The road chose me

We make our way around the north side of Lake Arenal, a beautiful windy drive along the lush green shoreline with Volcán Arenal looming in the distance. At first I don’t think it’s all that impressive, but as we get closer and closer I retract that statement. The town of La Fortuna sits just a few kilometers from the volcano and was decimated in 1968 during a major eruption. To this day red hot lava flows down the side of the mountain, creating some spectacular views. Everything in town is very touristy and expensive, including $60 volcano tours and $90 (!) hot spring resorts.

As soon as Mike hears mention of white water his eyes light up like a crazy man and we quickly find ourselves at Costa Rica Descents, clearly the best outfit in town. The guys are really friendly and down to earth and give us a couple of different options. We can go part-way up the best river in town for a day of class II and III rapids paddling kayaks, or we can jump in a raft to tackle the class IV and V rapids further upstream. We’re really torn on what to do here and finally decide that piloting our own craft is the way to go. Mike has a solid season under his belt and is confident in a small play kayak. I’ve done a lot of flat water paddling in canoes and kayaks, but very little white water and am less confident about the small kayaks. The guides recommend a “ducky”, which is an inflatable kayak they describe as somewhere between a raft and a kayak or a one man raft.

Dan and his trusty little boat

We pile into a mini-bus and set out for the river, nervous and excited at the same time. A couple of other tourists are along and they’ll be in a raft with a guide while two other guides will run safety in kayaks, along with Mike and I. We arrive at the put-in and get a quick briefing on what we should and shouldn’t be doing. I’m told my little craft will treat me fine as long as I keep it straight through the rapids and don’t wrap it around any rocks.

Keep it straight. No Rocks. Sounds simple enough.

Keeping it straight

The water level is controlled by a dam far upstream so we wait around for half an hour for the water level to rise, though I get the feeling it’s just to build the tension in the air. Mike and I opt to walk around the first rapid which doesn’t look very friendly at all and play around for ten minutes in a calmer area getting the hang of things. Our guides are pros, and Mike looks pretty confident in his little kayak, making me feel like the absolute novice in the group.

Mike crusing along

Setting out the guide shouts one final instruction – “Stay close to me, and go exactly where I do.” I’m full of adrenaline and I move into the first set of rapids and very quickly get the hang of things. I learn my little craft can scrape over and bounce off rocks just like a raft. I also learn it can’t maneuver and move across the river like a kayak. In the third set of class III rapids the guide in front of me skillfully moves from river right to left to avoid a series of shallow rocks. Despite my best attempt I find myself going straight down the middle of them and making things up as I go along. I feel amazing when I move along full steam and spot rocks, holes and obstructions and avoid them, all the while grinning like an idiot and paddling my little heart out. Of course I can’t keep it up forever and get stuck right in the middle of some big water & rocks, which turns out not to be a big deal when I wriggle my way off again.

Stoked on that one

We continue in this fashion for what feels like hours, threading around rocks and riding the biggest wave trains the river has to offer. Each one is a new challenge and it’s amazingly exhilarating to be completely in control of my own craft. At the top of a big set our guide laughs hysterically and instructs us – “There’s a huge hole at the bottom of this one – hit it as hard as you can!”. Following instructions yields the desired result as my craft and I almost completely submerge and I just manage to stay right side up and paddle out.

Hitting the hole dead-on as instructed

The only incident of the day comes when Mike grabs the raft during a brief rest break. He’s upstream of it and the current grabs his kayak and pulls him under in a split second. The water is shallow and the raft is literally on top of him, so he can’t roll right side up, causing those in the raft to run around frantically trying to help. He ends up pulling his deck and going for a swim, thankfully only his pride a little dented.

Paddling hard to stay straight

The river mellows a little and moves from mostly III’s to mostly II’s and we have some really fun wave trains to attack and play around in. Our guides also relax a lot and after some encouragement are soon surfing standing waves and trying to spin 360’s off rocks. At the take-out they cut up a watermelon and a couple of the best pineapples I’ve ever had in my life and we eat them right there on the side of the river. They also let it slip they were expecting both of us to swim multiple times, so we’re both bursting with pride at our performance.

