Despite a year back in the real world doing my PGCE (post-graduate certificate of education) I had the bug to go adventuring again. A fantastic opportunity presented itself when an old rowing friend from Trinity (Dan Darley) mentioned that he was organising a whitewater rafting trip in Alaska. Basically we were to rent rafts and kit, load them up with supplies then float approx. 200km down a river through uninhabited national park to the Pacific Ocean. Though it was expensive, it was an opportunity that I couldn't possibly miss. In the end, our group comprised 7 people. 'Colonel' Darley had done an amazing amount of organising and everything was waiting for us.
I had done my level best to miss out on the holiday by taking a self-inflicted tumble on a scree-slope in the Lake District 2 weeks before we set off. This left me with a large hole in my leg and had necessitated a visit to 2 different hospitals and a total of 15 stitches. Fortunately the stitches were removed the day before we left.
Getting there is no simple thing and a series of flights on ever-smaller planes was necessary. First up was to New York on a 767, This was followed by another across to Seattle on a 757. American airports being crap, this flight left an hour late leading to a bit of a panic on the next changeover to a flight on a 737 to Juneau. However, Seattle is of course also an American airport so this flight also left 1 hr late leaving us with plenty of time. Finally, at 2am we arrived in Juneau. This town, population 30,000, is unbelievably, the state capital. The reason being that it was the only port in Alaska that doesn't ice over in the winter. Anchorage is larger but virtually cut-off from the world in winter, which was a problem in the pre-aviation era. Without wishing to be too rude about the British public in general, Alaska is my sort of place having a population of approx. 600,000 and an area of 1,500,000 square km. I.e. fewer than one person per square km. The UK (admittedly a wonderful, but badly overcrowded place) has 100 times the population in an area less than one sixth of this and thus you will find some 250 people in an average square km. (Somewhere in Leicestershire perhaps?)
Overall map of Alaska. Look for Juneau and Haines in the bottom right. Note that many of the 'significant towns' on this map have populations of about 1,000!
Zoom in of the bit around Haines showing places of interest [yellow circles] nad our route [purple] down the 'Tat.
The final flight on our journey left at 8am the following morning. The rich City-boys in our group booked themselves into a hotel but the airport floor sufficed for 4 of us. After maybe 3 hours of sleep it was time for our first proper American experience so we rolled into 'Donna's Diner' and had a suitably large and lardy breakfast.
Our final flight would be in two 6-seater planes from Juneau to Haines - a village of 1,500 people that would be our base. We had paid slightly extra for this flight in order to fly over an outstandingly beautiful area known as Glacier Bay. The weather was mixed with low cloud and the scenic flight was not looking promising. However, my weather curse seemed to lift and took the clouds with it as we approached the major area. This is a place where a large number of glaciers roll down from the mountains and reach the sea. Some of them are several km wide and the wall of ice that reaches the sea can be over 100m tall! Every so often a piece of ice the size of large building breaks off and floats away.
First of many enormous glaciers!
Our flight took us up over one glacier which we followed right up above the remaining clouds and above the snowline onto a massive ice-field. Some of the surrounding mountains are over 4,000m and we got right close to many of them including one semi-active volcano which was smoking impressively. On some of the ice-fields were lakes of meltwater. They had the typical alluring aquamarine colour of glacial meltwater, but at 0 degrees C would have not beeen quite so nice at first hand!
Particularly stunning shot of the bay itself
And again showing the size of some of these mountains. To get a scale you should note that some of the icebergs which appear as dots are still the size of buildings.
It was a geographer's dream as we even saw a volcano.
The last part of the flight followed a steep-sided narrow valley that started off as glacier and became river and led to the tiny unmanned airstrip that serves Haines. We checked into our motel and picked up all the kit we had pre-ordered from REI. It was just like Christmas - a frenzy of opening. Another quality American meal preceded a much-needed early night.
Nice shot of the site of Haines. Not exactly a megalopolis!
