Photos courtesy of Scott Harcke Collection. (c)
July 3 2008
"Yeah, and we've got AIR HORNS!"
Well, here we are. Only tens of miles from the official start of the mighty Alsek River. The last (and only) other person to go into this river in midsummer flows (August in comparison to our July) was the man who first paddled the canyon...The Man himself. Walt Blackadar. His flows were certainly higher than ours, and he was on his own. Wow. To be in such a densely populated bear habitat, let alone the burliness-ness of the river itself...
The road up here was long, but gorgeous. Drove from Hood River (after runs of the Little White of course) to the border, then up to theStewart-Cassiar Highway to the Stikine River for camp. Estimated Stikine flow at approx. 35-50,000 cfs. Hiked from Willy's Camp (ranch) to entry falls. About six miles one way. Well maintained, beautiful trail. Entry was massive! Huge pourover in the middle, which is usually a huge rock that juts about ten feet out of the water (when you want to run the canyon) Lots of bugs here. Cant wait to come back at the right flow and catch that one.
Getting back to the here and now, camping on an ancient glacial wash. Huge mountains on both sides of us, surely to get taller and taller as the trip goes on. On the way up here, I was very apprehensive about the whole trip. At times, utterly terrified of the evil things that could happen to us if we were to drop into the canyon. Particularly when it so far up here, with many factors and variables that could bring the trip to its knees. (and us too) But, as my eyes have reminded me many times already, this trip is about the place and the experience of paddling through some of the most rugged terrain that this planed holds. That is why I'm here, and why I'm putting on with the boys tomorrow.
July 4
"Dude, I'm fucking fired up about some riffles right now"
River day 1. Put on in a beautiful canyon on the Dezadeash after a slow, leasurly breakfast. Put on time was approx. 9:30 am. Shortly after putting on, we found the strength of the winds ripping up the canyon from the pacific. After the Dezedeash/Kuskawalsh/Glacial Creek Trifluence, we had a little snack and had a safety meeting in a sick, open and windy spot. I remember being stoked to see some riffles and moving current. Paddled approx 50 miles in around 8 hours. LONG day of flatwater. The Dagger Green Boat would've been the craft of choice here. Stopped for a long lunch/nap about halfway through. Currently camped at Lowell Glacier. Just across the river, we occasionally hear a thunderous crack coming from a calving berg, or a slide/shift inside the glacier itself. Hard to tell which, due to the distance from us to the snout of the glacier...by the time we hear something, it's already settled. This glacieris MASSIVE! Supposedly 35 miles long, one mile wide. Massive. Gorgeous. Incredible terrain all around us, opposite the glacier (across the river and beyond our camp) is a beautiful red/gray wall with two beautiful silver waterfalls plummeting down each side of the cliff (left and right). Had a lot of time to think about a few things on the flats.
Time spent here is the most incredible healing potion I can imagine. This place heals/erases all those exterior woes of "reality." When, in a funny way, none of that is ‘real.' At least it seems such a hilariously sad idea of what is ‘real' when you compare it to this reality.
Here, ones mind is so focused on soaking in all in, not missing one second, that you have no more brain capacity to think about that stuff. When you do, all that comes into your brain is truth. Though many perspectives meld into one overbearing outlook on any situation, places like these allow the mind to weed out all that nonsense, leaving you with only what makes sense. "9 times out of 10," my dad has over and again told me, "the answer that makes the most sense is the one that is the truth."
On the same coin, it's funny when my mind keeps going back to what I'm gonna do when I get back home. Happiest in the woods, but once there, the ‘real world' keeps creeping back in. Like a bad dream that you don't want to relive, it pulls me back into the thought process of "get home, make sure you make it out of this so you can get home..." When these thoughts arise, I push them away by focusing on the here and now. Can't do anything to prepare for what I know nothing about.
Tell you what though, one of the first things I will do when I get home is play with my dog, Zudnik. For hours and hours.
Back here, Mt. Blackadar and Turnback Canyon await many a mile downstream. About 50% of the time, it drizzles here...woah! Huge boom just now as the glacier shifted.
Interesting note: there is so much silt in the Alsek, brought in via the Kuskawalsh Glacial River, that you can constantly hear a fairly loud hiss, sometimes loud enough to be distracting! Sounds a bit like the fizzing of aerated water, but there is no aeration here. You look down and literally see all the silt particles knocking up against each other. Hold ablade of your paddle in the water, listen near the shaft and its like listening to a conk shell that hisses instead of making wave noises. strange! Amazing the power and weight of this water. Truly humbled and nervous.
July 5
Pat:
"I wonder if it has a name...what should we call it?"
