If you can see Mt. Baker, you are part of The Experience
It was an eerie feeling, watching the twin engine Otter disappear into the clouds after leaving my friend Bill and I alone on a rocky outwash plain at the headwaters of the Ambler River, well above the Arctic Circle in wild Alaska. It was early August and the culmination of many months of logistics and planning had us standing there, with a pile of backcountry gear, bear barrels and a rolled up, un-inflated inflatable canoe.
As part of my ongoing quest to visit and find some adventure in each of America's National Parks, this was by far my most ambitious idea to date. The plan was to bag the last two, of Alaska's eight, magnificent National Parks, by paddling 140-plus miles from Gates of the Arctic National Park to Kobuk Valley National Park. We would start south on the crystal clear and fast moving Ambler River to its confluence with the vast, dark and sluggish Kobuk River and then follow it west to the Salmon River where a tenuous gravel bar landing strip awaited.
This trip was an easy sell to my frequent traveling companion, Bill. A lifelong Alaskan, he had yet to see these parks himself. What’s more, he was an avid fan of the author Seth Kantner. Seth grew up in the Alaskan arctic tundra and raised his own family there. He’s written several books about it, among them, “Ordinary Wolves” and “Shopping for Porcupine,” awesome books both. At Bill's urging I had read them before coming up to get a hint of what we would be up against. Seth lives in Kotzebue (the base camp for our adventure) and we had looked him up before flying out. He was gracious enough to have coffee with us, share some laughs and give us some insights about life in the land of the caribou. Now we were here to find out for ourselves.
Our first couple days were fabulous – fast moving water, fun rapids and gorgeous weather. Then:
1) It rained for 48 hours without let up.
2) We hit the lower river sections where the current slowed to a snail’s pace.
3) We experienced our first day with headwinds.
It was a total wake up call. We knew continued rain like we’d just had was going to create flood conditions and if the headwind kept up we were going to make zero forward progress, or possibly even go backward. Our canoe was not what you would call a “high-performance watercraft.”
The idea of making it to our take out point began to loom large. On the way in, the bush pilot had tipped his wings and gestured below at a narrow gravel beach. He warned us that was the last place he could safely land. It was a sand bar created by silt from the confluence of the Salmon and Kobuk rivers, still some 80 miles away. He said that bar would be submerged if the river rose significantly. If it disappeared, we'd have to paddle an additional 50 miles to the native village of Kiana to get taken out. That was not something we wanted.
Sporadic satellite weather updates we were getting from my wife, Teri, showed rain, rain and more rain in the forecast. That meant there was an ever-increasing chance we were going to lose our gravel bar landing strip. Our plan of a leisurely paddle, fishing our way down a lazy river was replaced by a sense of urgency and concern. We began pulling the canoe farther up on to the beach at night and stabbing a stick into the waters edge to monitor the river's rise. And paddling in earnest. The forecast, at least, showed tail winds for the next couple of days.
Still, paddling with purpose was slow and laborious and we would be lucky to make 15 miles a day, totally spent. Not good enough. We were going to need to get to our take out much earlier than planned. Inspiration borne from desperation struck and we hit on the idea of rigging up a sail to take advantage of the tail wind. We stretched a rain tarp between two spare paddles and damned if it didn’t work like a charm. We almost doubled our speed and managed a couple of high mileage days that really saved us.
We made the Salmon River by midday on Day 8 and – hallelujah – the gravel bar landing strip was still intact. But – yikes – the Salmon River itself that feeds in just above it was at full flood stage, raging, mud colored and full of tree debris. It wouldn’t take long for that outflow to eat up our precious beach. Right away we inReached our outfitter requesting an early pick up. Their first satellite text response read, "You will have to paddle on by.” What? No! For reasons we didn’t understand at the time, they were convinced our landing beach was already gone and that we would have to keep paddling to Kiana. Low on food, battery power, human power and dry clothes, we were not anxious for an extra 50 miles.
It took convincing through irregular back and forth texting that, yes, we really do have a beach. We held soaked phones up to dripping clouds to acquire a satellite connection and then had agonizing waits for replies. It wasn’t until we paced off the beach and sent those coordinates that we finally received: “Okay, get your asses ready, we’re coming.” Yes! We deflated our canoe, rolled it up and packed up all our gear and waited. An hour later: “All planes were grounded in Kotzebue due to low visibility, not sure when we will be able to come." No! What does that mean? Later today? Tomorrow? The day after? This beach won’t last and now we have a deflated boat.
So we sat, tense in the rain all afternoon, each of us with our gloomy thoughts. Do we re-inflate the boat and keep going? Pitch our tents and wait it out? Will this beach even survive the night? As evening approached, a decision needed to be made. Then, while deliberating ... a sound? We tilted our wet faces to the sky, ears straining for the thrum of an engine that was, to our very great relief, getting closer and closer.
When we were safely aboard, flying back to Kotzebue about 300 feet off the ground, our pilot told us the entire town was a mess. Apparently, all Alaska Airlines flights over the past couple days, in and out, had been canceled because of volcanic ash clouds from the eruption of the Russian volcano Krasheninnikov. What’s more, the atmospheric river that had been dumping on us had been dumping even more vigorously to the north and the Noatak River and all its tributaries were well above flood stage. They were certain our landing strip was in the same condition, which explained why they needed convincing it wasn't. Fortunately for us, we were on a more southerly river system and the flood conditions were just a little more delayed. Our outfitters' hunting, fishing and flight seeing trips had been canceled and they were rescuing groups off of the northerly river systems. All of those people were now stranded in tiny Kotzebue, all looking for a place to stay.
Again fortune smiled on us when our very resourceful outfitter was able to get us bunked up in an Airbnb that already had four people in a three-bedroom house. Now there were six of us. Turns out the four strangers-turned-roommates were a scientific group from the University of Alaska: Paddy Sullivan, Director of the Environment and Natural Resource Institute, and his fellow researchers.
They had been camped out on a gravel bar, much like ours, awaiting pick up after doing research on the Noatak River. In the middle of the night they woke to find the river had risen to within a few feet of their tents. They had to pack everything up and escape in their pack rafts! They were washed out on floodwaters until a boat rescue could reach them. Their rescuer? None other than Seth Kantner, in his fishing boat and well familiar with the Noatak River.
As the final exclamation point to our great good fortune, our bush pilot texted us the following evening to tell us the beach he picked us off of was completely submerged when he flew over it the next day. X