We were up early, too early, for the drive to the "put-in". This included crossing a proper Border Control into Canada. We would not be re-entering the States in such a formal manner! The journey was largely along the Haines highway - an offshoot of the famous Alaska highway. This is a quite remarkable road that has been driven through utter wilderness and goes all the way from mainland America through Canada into Alaska and pushes on to Anchorage, which is a very long way indeed. I imagine it must be considered a pretty vital access route as surely the cost of it compares pretty unfavourably with its usage. It is not entirely empty, as I recall passing several pick-ups and at least one SUV (basically an American 4x4). However, I suspect that it has been a long time since the road has seen what a European might call a 'car'. Alaskans have both a lot of space and a lot of oil so can't see the point of driving something weighing less than 3 tonnes or having less than 5 litres of engine capacity. Apparently, some of the newer ones even manage several miles to the gallon.
The final part of the journey went down a fairly steep dirt track to the river. We were told to get out of the vehicles and walk down as apparently the smaller weight makes the driving safer. I can't believe our weight made any significant difference but perhaps we were lighter than your average Alaskan.
Our first experience of constructing and loading up the entire raft was about to begin. We were to get much better at this. The system has been honed over many years of rafting and everything has its allocated place on the raft. Often this reveals its additional purpose. Whilst the washing-up buckets doubled up as balers, the fridge moonlighted as a rowing seat and we were soon to discover that what we had considered to be simply oars were in fact integral parts of the tarpaulin system.
There had been a bit of confusion from the guy off from whom we were renting the kit as to whether we'd fit everything onto 2 rafts. In the end we found that we did, although it was quite a tight fit. On enquiring as to why he had doubted we'd fit in everything, the reply was brilliant: "Well, I guess with you guys being British and all, I was assuming you'd have a lot more beer." Blair's support for the Iraq war notwithstanding, rarely can America have offered the UK such high praise.
Setting up the boats
Tight fit! Where are we going to put the 4 passengers?
Final shot in civilisation
Anyway, off we pushed with our puny 5 slabs of beer and a few bottles of spirits. Despite us being further north than the top of Scotland, it was warm and sunny though the water temperature was somewhat more Arctic. The river at this stage was flowing relatively gently, at perhaps 1 metre per second and was still quite narrow; varying from approx 20 - 50m wide. The triviality of the river still did not prevent the first encounter with an overhanging tree - ooh, maybe 200m after pushing off. The first grounding occurred soon after. Auspicious stuff.
It was really quite hot at first. Note the other raft in the background about to have another 'tree experience'.
Things were about to get more interesting as we entered what is known as "The Canyon". This stretch of river is the most technically demanding on the entire course of the 'Tat. Helpfully, it is encountered on Day 1, but this would only represent a problem for people lacking in whitewater experience... D'oh.
The banks of the river began to get steeper and water began to flow faster with rocks and whitewater becoming more evident. Here we were. The previous evening Colonel Darley had mused that there was a reasonable chance that we might flip one of the 2 rafts but we were damned if it was going to be our one. Despite some occasional disputes, sorry, 'communication problems', we remained pleasantly upside up. There were still 'moments'; the finest being perhaps where Rich (piloting) calmly announced "hold on guys, we're going to smash into this rock hard". This seemed like a reasonable suggestion but the boats handle controlled, head-on crashes remarkably well and we escaped with an elastic collision.
Starting to enter 'The Canyon'
The two boats tend to become somewhat separated whilst going through this sort of water but we still got occasional views of comedy crashes on their boat. It is amazing how easy it is to spot rocks upriver of you that are totally (and pleasingly) invisible looking dowstream. In a slightly calmer patch we managed to meet up again, but were somewhat surprised to see the other boat looking considerably less than riverworthy. One of the 4 airtight sections on the boat was completely airless and another was decidedly saggy. Thankfully, these imperfections were on opposite diagonals. We decided we needed to stop and assess damage. Unfortunately, even modern rafts don't tend to come with brakes and when the water is flowing at several metres per second this not easy. An all or nothing approach was chosen with crew members jumping out and desperately managing to tie the bowlines onto a tree before the boat travelled the length of the line. At the time we didn't really think about it, but as it was impossible to walk along the bank, leaving someone behind as we sped off would have been a tough challenge to overcome.
