the best worst idea ever (part two coming when i get the chance)
the resurrection river starts about 45 or so miles north of seward. it is fed by glacial and mountain runoff, a large portion of it from the harding icefield, the huge icefield that covers tons of the interior of the kenai peninsula. the river and feeds into resurrection bay, where seward is located. there is a trail that goes from seward up the resurrection river trail all the way to kooper landing, and then another trail that goes over resurrection pass all the way to the town of hope.
exit glacier, which feeds into the resurrection river, is about 8 miles up a turnoff you take right before the seward highway reaches seward. the river at that point is broken into many streams, some deep, some narrow. it looks like your average typical glacier fed river up here in alaska, as far as i've seen them. since the water comes from glaciers and runoff, it is not many degrees above freezing.
we put our rowboat in at a turnoff about 7 miles up the road to exit glacier. there were four of us, me, dave and mike from idaho, and aaron, my partner in adventure from ohio who i met in spain. we'd all made haste in finishing with work so that we could get out there, it was about 5:30 or so. after throwing on raincoats and grabbing our rented oars, we quickly scurried across the road carrying our boat, wobbled it down a steep little hill, and threw it in the water. i sat in front left, aaron in front right, mike in back left and dave in back right. we had the cooler of beer, a few bottles of water, some disposable cameras, and a slight inkling that this wasn't the best of ideas. that, however, did not stop us.
after scraping against some rocks barely concealed below the water, we were underway. i was very glad that i'd worn my sandals, for dave quickly found out that his shoes in back managed to soak up the water and to freeze his feet. aaron too was remiss at his choice of footware, and in his usual nonchalent manner he took of his not-so-waterproof berkenstocks and tied them to the rope on the bow of our dingy.
it didn't take us long to find some sort of a rhythm, with any of us calling out "hard left" or "right reverse." i looked around at the river valley we were floating not to slowly down and wondered at the glacial forces that had carved it out, at the trees and chutes of snow still visible in what was now july. there were the green colors of summer mixed with the greys of the rocks and white of the surrounding snow, all of us were smiling, and i told aaron that this was a bang up idea.
as the streams merged and diverged, we had to make decisions on which ones to follow. i would stare hard at the water ahead, trying to guess which white tipped water was capping because of the fastmoving currents connecting and which was doing so because the rocks were about 8 inches underneath. every once in a while we'd scrape on something, and we'd laugh and look at each other, only the slightest bit nervous but not really at all. the tiny crack in the bottom of the boat was covered up by some styrafoam that we kept our feet on, but i could see the water in the bottom of out dingy building up ever so slowly.
we came around a turn and some exposed rocks jumped up right in front of us. our boat ground to a halt against them, and mike was the first to hop out and try and get us moving again. it became apparent that we'd have to lift her up and move her a bit downstream, just 10 meters to the a faster moving current that should be deeper. we stood around on the exposed rocks looking at our boat and at each other, and decided to drink a beer. it was a great moment, there's nothing like a cool hamms in alaska with good buddies, a river, and a mostly seaworthy boat. we took some pictures of each other and then pushed her back in.
for a while it was smooth sailing, although every once in a while we'd scrape a bit on the bottom. usually the current would pull the back of the boat around and swing us into a 360, an event we found quite humorous. dave laughing from behind me made me laugh as well, then i'd see the next turn we'd have to make and i'd yell "everyone forward!"
up ahead there was a fork in the flow we were in, and it was clear that we'd either have to paddle like hell to go left to avoid a drop off and what may be unknown rocks underneath, or else just push into it and hope for the best. the option of beaching and portaging around crossed my mind, and i mentioned it, but we really were moving too fast and aaron yelled "go for it!" so i left to the paddle and we forged ahead at the drop off.
going off of it was fun, and not hearing out boat scrape against the bottom was a relief, but then a second later water rushed in and filled the boat halfway up. suddenly we were very sluggish in the water. the tops of the sides less then a foot from the surface, we managed to get her safely to a bank on the right side. mike and aaron jumped out to pull her ashore, and as i went to do the same i dropped my paddle. it floated away down water, and aaron ran along the bank right behind it. as the bank ended he was faced with the choice of jumping in or not, and he chose not to, which made perfect sense at the time. i was mad at myself for losing the paddle, but figured maybe it would washup somewhere and i'd retrieve it. otherwise, it couldn't cost more then 30 bucks for the oar, right?
we dumped out our boat and put back in, me grabbing a paddle from in back and stroking furiously, trying to catch up to the lost oar, which proved to be a lost cause. it had the advantage of not weighing much and greater boyancy, so the closest current carried it out of our lives. plus we had to try and avoid shallow channels, a task at which we were having an increasingly harder time with. there was only one oarsman in back, so the other person took to shouting instructions and sightseeing.
after what had to have been at least 4 miles and several more 360's, we picked a wrong stream and wound up beached again. this gave us the opportunity for another beer break, and mike prodded me into trying out a skill he has hands down perfected, that of shotgunning a can of cold brew. i did pretty good, finishing almost all of the can in a mere few seconds. mike was pleased.
so our options sitting on that rock bar were this: we could put in on the right, into fast moving water that came to a right elbow in a mere 30 meters, or carry the boat over to the left, into a channel that looked almost too shallow. we opted for the right. in the bend of the elbow, there was some trees sticking out over the water, and then a pileup of branches that had been collected for some time and reminded me of a beaver nest.