TR: a canoe ride to remember.

[freeclimb9]

We had planned for an afternoon canoe ride across a couple lakes along the base of the Tetons. We got a ride to remember.

The three of us –myself and my sons Nate (age 10) and Liam (age 8)– had spent a few days enjoying the tourist delights of the area from our tent cabin bivy at Colter Bay. The whole trip was meant as a diversion from the impending start of school. We had gone on a horse ride, swam in Jackson lake, and enjoyed the sight of the nearby mountains. For another experience, I decided we should rent a canoe from Dornans and paddle up String Lake and across Leigh Lake to the mouth of Leigh Canyon.

We got the canoe –an aluminum model with no rocker and a keel– and got it into the water. Nate and Liam took turns being the bowman (the guy in front who sets the paddling pace), and we made our way northwards to the portage between String and Leigh lakes. I humped the canoe over the portage, and put into Leigh Lake. We paddled long the western shore of the lake, and stopped for a quick lunch. Then we started out for the beach at the mouth of Leigh canyon.

Gathering storm clouds over the mountain crest warned of impending wind, so I encouraged the boys to keep paddling. They warmed to the task, and we clipped along. But we weren’t quite fast enough. When we were about 50 yards off the beach, the winds blasted from the canyon. Strong winds. Very strong. Winds strong enough to make it difficult to stand, and certainly impossible for us to paddle against. But that wasn’t an option anyways: the canoe’s slender sides acted much like a sail, and caused us to sheer away from our course. The northern shore was also close, but waves built rapidly, and I had no desire to keep the canoe broached. Nate and Liam, meanwhile, were getting tossed around the canoe by its rolling motion, so I barked at them to stow their paddles, to sit down, hold tightly, and not move. I braced my paddle to steer us to run with the wind, and we began our ride.

The wind rapidly pushed the water into waves then ripped the wavetops away into spume that foamed into streaks across the lake. The waves themselves were about three to four feet from trough to crest. We were surrounded by white horses, and were being driven ourselves by the strong wind. The flat bottom and keel of the canoe –so pleasant for keeping a straight course while on a flat lake– were now making it very difficult to surf the waves. I was alternately bracing and side paddling to keep us from broaching. The last thing I wanted was for us to be swamped. The canoe would’ve sunk directly, and a swimmer would have a hard time remaining above the waves.

Understandably, Nate and Liam were not especially calm, and I shouted through the wind more than once for them to shut up when they began crying their concerns for survival aloud. I shouted that we’d be okay if we could continue running with the wind. But warned that the waves would be higher as we got nearer the lee shore, and gave them instructions on what to do should we swamp.

Waves began breaking over the stern –and over my back– as we were blown along. This wasn’t encouraging to me, but our speed was. The width of Leigh Lake that we traversed during the storm is nearly two miles, and we covered that distance in a time I estimate of 10 minutes. As we neared the lee shore, the waves caught and carried us for a longer distance, and drove us even faster than the wind could alone.

I warned the boys that the most dangerous part of our trip was likely to be beaching the canoe among the breakers. But providence was with us when we arrived on the far shore: a small spit of rock formed a sort of breakwater along its northern edge, and I was able to control our surfing angle enough to scud into it. I barked orders at the boys to not move until I gave the word, then to do exactly as instructed. The canoe keel rode up upon the beach rocks, I jumped into waist deep water to hold the stern steady, then gave the word to exit over the bow. They were out in seconds, and into the forest while I pushed the canoe onto driftwood on shore. I overturned the canoe to drain the water then pushed it higher into the forest to create a shelter over the moss-covered ground. The boys crawled underneath, and I broke out raingear and chocolate to make our wait for the storm’s end more comfortable.

An hour later the winds had abated enough for us to relaunch and sneak along shore to a part of the lake less in the line of the canyon’s mouth from which the maelstrom had emanated. And by the time we were paddling back across String Lake, hardly a catspaw broke the smoothness of the water’s surface. The three of us now joked and laughed through our adrenaline afterglow about what had felt like a near-disastrous situation. Definitely a canoe ride to remember.

 

[ChrisT]

Nice TR! Glad you all made it back safely. I miss my canoe.

[bunglehead]

HOLY CRAP!!

Great TR. Man, your kids are going to remember that for the rest of their lives.

[mmcmurra]

Nice story! Thanks for the great read.