Note the waterline on this 'boat'.
Rich fighting to retain control as we try to park next to the trashed raft.
The damage was duly assessed and a long (c. 50cm) gash discovered. Bollocks. This was only day 1. We shifted some of the kit onto the OK raft and applied our combined engineering knowledge in using a spare oar to transfer some of the buoyancy from the 2 good sections to the sunk section. This raft then successfully limped to the place we had planned to camp. The other raft - my raft - now suitably encumbered, kept grounding and a sub-optimal choice of routes when the river braided necessitated a tedious and back-breaking drag across shallow water for much of the last part of the journey. We unloaded the rafts and set up camp - a procedure that took far longer than necessary. Cooking didn't even commence until 11pm, but it being Alaska it was still light. In fact it never got completely dark and by 2am had begun getting appreciably lighter again.
D'oh! This sorry looking thing is supposed to carry 4 of us, half our equipment and 12 days of supplies.
The rules dictated that we couldn't leave anything behind at all!
Day 2 quickly became devoted to raft fixing. We had with us a sort of large scale bicycle repair kit and just about had enough spare rubber to cover the enormous gash. After fixing up the raft we inflated it, left it to dry and set off on a small hike to have a look up the tributary next to which we had camped. We didn't really find anything interesting but I managed to walk into a sharp branch at about shin height and tear open the wound on my leg from which the stitches had been removed the day before we left. Ooops. Bloody painful it was as well. Luckily, we had quite an impressive first aid kit with us courtesy of contacts in the NHS and although we had opted not to bring real stitches, butterfly ones seemed to do the trick.
We were packing up camp ready to leave when suddenly there was a muffled explosion from the direction of the boats followed by an unmistakable hissing noise. Hmmmm. Maybe we had asked for this with the self-congratulation on such a fine repair. Repair job 2 was needed. This time with additional help from that most universal of tools: duct tape.
Finally, it was time to move on downstream. This section of the river is fairly flat and meandering but the sun was out and I had tactically placed myself on the beer-equipped raft. The sight of Rich and I sunning ourselves, beer in hand had the desired effect on the other raft and a full on pursuit duly ensued. However, it is not for nothing that both Rich and I know the film Top Gun so well. We steadily drew them in towards us in the middle of the fast stream and with text-book timing, backed the oars whilst steering into a back-eddy. The other boat did indeed "fly right by". Rarely have I been more pleased with myself!
We pushed on making slow headway into a headwind through a very meandering course where 10km of river meant about 2km of progress. Whenever Colonel Darley checked the GPS we always seemed to be 'only a mile or so away' - he should work for Labour's spin section. When we finally arrived at camp it was again late. We discover that it is not for nothing that people refer to Alaska's state bird being the mosquito. Luckily, we have the ability to reply with chemical weapons a good deal faster than 45 minutes.
Drifting slowly down the course
We're woken early next morning as the tent starts to do a passable impression of nuclear fusion in the early morning sun. I certainly hadn't imagined this sort of weather this far north. Indeed, we were told before setting off that there has been virtually no rain for months and that much of this region was having serious forest fires. In light of this, all our fires have to be on a metal tray and with the tray placed on sand or rock. The flip side is that pretty much any pile of wood in any arrangement can be easily lit from a single match!