Austin:
"Da Dome"
"The glaciers...the river creators...The Ultimate River Gods"
Mellow day. Woke up late (as usual) to Scott and Austin chatting beside the breakfast fire. Water level rose ~6 in. When a river is nearly 100 yards wide, six inches is a whole lot of water. Slow breakfast and morning, as we were thoroughly enjoying the epicosity of such a sick place. Listening to the glacier shift and groan is mesmerizing. Like the most massive of all Jurassic Park style footprints. Nature's largest machines, ‘the canyonmakers.' They can change climates and create the sickest of rivers...In a way, the gods to all rivers and the kayakers that float down them. We hiked a ways up the Goatherd Mountain (cliff behind our camp) to see the fountain peaks (Kennedy, Lowell Massif, Da Dome) over 40 miles away. Mt. Kennedy loomed in the distance, slightly left. Amazing rock formations on the Goatherd. While upthere, I asked Harcke to sketch out a quick drawing of our incredible view, which turned out very well. Lunch atop the terminal moraine pile beside camp, which was formed during the final throws of Lowell's last great surging period, where the Lowell Glacier actually dammed up the Alsek, backing it up and creating a lake that put Haines Junction (50 miles upstream) under 150 feet of water. After lunch, we again hit the water. The amounts of silt in the river went down noticeably from here, due to the massive and clean inflow of the Lowell Glacier, followed by the moderate stagnance of the water in Lowell Lake. Incredible paddling around that lake, eyes working overtime to soak in as much as possible of the beautiful bergs and views surrounding us. BERGS! Beautiful, captivating and dangerous. So blue, so smooth to the touch. Giving the biggest bergs ‘plenty of space,' I quietly moved my way to the exit of the lake.
Beautiful waterfalls (2 separate creeks) on river Left, just downstream of the Lowell Lake. Saw a lone Golden Eagle here.
The Lava rapids are awesome. Sadly, the only two things that could be considered rapids thus far. The first is a boulder garden wash, with big waves (and one big hole) in the middle. The second of the two (and the most dangerous) starts similarly to #1, but then the current moves right as the river takes a large bend to the left. Midway down this rapid there is a massive hole, that reminded me of a backwards Phils Hole from the Ottawa. Just downstream of this large wave-hole is another huge pourover, threatening to give anyone who messes up the first move a nasty swim. Cruising in, none of us saw either of these holes till we were right on top of them. Luckily, we all got left just in time to miss the reverse Phils, and therefore skirted the pourover with ease. Tell you what, it felt great to be in the rapids, feelingout the flow...and there's PLENTY!
Shortly after the Lava Rapids and just downstream of the Bates Creek gauge, we caught up to a raft team camped near the Fischer Glacier. Nice folks. Gave us some extra food. Carried on a few more miles to find our own sweet secluded camp on river right, with some sick mountains and hanging glaciers downstream and an ultra sick copper/reddish/gold mountain just upstream of us, across the river. Beautiful creek and mini glacier on base of same mountain. Just upstream, a fun little hole with eddy service. Did some surfing and hole punching...really got to feel how heavy the water is here. Scott had my breakdown paddle duct taped to the outside of his kayak... "Its mostly flatwater...it'll be fine" ...Haha. Famous last words. While he was surfing the wave-hole, the water ripped the paddle free, to sink to the bottom for it's own permanent rock grinder session. Oh well. River rose another three inches since we got here, but flow feels in right range. Ready to have a girl laying next to me...ah the lonely life of a traveling kayaker.
Stoked about Harcke's dream realization...
"Hey Pat, remember that dream that I told you about, where the flow was of the Alsek and the gradient of the Stikine?...it was right here!!!"
-just downstream of the Fischer Glacier and Bates Creek.
~And yeah, I could have tried and devoted my life to both ofus,
wont waste a my time when the world we had was yours...
So break me down if it makes you feel right
And hate me now if it keeps you all right
You can break me down if it takes all your might
Cause I'm so much more than meets the eye."
-Seether's Breakdown. Had it stuck in my head for themajority of the trip.
July 6
"You have to think of things here on a ‘great' scale"
-Austin
Morning Entry:
Drizzle for hours this morning. Sleeping a top an ancientmoraine so the ground is very rocky and packed down. Tent stakes only went in a little ways, and kept coming out through the night. Resorted to rocks keeping some of them in the ground. Not a heavy drizzle, but one that's made me not want to get up and start the day just yet. Can't imagine that the water level has dropped much (probably kept coming up). Glacial flow seems delayed by about two days or more, so the warm temps of the past few days are cranking it up. Hope we don't have too much at Turnback, cause we sure have shit tons right now! Big volume! Interesting dreams last night, where I was in a kayak race, and suddenly decided to throw away my paddle and bare hand the rest of the race. Also some mountain biking in there, and some friends talking about a past girlfriend. Interesting.