 

freeclimb9 said:

The canoe would’ve sunk directly,

 

Really? I remember my parents showing us kids how even a completely submerged canoe could not be made to sink. Thank goodness, or I would have lost more than I did when we got swamped going down the Hoh... Anyway, capsizing wouldn't have been fun!

[freeclimb9]

mmcmurra said:

Nice story! Thanks for the great read.

 

freeclimb9 said:

The canoe would’ve sunk directly,

 

Really? I remember my parents showing us kids how even a completely submerged canoe could not be made to sink. Thank goodness, or I would have lost more than I did when we got swamped going down the Hoh... Anyway, capsizing wouldn't have been fun!

My experience with aluminum canoes is that they sink unless you can keep them capsized with trapped air inside. A wooden, or plastic canoe will float.

[Figger_Eight]

Great TR!

[Stefan]

Good write up. Those boys will remember those hours for the rest of their lives, and have a good story to tell when they get back to school......"What did you do this summer?"

 

Very happy the story was one where a positive ending happened.

[cj001f]

freeclimb9 said:

My experience with aluminum canoes is that they sink unless you can keep them capsized with trapped air inside. A wooden, or plastic canoe will float.

Alum. canoes should have 2 foam blocks ( 1 in the bow & 1 in the stern) to provide buoyancy in the event of capsizing. All canoes suck to be in once capsized.

 

Good to see you made it ok!

[Bug]

I have had three aluminum canoes and they all had flotation in the bow and stern. "Stay with the boat" was the rule. Of course, there was the time in the Big Blackfoot during high water that we all would have died of hypothermia so we broke formation and clammered to shore.

But, it was a great thing to see nature up close and personal that way. I hope you and your kids have more fun adventures if less harrowing.

[Dr_Flash_Amazing]

freeclimb9 said:

[wild canoe epic]

 

Lifejackets?

[freeclimb9]

Dr_Flash_Amazing said:

Lifejackets?

Of course. But it concerned me that the boy's jackets didnt' have crotch straps.

 

With regard to the aluminum canoe, it might have had flotation embedded in the bow and stern. It might not have. I have pulled aluminum canoes off of a riverbottom, so I know some don't float when capsized (that was yet another canoe epic, but not of my own making: I was tubing the upper Gila river with friends when some gumbies got into serious trouble. It really killed the beer buzz.).

Different gear would have made it all a little easier. With no exaggaration, the trip across the lake was like a 2 mile stretch of class 2-3 whitewater. A canoe with no keel and some rocker would have been better. There's always next time.

 

[Dr_Flash_Amazing]

freeclimb9 said:

Dr_Flash_Amazing said:

Lifejackets?

Of course. But it concerned me that the boy's jackets didnt' have crotch straps.

 

 

 

Didn't mean to cast aspersions on your safety precautions; just curious. There're an alarming number of doofuses out there who think they are immune to drowning, despite the curious trend in water accident fatality statistics indicating otherwise.

[Bug]

freeclimb9 said:

Dr_Flash_Amazing said:

Lifejackets?

Of course. But it concerned me that the boy's jackets didnt' have crotch straps.

 

With regard to the aluminum canoe, it might have had flotation embedded in the bow and stern. It might not have. I have pulled aluminum canoes off of a riverbottom, so I know some don't float when capsized (that was yet another canoe epic, but not of my own making: I was tubing the upper Gila river with friends when some gumbies got into serious trouble. It really killed the beer buzz.).

Different gear would have made it all a little easier. With no exaggaration, the trip across the lake was like a 2 mile stretch of class 2-3 whitewater. A canoe with no keel and some rocker would have been better. There's always next time.

 

Yeah. It sounds like good surfing sans kids.

When I was about 5, my dad bought a little sail boat/board. It was similar to the Sunflowers that came out later but was more of a styrofoam board with side ridges. My 3 brothers and I took it out on a small lake the first time and got blown to the other end. Coming back, we were piling up on the windward side trying to keep it upright and zipping along at what seemed really fast then. We tipped a few times and finally got over the panic and actually had fun. But as the story gets told around the dinner table, my mother was in the car the whole time crying. She was sure we would never come back alive. It was a wise decision on her part to not go on many of our adventures after that. Dad had a little of the go-for-it in him and i sometimes wonder how we all survived.