We hike up a nearby mountain, gaining some 1,500m and reach a patch of snow not yet melted. Evidence that it is not always so pleasant. Because of the risk of bear attack we were supposed to be wearing small bells and making lots of noise. This proves effective as we came across no bears. However, it doesn't work so well on wasps and a nest of them decided that for some reason my long-suffering legs were a legitimate target. Thankfully, because of the bandaging, I escaped with only 6 stings. [Revenge was duly taken later on several daring to invade the airspace whilst I was preparing dinner; I recall the final score being about 25 - 6]
We pushed on up towards the edge of a tributary only to find a magnificent sheer drop down to it. Evidence of recent erosion was clear all the way down the edge. Despite the obvious implications of this we all decided to risk having a cheeky photo taken right on the edge the far side of a large crack. Later, on walking a little further along the cliff we discover this spot to have been a significant overhang...
The Pick on the overhang!
Obviously, I had to have a photo as well. Note the large crack in the bottom right of the picture...
We celebrate a safe descent in the evening with a dip in the river (as cold as hiking uphill was warm) and a large steak. Extra rare.
The next day's trip is memorable only for Picky performing his bizarre morning ritual of unpacking and re-packing the entire contents of his bag several times and for some particularly fine Picky-isms during a spell when we unwisely gave him the helm of the raft. My favourite being "Anticipation of river-danger is only for those who lack the power to get out of the way.".
Pick and his bags.
We camp once again at a huge river basin. This river clearly erodes a lot of mountain as stretched out before us is several square miles of boulder-strewn wasteland. It is very Clint Eastwood-esque. Many of the channels are dry but one of them is filled with a seriously raging torrent. As you walk next to it you can continually hear the crashing of large boulders being carried by the force of the water. Dewire reckons he could cross it. We know he is insane. Fortunately he doesn't even try.
The view upstream of the delta. On the very right of the picture you can see edge of the massive delta which was 5m taller then the river. All those stones were part of the mountains a few decades back.
This was a fresh baby bear print. As you can tell from the fact I am writing this, we never came across mother and baby
Even fresher prints
We are carrying with us an enormous cool box with masses of ice in it so we can take fresh meat and fish - some of it pre-frozen. The box keeps it that way so we have a regular supply of excellent food. Much better than anything you could take with you trekking. Another fine dinner of salmon and halibut steaks follows taht evening after Picky has discovered that neatly packing the wood as densely together as possible to create a tightly packed oblong is a sub-optimal way of making a fire. I jokingly offer a spread of 9 - 11 matches for him to light it. It takes nearly 20.
There were dozens of these massive and magnificent bald eagles all over the place.
Weather is starting to change the next day and some clouds are rolling in. We encounter our first proper rapids since day 1 with me on the helm, but now we are actually experienced and we cope OK. There are a couple of difficult turns in the river where there is a strong circular back eddy that one of our raft gets stuck in for a few laps whilst we look on in mirth. The river is now alternating narrow rapid patches with huge mile-wide bits containing many braids all travelling at different speeds and of different depths. Sometimes we get out of sight of each other as the river is so braided. Grounding is frequent and requires jumping in to pull the boat off the river bed, but we are slowly getting better at spotting shallow water from the texture of the water surface.
Shallow water strikes again
We [on the other raft] thought this was hilarious but it took them a long time to get out of this situation!
It then starts to become considerably colder and pouring with rain. After one particularly sharp turn in the river with the water undercutting the edge, Colonel Darley managed to just miss the face with frantic back-paddling and the wonderful line "I'd love to see how Raf [piloting the other raft] gets through that".
Sadly, we never did see "how Raf got through that", but we managed to find some slack water in which we could wait for them.
Then they appeared. Sinking. Badly. We suddenly noticed bits of boat and kit flowing downstream and a frantic pursuit of key items including our main air pump was necessary. Thankfully, we rescued everything except a paddle and a water bottle which are presumably now mid-Pacific. Apparently, the other boat had smashed into the rockface with some speed and apart from another huge gash in the raft had been lucky to avoid injury and/or flipping while pinned against the wall. This was the same raft that had had the previous disaster. We began to suspect the 'Talkeetna' was cursed.