Mike looking serious

This is the first time I’ve been in control of my own white water craft and needless to say I’m completely hooked and can’t wait to get out again. The guys at Costa Rica Descents have paddled all over North and Central America and it really shows – they were amazing and I highly recommend them to anyone in the La Fortuna area.

The river crew with fresh fruit

We finish out the day with a soak in the free hot springs just near Tabacón Resort. There is more hot water here than I’ve ever seen, quite literally a rushing river of it, complete with rapids and natural water slide.
This youtube video shows how to find it (easy) and also gives a good idea of just how much hot water there is.

Getting a little wet

Bursting through the waves

-Dan

The next morning the wind was down and we made our way down the shoreline of the West Arm of the lake.

Dan and Bill on Bennett Lake

We checked and double-checked and made a group decision to cross, knowing full well we were all dead if we capsized. As Brett very calmly stated “If a grizzly bear falls out of the sky into the canoe right now, we’re not capsizing this boat”. We made it across with no problems at all, and just as we were nearing shore I hooked onto a 6lb lake trout – Bill was so excited there were a few tense moments of rocking side to side. We managed to keep things under control and got it aboard.

Very proud Dan with his lake trout

Later in the day we pulled the canoe up a small creek to the most amazing lake I have ever seen – perfectly calm and tucked in between snow-capped peaks. I’m not supposed to name the lake, so I won’t and please don’t ask.

Pulling up the small creek to the unamed lake

We stayed on the lake for two nights – we explored the entire length while fishing, swimming and enjoying ourselves immensely. Bill caught three Arctic Grayling which were just as tasty as the lake trout. One evening we again emptied the canoe and played around in the moving water of the creek. Brett showed me all his whitewater moves which were great fun and Bill and I were like maniacs zig-zagging this way and that, more or less in control.

The three amigos at the unamed lake, lake trout cooking on the fire

As seems to be common for my trip in the north, there were lots of huge wildfires burning not far away, so the visibility dropped to almost zero when the smoke rolled in. We had planned to paddle the entire length of the west arm, but now that we couldn’t see the mountains lining the shore, we decided to cut it short and head somewhat for home.

On the smokey lake

Again we crossed the arm and luckily managed to avoid all falling grizzlies. We found another gorgeous campsite and quietly watched the blood-red sun set behind the silhouetted mountains.

The smokey sunset

For our final day we had only to stay close to shore and paddle all the way around to Carcross. The weather was great and the lake very still, but we knew that could change quickly and didn’t dare cross here were the lake is much much wider. We stopped for a swim at every opportunity and jumped in only to run out screaming seconds later

Dan & Brett paddling

What an amazing trip and man-o-man did the victory ice cream taste great!

Arriving at the Carcross takeout safe & sound

-Dan

(Once again A lot of the photos in this article were taken by Brett, credit goes to him.)

Brett and I had been throwing around a bunch of different ideas for the major adventure we should undertake together. Originally it was a multi-day hike into the very remote Deer River Hot Springs – the whole reason I met Brett in the first place. We also threw around the idea of trying to find McArthur Hot Springs – another extremely remote one that almost nobody has even been to, including Brett. We quickly agreed we should go somewhere Brett has never been, and then decided to do an activity that I don’t normally have access to – whitewater canoeing.

For some extra entertainment and paddling experience Brett invited his good friend Bill to be the third member of the trip. The basic plan was to paddle down the Lower Wheaton River to Bennett Lake and explore the lake and surrounds for a few days. Nobody we knew had paddled the lower river before, although we did hear a report from a group that took five days just to get down the river, making us suspect the river would be tough & slow going.

To confirm this suspicion, from the get-go we were ‘lining’ the canoe – walking along the bank holding onto the bow and stern lines to keep it under control as it moved down the current. The water was extremely silty from the glacier melt, which made it very difficult to see underwater hazards. A few corners later we were able to pile into the canoe and paddle away, constantly on the lookout for hazards and always using the calm eddies to re-evaluate our position. Before the trip we talked a lot about how we wanted to be very controlled and cautious – we were not interested in going around any corners blind.