We'll be making a push for the entrance to Turnback today. Gonna soak it up as much as I can, and just enjoy being here.
Evening Entry:
How to describe one of the most beautiful thoughts imaginable...hmm. Let me start where I left off this morning. Finally motivated to get out of my personal climate control device (tent) after the drizzle abated a bit. Austin and Scott started to move around in preparations for the morning fire. New fire spot today, in the sand hole downstream of camp. Found some dry wood under a large pile of rock-fall. Noticed crater/impact marks of one particularly large rocks, as it freed itself from it's greater self (mountain) and came a tumbling on down. One bounce mark to the next measured 48 feet by pacing!
Feel so right to be out here. So simple. Competitions are very fun, and were great for getting to where I am now, but this is as good as life gets.
Got a super late start (2:30) on the river. Windy, cold and drizzling for much of the afternoon.
Highlights: Somewhere near the Lava Rapids, A large Golden Eagle soared as we floated by, using a large buttress in the cliff as a wind eddy. He would gracefully peel out, catching the wind that was ripping around the buttress, soar around with the wind-flow, do a slow wind-eddy-turn just behind the buttress, gaining altitude, then blast back out into the wind for another epic peel out. As I was floating away from him and the buttress, he kept peeling out further and further. As he would peel out, blasting back into my sight, I would holler at him, vicariously reveling in his dance with the wind. It seemed he was keeping us in sight, possibly wondering what the hell we were doing, and yelling about, way down below in the cold river...maybe he knew that I was shouting out praises to him for such an amazing action, and showing me more and more as I paddled out of sight.
The view and the lighting at Mt. Blackadar was epic! Hanging glaciers on Blackadar in the background, with one massive ray of sunshine, heightened by the perma-drizzle, giving the place a heavenly glow. The beam of light was only about 300 yards wide, but placed ever so perfectly at the base of the peak, where the creek that originates on the gorgeous blue glaciers on the flanks of the peak, dumps its waters into the mighty Alsek. It almost seemed as if the sunrays were bouncing off the glacial creek and wash at the base, reflecting up the mountain and accenting the already deep blues of the seracs and crevasses of the hanging glacier. Absolutely incredible blues. Its funny how in the most wonderful times like these, sometimes you don't even think to take out the video camera, but in hindsight... Scott, on the other hand, was a bit smarter in the documenting department than i, and was able to get some sweet shots. Needless to say, we floated along with our jaws way down in our cockpits, reveling in the beauty of such an epic place. We stopped for a lunch break in a tiny eddy/rock outcropping just downstream of this creek and the massive pillow, where the river takes a sharp right turn around the foot of the massive Mt. Blackadar.
Epic surf wave! Best one I've found for just chilling in a creek-boat in years. Perfect little triangular guy, about three and a half feet tall, great bowl shaped trough, so your bow would stay up at all times! My dad always talks about how much fun he had surfing waves in big old creekboats, and I chuckled to myself about how much he'd love this wave. I was sitting perfectly still, yet the water was speeding by underneath me so quickly! Was having the time of my life. Fun wave-holes, boils, and seams riddled the river left below here, as the Alsek slowly cut its route around the base of Mt. Blackadar.
First view of Tweedsmuir was insane! Got out to film Austin floating by and as I was waiting for Harcke to come around the corner, I was allowed to witness another of natures beauties, a delightful little rainbow. Got a quick shot of this before heading downstream towards camp.
One could easily float on by the campsite while staring at the large hanging glacier coming in from the left, if it wasn't for the intensely foreboding canyon created by the Tweedsmuir coming in on the rightand the Noisy range on the left. We knew right where to stop...
The Tweedsmuir Glacier is the most incredible river-making machine I've ever seen.
Chris, one of the guides we met here at the Tweedsmuir Glacier camp, said that last year they weren't able to see the glacier from camp. Now, only a year and 328 feet later, it's surging and CALVING into the river. Amazing. Not more than five minutes will go buy before there's a "small" thundering splash, where a baseball-to-car sized chunk will fall in - slow motion style - creating a thunderous boom, an epic splash, and a massive wave.I saw one fall in that was easily the size of a small garage, stacked vertically!!! Really hope to be far away from any big chunks of ice if we run the canyon. The entrance to Turnback, by the way, is horrifically ominous. The glacier's snout extends into the water just upstream of the canyon entrance, called the Pearly Gates. The glacier hasn't yet made the climb over the river right wall of the canyon, but the reality of the matter is that the whole right wall from camp all the way to the canyon is the unstable and incredibly dangerous glacier.