The way the raft had deflated meant it filled up with a lot of water and so was now riding very low in the water. The river at this point had just opened up again into a mile-wide bit with multiple braids and fast-flowing deep channels. We were no longer in slack water. They were in the middle and trying desperately to work their way to the side. Then they grounded right in the middle. The deflated side of the boat was facing upstream and the weight of water pouring into the raft meant they were totally stuck. This was not a good situation.
In fact, it was worse, because having rescued the essential air pump, we were some 200 - 300m downstream, out of earshot and with no way of paddling back against the current. We had managed to pull in on one of the many shallow islands you get when the river braids. A brief attempt to walk upstream towards them was ended when we realised that there were deep channels between us and them. The speed and power of the water meant that you could not safely wade in anything more than knee-deep or so. Meanwhile, the other boat was stuck, freezing in the icy water. In a moment of which the Keystone Cops would have been proud, we realised that both our walkie-talkies were on our raft.
We realised that we were going to have to somehow rescue them. This necessitated unloading our raft. A frantic dash across a fast channel to an island suitably above water (the river was rising as a result of the rain) lost us another few hundred metres downstream and we began quickly unloading the raft. Having done this in record time we set about the tedious task of now dragging the raft upriver through shallow channels and often over land. This took a long time but through a series of gestures we were able to communicate our plan to the other raft who now at least knew that something might be done about them. This turned out to be good as they were starting to consider jumping in the river with a minimal amount of essential kit and floating down to us. That would have been bad.
After about an hour we had dragged it the best part of a kilometre upstream and were ready to commence our rescue mission. Given the fact that they were grounded on a fast flowing bit, we would only have one chance to float up alongside and rapidly tie the boats together before we were rushed past by the stream. Luckily it worked like clockwork and after transferring some weight off the damaged raft, it became afloat again. We returned to our little island and the kit strewn everywhere.
Our situation had improved, but only slightly. We were on an island a long way from the river-edge and any suitable camping spot. One of the rafts was barely afloat. The decision was made to aim for a promising spot of flat-ish ground on the edge. This was a foot or two above river level and likely to be OK for camping. An advance party was sent to get essentials such as the fire and some shelter going. Getting the rest there proved another tough challenge involving much dragging of kit and boat but eventually everything was safely together. We were very grateful for Dan's 100 square metre tarpaulin under which we set up a joint kitchen/repair bay. It is amazing how even spoilt city-dwellers like us can be resourceful when the situation demands it! We called it Camp Endeavour, perhaps a touch pompously, but I don't think so. Survival was celebrated with large hot chocolates generously bolstered with rum. These goes a long way to offsetting coldness, wetness and stress!
Camp Endeavour. We couldn't repair the raft unless it was dry which necessitated it being out of the rain and near the fire.
Suitably experienced in such matters, a fine repair was made and we were ready to continue the following afternoon. After reasonable requests by yesterday's victims to '[can we] please not go on a raft that sinks today' I found myself on the Raft of Death aka Talkeetna. Facilitated by the recent downpours the river had risen significantly and we made fast progress. The rapids were of the enjoyable and bouncy type. Much baling was necessary as waves poured over the edge but there were no scary walls and few rocks. A good day's rafting was had. The long-suffering Talkeetna held up reasonably well although 2-hourly reflations were required. We became adept at doing these on the water.
As the evening approached, we pulled in to camp on a delightful sandy beach. Excitement levels were high when we spotted lots of bear prints but no bears were spotted (or striped, tee hee). It was still raining but we figured that this meant that our fire restrictions were presumably lifted so a large pit was dug and bonfire prepared. A wonderful discovery was made when we worked out the second function to the main air pump. A high-horsepower set of bellows. These had the power to transform a warm camp fire into something visible from space in a few minutes. Another marvellous consequence of this was that we were now able to dispose of all tins and glassware as they melted easily. [The rules meant that all rubbish had to be either taken with us or burnt. We were not even allowed to bury things.]
