon are small and this is one of the larger sites. We feel lucky to get this site. I had cook duty tonight and helped prepare another great meal of chicken gumbo. Excellent! We all seemed to be on a mission to drink all of our beer and wine on our last night and we made a good dent in it! Wednesday, June 28th (Tumble Creek to Cache Bar takeout) Everyone is really on the ball today. You can tell we all have had a great time, but we are ready to wind it up. We are all packed and up even earlier than normal. One reason we are in a hurry is we want to beat the other groups to the takeout so we can avoid a big cluster of people, boats and gear. We had another great breakfast of eggs and bacon and took off. The river has one more big one in store. Rubber! The biggest wave/hole on the river. There’s really no sneak route that we could see so we pretty much had to hit the meat of the rapid. I came the closest to flipping in this rapid, however I braced hard and stayed upright. The last rapids were good class III's, but we all were so used to big stuff by now that we spread out and paddled many if not all of them alone. Rapids such as Hancock, Devil's Tooth, House Rock, and Jump Off all passed by in a blur as we approached the confluence with the main Salmon. Got to the main Salmon around 11:15….I took one last look up the Middle Fork river valley, an image I hope I will never forget. I can’t wait to get the opportunity to see it again. It should be called "the river of must return." The water in the main Salmon was a little browner and noticeably warmer. The river is also a little bigger/wider too since it has both the middle and north forks now.. There were a couple of class II and maybe a couple class II+ rapids before we got to Cache Bar. We arrived at Cache Bar (mile 99.7) right on time at noon. Surprisingly, for a while at least we were the only group there. Margaret the shuttle driver from River Rat Express was there waiting on us. She was surprised to see us arrive right on time. Cowper’s wife, Debbie drove up about 15 minutes after we arrived. (she had been on a week long solo trip to the Olympic Peninsula in Washington) We unloaded boats and broke down our gear for an hour or so. We had another great lunch of sandwiches, chips, cookies and fruit and said our good-byes. Everyone piled into their vehicles and took off. Some were heading for another permitted trip on the Selway river in Northeast Idaho, some were heading to Colorado to paddle on the way home and some were going sightseeing in Montana. The rest of us, the Boise crew settled in for a long drive. We saw a ram big horn sheep on the way out of the valley. (Margaret said it was very unusual to see a ram) I took a good photo as we were driving by. We stopped at the community of North Fork briefly to make phone calls and buy stuff then drove an hour or so to Stanley and ate dinner. Bought T-shirts in a good outfitter store next to the restaurant. Made it to Boise by 11:30 PM. Marcel and I again shared a room for the night.
Thursday June 29th Got up, caught the shuttle to the airport and came home via Salt Lake and DFW. Got home right on schedule!
THE GROUP Gordon Kumpuris, Little Rock, AR (Permit Holder) - kayak Walter Felton, El Dorado, AR - Trip Leader/Organizer – oar rig captain Gale Felton, El Dorado, AR - oar rig rider Hunter Brown, El Dorado, AR (age 8) – oar rig rider Roger Head, Newport, AR paddle raft captain Mark Brown, El Dorado, AR - paddle rafter Larry Crane, Little Rock, AR - paddle rafter Marcel Jones, Little Rock, AR - paddle rafter Lara Jones, North Little Rock - paddle rafter Tom Kennon, Ft. Smith, AR - paddle rafter Newton White, Hot Springs, AR - oar rig captain David Thrasher, Bentonville, AR – oar rig captain Mark Kruger, Bentonville, AR – oar rig rider Cowper Chadborn, Conway, AR – oar rig captain Ted Smethers, Hot Springs, AR – oar rig captain Paul Newton, Little Rock, AR – oar rig captain Kim Keller, Little Rock, AR – oar rig rider Bob Wiley, Jefferson City, MO – oar rig captain Dave Smallwood, St. Lois, MO oar rig captain Drake McNeery, St. Louis, MO – C-1 Lance Jones, North Little Rock, AR – kayak Ron Workman, Little Rock, AR – kayak Greg Churan, Little Rock, AR – kayak Dave Roberston, Ft. Smith, AR - kayak
Hi, Vince, Did you run the NF Boise Saturday, April 29? (YES I DID!) I was there with 4 other kayakers at the putin and one of them thought you were one of the cat-boaters. Hope you had a good day.