Brett lining the canoe

As we progressed down the whitewater, we were most concerned about two major kinds of hazards:

1. A sweeper is a fallen tree that lies across the river. A sweeper is usually about a foot off the water, allowing the canoe to glide nicely underneath while the occupants will be ’swept’ out. It can be equally as bad when the sweeper is low enough to stop the canoe – the current will swing it around sideways and swamp it. A sweeper can be partial or river-wide and must be avoided at all costs.
2. A strainer is a pile of logs and sticks that has a significant amount of water flowing through it. If the canoe was to get stuck on the strainer or we capsized upstream and got pulled in, the current would pin us and the canoe to the logs, just like a pasta strainer. We would more than likely be pinned underwater, not a pleasant thought.

Dan in front of a nasty sweeper

The first day involved paddling a few hundred meters then “eddying out” in safer calm water. Once safely in the eddy we all piled out and walked downstream until we had a really good view of what was coming next. Sometimes we would see everything was clear and paddle down to the next eddy and sometimes we would find a river-wide sweeper, which we would line the canoe down. The sun beamed down all day and it was over 30 degrees – we all grinned from ear to ear as we made our way down enjoying the river and everything surrounding it. Brett enjoyed commenting that it was “a busy weekend” and how the place was “too crowded” – of course, we didn’t see another person.

Friendly porcupine that wandered into camp

We came across a couple of oddities as we made our way; the board from a wind surfer that was a little worse for wear, a dead moose calf that had apparently drowned not long ago and the front meter of a canoe smashed around a tree. Seeing the remains of the canoe was an excellent reminder of why we were being so cautious and we were all proud of how well we were keeping it under control.

Dan and Brett loving the river

We chose a sand bank from the one of the three thousand vacant spots and set up camp for the night. Brett and Eva like to eat well on their out-trips so there were no dehydrated meals on this trip – fresh pasta sauce, sausages, cheese, bread, oats with 10 all-organic grains added and everything else tasty and healthy you can imagine. We ate like kings.

Brett cooking dinner at our first campsite

Bill chose to sleep in his “tripping hammock” – a beefy hammock with a bug net, rain fly and very complicated system of ropes for setting it all up. Much hilarity ensued when he wound up lying on the ground on the first few attempts then uprooted a couple of poor little trees that weren’t up to the task.
Brett affectionately nicknamed it the “Bear Burrito” and we both broke down in fits of laughter whenever Bill tried to get in or out of it

Bill in his bear burrito

The next morning we moved further down the river again in the beaming hot sunshine. The river became wider and mellower and we made good time all the way to the mouth at Bennett Lake. Looking out over the lake we were all certain it was the ocean, a four foot swell was rolling in with whitecaps adding menacing touch. The lake water is only a few degrees and Brett explained that rivers don’t often kill people in the Yukon, lakes do. On a nice calm day people happily paddle out into the middle of a lake to cross. The weather changes quickly and whips up waves that capsize the unsuspecting paddlers. With the water temperature so low, the body draws in blood from the limbs to keep the core warm, arms and legs quickly stiffen up and people drown very very quickly without even being aware the lakes are dangerous.

Dan Brett and Bill at Bennett Lake

Later in the afternoon when the waves were even bigger, Brett and I unloaded the canoe and paddled out for some surfing fun. This involved paddling out directly into the waves, which was tricky to manage from the bow because the waves were so big my paddle often didn’t reach the water. Once we were out a good way, we would turn the canoe as fast as possible and paddle like made to catch a wave. I’ve never surfed in a canoe before and it was just as much fun as it sounds. Staying close to shore meant we could just swim in if we got in any trouble, but that wasn’t needed.

Dan and Brett surfing the waves

There is a lot more to come on this trip…..

-Dan

(A lot of the photos posted here were taken by Brett, all credit to him.)