The next day it had even stopped raining and we got our first close-up of a nice glacier. We left 'Bonfire Beach' in high spirits. The highlight of the day was reaching the confluence with the Alsek river. From this point the river becomes a true monster with a flow rate of over 100,000 cubic feet per second. There is a strange large rock at this confluence which has become an island. Apparently there were some Native American carvings on the top of the rock but a detailed search by us failed to locate them. However, just as we were sitting down, about to leave, Tom spotted some very faint circles. It was highly underwhelming.
After a surprisingly difficult passage of the confluence (we kept getting pushed back into the 'Tat in a giant whirlpool) we started to go past some seriously large mountains. The weather began to deteriorate again and it was both rainy and had poor visibility. It was also noticeably colder and there were areas of snow and ice coming right down to river level. We think Rich may have spotted a bear moving over a patch of snow but it was so far away we will never know.
Our next point of call would be one of the most popular parts of this trip, Walker Glacier. This is a glacier that comes all the way down to the river. There were a couple of other groups camped at the bottom so we decided on a non-standard plan. Despite it already being 7pm we would pack a minimum set of kit into our bags, including the tents and climb up the glacier to camp higher. This was an ambitious plan and it became more ambitious when we realised that the well-trodden path simply ended at the glacier base. No one else was keen enough to try to get higher up. We could see that the ground flattened out somewhat higher up the glacier but getting up to this point, several hundred metres above us would be difficult. Our first attempted route up had to be abandoned as the number of large rocks being sent down was proving dangerous to others below.
What sort of idiots climb glaciers at twilight?
This was enough for Raf and Tom who, perhaps wisely, decided to head back to the river and an easy camp. It was after all now 9:30 and heading up into a mountain at that time is not always sensible. The second route we tried followed a steep gully that had been carved by a stream next to the glacier. It was a nice scramble. Once on the top we discovered that there wasn't much flat ground on which to pitch the tent so pushed on up higher. We didn't fancy pitching on the ice itself but it was now getting dark and our options were becoming limited. We set ourselves a deadline by which we would turn back if we hadn't found anywhere. It came and the group decided to press on anyway. As someone who has read 'Into Thin Air' I was less than impressed by this foolhardiness but fortune smiled on us and just as we were preparing for what would have been a highly dangerous descent in the dark, we found a small area just about flat enough to pitch the tent.
Looks fairly safe when we put it up...
But more interesting the next morning...
And the view from above. We had to make the rock 'wall' around the tent to secure the tent against the wind.
The pitch was far from ideal, with a steep drop one way, a crevasse-filled glacier the other way and a fairly active rockfall above. We were just about the far side of a small gully from the rockfall but our 'wall' would not have stopped some of the larger boulders. It was precarious enough for Lowish and I to share some black humour about how many survivors we'd have the next morning. It was also pretty cold being right next to many Megatons of ice and was still raining. A strong cold wind develops in these situations as the air cooled by the glacier sinks downhill.
We checked in with Raf and Tom several miles away at 'Base Camp'. They claimed that they could see our headtorches high up on the glacier. We didn't believe them and asked for them to flash us. It was amazing how easily we could see them way down below, but then we in England are so used to immense amounts of ambient light.
It is very surprising how active glaciers are. Throughout the night thundering groans and creaks can be heard coming all around us. It is quite eerie. Some of these weird noises turn out to emanate from Picky but by no means all. We awake and give thanks for no large boulders. A hearty porridge and raisin breakfast and we're off. So far we have stayed on the rock but led by the ever-fearless Colonel Darley we venture onto the snow and ice. Soon we have the crampons on and are on the glacier itself. It is a mass of knolls and crevasses but they are easy to spot. It is still raining but heading uphill as we are, no one is cold. Yet.
Ready to hit the ice
Wouldn't want to fall down there
Probably shouldn't have gone this close
We spot a crevasse full of water - effectively a lake on the glacier with ice for shores. Water temperature 0.0C. Oh no. Nooooooo way. You must be jok�
I wish I weren't so competitive. After Darley strips off for a dip and mocks our cowardice, I decide that I would regret not having at least tried it. It turns out to feel not quite as cold as I'd thought. Certainly I was far colder when persuaded to go for a dip in a stream in the Lake District. In July. And this location is far cooler in both senses. What is genuinely unpleasant is standing on ice in bare feet. However, the whole experience is surprisingly invigorating. Those Muscovites aren't so mad after all.
