Sauk River Volunteer Adventure

Early Saturday morning we loaded our gear bags, dogs and mugs full of coffee into the car and headed off to the Sauk river for some volunteering and rafting.  Before we left Bellingham we had to fuel up with delicious breakfast sandwiches.  "You all headed up to the mountain?" Inquired the cook. "Nope off to the river!" We exclaimed with grins hanging from our sleepy faces and off we went.  

Pulling into Whitechuck boat ramp the clouds started to lift and the rain kept to a quite drizzle.  We went right to work shoveling and racking out clogged drainage systems.  Dogs at our heals eager to help out where needed and greet new visitors to the area. We filled bags of trash, trimmed overgrowth that had flowed into parking spaces, racked leaves, and devoured a delicious bowl of hot chowder and corn bread.  Spirits high from our hard work and bellies full from a warm meal we knew there was only one thing left to get done, go rafting!

Dedicating the day to new friends and new adventures, we decided to float a new section of the river to keep with flow. At the 530 bridge we launched our boat and boom! Right away we saw two giant Salmon dancing across the water.  Breathing in the cool crisp air we couldn’t have been a happier group of boaters.  Especially being that we were able to take two people on their first ever river rafting trip. Throughout the float I found myself trying to keep track of how many bald eagles we encountered but I lost track after 13 or so. I never felt any less amazed as they continued gracing us with their enormous wingspan and intelligent gaze. The color of the water against fall colors and painted snow capped mountains made the extra layers we were wearing well worth the gorgeous float.  Best of all, I didn’t even get my feet wet.

 

Thank you new friends for a great day. And, thank you Martha from Darrington Friends for Public Use for providing us with tools to clean the Whitechuck boat ramp.  We’ll be back again soon!

Catch you on our next adventure!
-Kristi

"You guys run the river at night?"

Downstream view on the Nooksack

Recently the Adventure Cascade crew found ourselves on the water. When you get right down to it, we love being out there, and often find any excuse to stay out. As we floated through the pools of the Nooksack river, an idea begin to form amongst our all employee trip. It was such a nice evening, why should we get off the water earlier then necessary?

Is it a full moon? It might be close to a full moon. We argued amongst ourselves, when was the last full moon? As we drifted by our take out, we discussed who would have to hitchhike back to the take out to the vehicle that we were now passing by. A fisherman watching from shore called out in friendly warning, "where you going?" we told him our new takeout plan, he smiled, "you won't make it before dark!" We continued on.

View of the Twin Sisters from the Nooksack River

As the sun began to set we admired the alpen glow on Mt Baker and the Twin Sisters. The sky colors were phenomenal as sunsets in the great northwest tend to be. Pink, red, orange, ending in a gray and blue.

I spotted movement. In the fading light it was difficult to say what it was. "Hey guys, is that an animal?" No,” said my companions, “it's a piece of wood.” As we grew closer my piece of wood began to move. It was a large beaver, large enough to remind me of the critters in the Princess Bride, well definitely the largest beaver I've ever seen. He/she regarded us with skepticism, these humans on the water at this late hour. The big guy ambled to the water and swam away, presumably towards home. 

The bald eagles decided in the last of the light to give us an acrobatic show. One of the values of a sunset trip is the increased chance of seeing wildlife. As the sunset was officially complete we realized that we were not even close to a moon showing soon.

Our laughter startled a couple having a romantic tryst on the side of the river. The gentleman yelled at us, "it's awesome you guys know the river so well you can run it in the dark." We laughed again and continued on, we do know the rivers well.

As we safely approached our take out the idea for a commercial sunset trip was born -not to be run in the dark but carefully timed to take off as the sun set finished. We made it back to our respective vehicles without a hitch, and went on to warm meals. As always, we believe in the choose your adventure approach to life, and on this occasion we were rewarded well for it.

Post sunset from the Nooksack River

Katie Higgins has been with Adventure Cascades since its creation. She has worked on rivers all over the country for the past decade, and decided to make the northwest her home after falling in love with the waters of the North Cascades. Look for more stories and insights from her and our other guides on our weekly blog; or check out website www.adventurecascades.com