All the ice chunks and water converge and drop into the canyon and out of sight. So much water! So much ice! After checking out the canyon opening, I chilled alone near the top of the bluff (out of the wind) and watched the glacier. Thought about it. Thought about 'me'. Thought about the river. Thought about my family a bit. Gladly, not too much else. Really wish my dad could be here to see this. He and my mom would love this kind of trip. They would be rocking the raft support option, of course. Been thinking a lot about what I want to do with my life after I get out of here,and how kayaking will fit in. I know I can't keep going on trips like this, spending more money than I'm bringing in. Real world calling, and it's a frightening alarm that I don't want to wake up to just yet.
All in all, I want to be able to continue kayaking for the love of kayaking. Hopefully in places such as this or California every now and then. Damn, what a wonderful life this is.
Beautiful new sea anemone-esque flowers here. Don't have anything else to say.
‘Till tomorrow!
July 7
How does one weigh the options of something so terrifying? I know for a fact that I can leave this place, fully stoked on the trip and the experience as a whole - even having not run the canyon. On the other hand, how does one simply let something this wild, this amazing and this inaccessible - go without giving it a try? There are two things about this trip that no one has attempted since Blackadar's INCREDIBLE run of the canyon.
1. July/August summer high water flows
2. Tweedsmuir Glacier is surging, which adds a whole differentelement to running the canyon
The canyon. Roaring in the distance, calling...but also sounds like a warning siren. Still haven't seen the rapids. Just the entrance of the S-turns. Very first rapid. "It gets way gnarlier downstream." Alaska Discovery raft guide Chris tells us. Scared to drop in, scared to turn back and forever wonder if I/we could've made it. If the rest is anything like what we saw at the Pearly Gates. I know I can run those rapids. I'm pretty sure I can fight my way down with the ice in rapids such as those (minus the random huge ice chunk). But if the rapids get gnarlier, then I just don't know about that much ice.
This shit is the most dangerous form I've ever seen a river take on. The water amount, the size of the boils, seams and whirlpools is terrifying enough. Add ice to the mix and it's like dropping in with a huge piece of shrapnel and a hand grenade duct taped to your boat. Austin, after a moment of what must've been deep introspection mixed with sheer terror said, "It'd be like putting five in the chamber and playing Russian Roulette."
I agree with his notion. The chances of all three of us making it through that minefield of terror are very slim. One person - the odds get better.
Ice Worries: berg sandwich, berg/wall sandwich, berg upwelling underneath my boat -flipping and exposing me to whatever else is close enough to do damage, etc, etc.
Small bergs, in schools of tens or twenties move though every few seconds could crash down on top of us as we ender a hole of crashing wave - knocking us silly or taking us out completely. The ice could also break a paddle or easily pop a spray-skirt. All options could be deadly.
I just don't know. If the rapids look awesome downstream, I might give ‘er a go. Not to try and put myself up with Blackadar. I know that I am no Walt Blackadar. If I run this thing, it'll be because I've weighed the options tomorrow and I've found it to be fun-as-hell looking and want to get me some action. If that's the case I'll load up that chamber and see what happens .Funny feeling or anything weird, and I'm out right then and there. So simple. Go in, or go straight home...yet so difficult a decision. Haven't seen all the rapids yet, so I just don't know. I'll make that call after the Heli-Scout tomorrow. Sick scenery today. The clouds parted a bit and we were given an epic view of the surrounding peaks, from Blackadar (just upstream and on River Left), the St. Elias Range across the river (where Tweedsmuir originates) and the Noisy Range downstream River Left. Witnessed four MASSIVE calvings today. Two were at least the size of a very large barn, stacked vertically. One sent ice, rocks, and some very confused droplets of water all the way up on the rocks on the other side of the river, easily three hundred feet across. The amount of ice continuously going into that canyon is ridiculous. From where they calve off, they have about a half mile of tumbling and rolling (or floating i funder the size of a VW Bug) Every 20 seconds to a minute, it seemed, a piece would float through that would gobble up a Smart Car or VW Bug, ranging to the size of a large living room. 20 seconds. Those are scary. The really terrifying part, though, was the continuous run of small bergs that would drop into the gorge absolutely continuously. Only saw one gap of more than five seconds without any form of ice in the time I was there, but there still could've been plenty underwater and out of sight. Just don't know if that's a risk that I'm willing to take. Either way, I can't think of a more epic place than right here, right now.
Live life as best you can.
Go out into wild places such
as this whenever possible -
Cause there are fewer and fewer
of these places. See, experience,
Live it up. Beautiful places, a
Clear mind and unlimited fun await.