Swimming technique goes out of the window in these situations.
Suitably cleansed, we have lunch in a sheltered mini-crevasse and head back down. This takes a while as it is still raining and wet rock plus steep slopes mean that even Darley is being careful. We celebrate a successful venture with a beer or two, pack the boats and head off. It is still raining. It is now misty too.
The next major sight is Sapphire Glacier, a spectacular and self-descriptive sight. Alas, I cannot confirm whether it lives up to its name as the banks are barely visible let alone anything beyond. In the confusion in the mist we end up on the wrong braid of the river and miss our intended camp spot near the glacier. We do, however, find a sandy island where we decide to camp. Owing to a preponderance of bear prints, we called this place Bear Island. It is still raining and we end up putting up a soggy tent in the dark.
We wake up to find we have unknowingly pitched the tent in a small hollow that is starting to do a reasonable impression of a lake. It is still raining so we see little point in remaining and set off downstream in thick mist. I am now wearing all my clothes. We are nearing the end of the river and the last major place is Alsek lake, which is massive. There are three possible entrances to the lake known by numbers: Channel 1; Channel 2; and Channel 3. Channel 1 is also known as the 'Channel of Death'. This is perhaps an overstatement but the fast flowing channel can get blocked with ice and apparently there is the potential to get your boat pinned under an iceberg. Not a good thing. Before attempting this route one has to park the boat and do a recce of the Channel from the bank to check that it is clear. However, as we could often not even see the bank from 50m owing to the rain/fog this option was closed. We were therefore going to have to take the safest option of Channel 3. Here the only risk is that because it is a shallow slow-flowing channel, then in low water one can become grounded and need a lot of dragging to get through.
Given that it is still raining, we decide that it is unlikely to be low water and are rewarded with a hassle-free passage. Our next campsite is on a large island called Gateway Knob marking the entrance to the lake. We pull the boats onto a wide beach and set up another fine camp. Keeping a fire going is now quite a time-consuming experience and a full rota for drying the wood before burning it is necessary. Even the addition of large quantities of paraffin is of little help. It has now been raining continually for about 48 hours which we have found surprising. I am accused of pessimism when I offer a spread on it stopping between 20 and 25 hours thence.
Visibility has improved the next day though it is indeed still raining. Unbelievably, the massive lake has risen by a couple of feet [think how much water is required to do this] and our boats are now fully afloat offshore. Thankfully they are still tied to something. We can now see the magnificent sight of mile wide glacier cliffs edging the lake and icebergs everywhere. In the distance are some seriously tall mountains as well.
Rising waters...
Panoramic view from shore.
Darley decides it will be fun to try to row over to the glacier cliffs. The map says it is about a mile and we set off. After much paddling, I am getting cold because, yes, it is still raining and to me we are not even half way. Again, I am accused of excessive pessimism but Lowish and Picky are cold too and decide to return with me in the other boat. 5 hours later when the others return they agree that they had not even been a quarter of the way. This being an uninhabited region, our maps are based upon aerial photographs taken in the 50's. We realise that in the intervening half century, a lot of fossil fuels have been burnt, some even by nations other than America. This, of course, has warmed the planet somewhat and hence the glaciers have retreated as they melt. The lake is now about 4 miles wide. Mr Bush, if you still don't believe in global warming, go to Alsek Lake. You won't even have to leave your country.
Paddling past you see their wonderful colour.
As the glacier melts it spawns off many icebergs varying in size up to ones larger than a street block. Some of these are very cool when you get up close. Our Alaska book tells us that it is very dangerous to climb onto the icebergs�
They were actually pretty stable.
The rest of the day is spent playing games in our camp. We have still not seen any bears but our initial efforts to keep the place tidy, and so not attract any, have faded, which may change this. No one seems bothered.