We had a fairly epic adventure. One of our boaters swam at that big river wide hole near the top of the "Miracle Mile". He got to shore quickly, but we had fun chasing the boat and paddle through the rapids. He hiked (and swam) most of the mile. All's well that ends well: we found boat, paddle, and even the float bag that disappeared.
Please let people know about the two logs that span the river. The first is about a mile or two above Black Rock or about 3 miles below Barber Flats. At the current flow (3400 cfs at Twin Springs on the MF Boise), we floated over it on river right. It will surely block the river when the flow decreases. The second was about 3 miles above the confluence with the Middle Fork. It was very fresh and very big. One of our boaters ran around it on river left, but a portage would be much safer. Otherwise, most deadfall seemed obvious and avoidable.
Brian McKinley
My partner, Darin, and myself decided to paddle ahead as we felt we neared the camp site. We made a poor judgement call by not telling the other two what our intentions were. We got way ahead. We were tired. All of our first aid and survival gear was behind us, up stream in the raft. We paddled through a no-name class II rapid rock garden. Darin side-swiped a submerged rock which knocked him over. He made a couple of roll attempts and finally rolled up. When I paddled up to him he turned his head and told me he hit a rock. There was a huge laceration (3"x1") above his left eyebrow! It looked like someone hit him in the head with an ax. Lots of blood. I assessed his level of consciousness (eg. person, place, day, event, history, etc.) for several minutes. It was stable. Visual tracking was good. Left eye vision good. Bony palpation around the eye was in tact. Cervical spine and upper extremity alignment/function was normal. Upper extremity sensation was normal.
We then ran a big class III called "Artillary". We had to wait a long time for the other two to catch up. What if they had troubles? What if they had to pull over and camp without us? We decided to wait until it was almost dark, if no-one showed we'd paddle to the hot springs for warmth that night. They showed up, and we all made the hot springs before dark. We cleansed his wound with soap and water, then Betadine scrub, then packed and compressed the wound to slow the bleeding. I had a syringe with Lidocane which was injected to the edges of the wound to numb it. Then, with firelight and flashlight illumination, I used a surgical grade needle and thread to suture the wound closed. Since we had two days of whitewater left, I covered the wound with Tegaderm to water proof it. This worked quite effectively in keeping the stitches dry.
The lesson for us was three-fold: (1) stay together, communicate (2) keep a thoroughly stocked medical kit with you, and keep up with 1st aid training and swift water rescue techniques. (3) don't get knocked over in a rock garden.
Chip S.
3-12-2000 Report:
Jerry , Scott and I just got back from a lower 7 run on the NF Payette. 1st TIME OUT FOR THE YEAR! Scott popped up pretty big at Jaws1, thought his 2000 season was going to be off to a rough start, but he beat gravity just in time.
The Boicatr
Monday, April 10, 2000 00-131 - Canyon lands NP (UT) - Boating Accident On April 6th, William and Mary Muth of Wenatchee, Washington, headed down the Green River in an aluminum canoe on an extended boating trip. They passed through the confluence of the Green and Colorado Rivers, but failed to recognize this significant geographical feature. Several miles further down the river, the Muths saw a large sign warning of the dangerous rapids in Cataract Canyon "2 ½ miles" ahead. They employed their river map to determine their location and concluded that they were at Bonita Bend, 31 miles above the confluence. They assumed that the sign had originally said that the rapids were "32 ½" miles ahead and that the "3" had been removed from the sign by vandals. They proceeded down the river and soon heard the sound of "Brown Betty," a Class III rapid. They were unable to get their canoe to shore, so quickly donned their lifejackets - a life-saving decision, as they soon ended up in the 54-degree water and floated through "Brown Betty" and two additional rapids before being able to swim to shore on opposite sides of the river. Their canoe, food, water and equipment floated away. The Muths hiked three-and-a-half miles upstream until the encountered a motorboat being operated by Tex's Riverways, a park concessionaire. The Muths were reunited and evacuated from the canyon. Neither was injured
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