Go get it!
July 8
BOOM!...BOOM! Icebergs calving off the surging Tweedsmuir woke me up several times throughout the night. I don't normally remember my dreams very well, but I do remember a short one that I had last night, some timein the wee hours of the morning..
I can recall being at home. It felt like I was doing something really fun previously, or I was just stoked about the sense of being home after a long trip. I looked to my long time best friend and Alsek trip companion, Scott Harcke. He smiled, and after a moment said these very words, "You know, I think the Pat of old probably would've run that canyon a few weeks ago, but I'm glad you didn't." Somewhere around this point, I realized that I was dreaming because I had no recollection of scouting the canyon from the helicopter. I woke up briefly, rolled over and went back to sleep.
Thwock Thwock Thwock went my wake up call this morning. As Daniel DeLaVergne once so eloquently put it, "The reality of the here and now set in..." A very serious decision had to be made today, and I tried hard as I could not to let my mind wander into that realm of never-ending speculation. Doug got his business with the Alaska Discovery guys done first, and we were intrigued that he'd brought two older, but very strong and adept guys with him. I believe that their names were Nevel and Tom. Only four spare seats in a Bell Jet Ranger III. Three of us...pilot...two others...hmm.
After he finished with the raft portages, Doug opened the doors to his multiple-hundreds-of-thousands-of-dollar helicopter for our scout. Like Mike King before our Mosley Creek Expedition in 05, Mackonnen was ice cold all the way through the canyon. Very few words. We knew that he was the man around here, the person who could get down farther into the danger zone of the Alsek Canyon than anyone else... If we could find a place to stop and get out consciously, we had about as safe of a set up as you could ask for out here...but still there would be nothing he could do for us if we were injured in the flow.
Still, there was the ice. In the initial flight downstream, I was holding the camera out, but looking through the window, not the viewfinder, at the rapids. The flow looked awesome. All manageable except (in my eyes) the largest, scariest rapid. Undoubtedly the rapid Blackadar famously named, "The Hair...like riding down the back of a coiled rattler, striking at you from all sides." My eyes scanned over all the massive curlers in the initial hallway, watching as all the curlers led into a boiling pit, feeding into a massive hole where the river kings slightly to the right, then back to the left. Left side has an absolutely massive hole, backed up by what could be a terminal eddy. The river right is all huge boils (after the curlers) it wrapped back left. Occasionally there was a curler in the right of center that may've kicked you into an entirely different terminal eddy, just downstream of the kink on the right. Fine line. I think it was below this that we flew over what could've been the "Roller" Blackadar described in his journal entries. Taking up three quarters of the width of the river was a boily ledge hole/pourover thing, which could become absolutely horrific with any more flow, but water was going out and around on either side. Just had to be on it to get out of the main flow and around that monster. All in all, the rapids looked fucking great! After the first fly through, I was in. Saw more and more problems as we went back upriver, though. Not only was I looking at the rapids, I was keeping a close eye out for ice. You know, seeing this brings a whole new meaning to the idea of "water freight training down the river." The current itself is strong enough, now throwing tens of thousands of chunks of ice in the mix and you have something entirely different. We came here, three ambitious youngsters who wanted to see the Alsek as it was seen through the eyes of Blackadar on his legendary run. If what he paddled that day some thirty four some odd years ago, in a fiberglass kayak...if what he saw that day was anything like what we saw today - of which I have little doubt - Blackadar did something incredible in that canyon. "Runnable" and "Unrunnable" have been interesting terms to watch as I've been growing up. In the creeking world, and the waterfall realm, the bar keeps getting raised, year after year. I believe on that day in August 1971, upon fighting his way out of that canyon, with massive volume, ice, and extremely cold all working against him, Walt Blackadar set the bar far higher than I'd ever imagined, even after i grew up with the knowledge of who he was in the kayaking world. He raised the bar to a level that not in my dreams could I reach. Nor did I want to jump from my platform of comfort, to try and grab ahold of that bar. In water like this, advances in technology (although helpful) will make very little difference in the long run. Today, at least for our little expedition/mission into this wonderful place, Turnback Canyon has lived up to its name.
From the point that I got on the helicopter heading back to Haines Junction, the rest of the day was filled to the brink with the natural elation of simply being alive.
I'll leave you with a quote that Doug left with us...
"Why do climbers go straight up big (mountain) faces?...
So when they get to the top they can listen to the windwhistle through the holes in their head."
-Doug Mackonnen
Thanks for reading. hope you enjoyed and have been motivated for an adventure in the woods...no matter how small or short.
Good Lines,
Pat Keller