At one point it looks like it is going to stop raining.
Anyone for another game of Scrabble? Don't all shout at once.
It is still raining the following day, but Darley, Dewire and I decide to climb Gateway knob. Gateway knob is seriously overgrown and we spend a long time looking for a path. We think we may have found one whilst climbing a water/rockfall but it turns out not to be the case. After 90 min or so of scrambling and bush-bashing through seriously dense undergrowth we have still not found the path but we think we have made it to the top. The view is disappointing as we are in the cloud. It is still raining. The descent has some hairy moments as we try a different route looking for the mythical path. There is no path.
Yes, the 'path' goes up to the right!
It is now our final night although it is still raining. A massive feast is prepared as we still have much food. A fair amount of beer also remains and Dewire and I see that this situation is rectified. One of our final tasks is to burn the remainder of our food as we are not allowed to leave anything. We discover that, unsurprisingly, lettuces do not burn well. We discover that Molotov lettuces work better but still not well at all. However, as we have about 10 litres of spare paraffin, multiple Molotov-ing of the lettuce makes some progress. At some point in this night, some 96 hours after it started, it stops raining. Even in Scotland you would have expected the odd 5 minute break in 4 days! We will, alas, be leaving at dawn the next day.
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
We do at least get some breathtakingly clear views of the lake as we paddle away to our rendez-vous with the pick-up. The sun reminds us that it does actually still exist. The final part of the river is quite fast and amusingly accompanied by some icebergs that have floated across the lake. Some of the water hydraulics are very strange on the final rapids and there are a few dodgy moments, but the final piece of white water is safely passed with the river at full height owing to the recent weather. After a series of false alarms we find the off-channel that leads to the unmanned airstrip and pull in to disassemble the rafts. All we have to do now is hope that the aeroplane arrives when it is supposed to. If it does not it is not clear what one could do!
It turns out that the weather has stopped all the flights for the preceding 4 days but we are lucky and the tiny aeroplane lands. It will need three trips to take us plus all the kit back. We cram a lot of kit into the plane for trip no. 1 which will have Raf, Picky and me on board. As we put more and more weight in the plane, I ask the pilot how he can tell if the plane is overloaded. He just smiles and says 'Oh, it will tip over'. He is that sort of chap. There seem to many like him in Alaska.
All the stuff is packed and we climb into the plane. It tips over. Not badly, just onto the tailplane. The pilot, being that sort of chap, smiles again, says that we will be fine and revs the engine to taxi away. We reach a damp uneven line of gravel. Raf naively asks me where the runway is. At the far end, we swing round to get a good run up but the plane bogs down in the mud and we are stuck. Out we all troop to dig the thing out. The others, watching, think this additional haplessness is hilarious. Finally we are ready to take off. With full throttle, we slowly ease down the runway. We are comprehensively overtaken by several metaphorical Skodas as we pass the others halfway down the runway. Three-quarters of the way down we remain firmly earthbound. Raf and I exchange glances. As we reach the end of the runway, and with the stall alarm ringing loudly, the poor little plane bounces and climbs to about, ooh, eight feet. The trees at the end of the runway are perhaps thirty-eight feet but the pilot deftly avoids them by banking over the river with the wings just clear of the water as we continue slowly climbing. He later admits that we probably were a little overloaded.
We get some spectacular views of the lake and glaciers on the way back during a flight that becomes a great deal more enjoyable than the take-off experience. After 90 min we are back in civilisation. It has been a wonderful fortnight.
This link will take you to an aerial satellite photo of the river. You can double click on this photo to centre it where you want and (after single clicking on the image) you can use the cursor keys to scroll downstream (generally heading south-ish at first and then more west) and follow the progress of the Tatshenshini river, through to the confluence with the Alsek, past Walker Glacier into Alsek Lake and all the way to the Pacific Ocean Note the tiny airstrip just visible on the southern bank of a U-shaped braid.
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