The Main....

The trip started with a potential invite for a permitted stretch on the Selway River, the Lochsa’s big sister over in Idaho. The couple days previous to the trip we started noticing the rain and weather, the gauges began rising. If I remember correctly, the personal safety cutoff was about 5 feet on the Selway gauge, anything higher and youre pretty much out of luck on having a successful safe trip. The gauge kept rising.

In preparation for the trip someone loaned Matt a copy of some video explaining the details and rapids on the Selway. Almost immediately we noticed and commented and laughed at the ridiculous nature of these boaters, especially the kayakers. One guy in particular would approach the rapid, fall over, run the rapid upside down and then swim immediately to shore, leaving all his gear to float downstream where somebody else had to deal with it; multiple times. Quite funny.

2 Days before the trip was to leave, the Selway gauge exceeded the 5 foot mark. Everyone bailed. There was a pretty cool option lining up, though, and the trip and most of its participants were to head to the Main Salmon River, an 80 mile stretch of river described as a fun class III-IV between the Middle Fork and the Lower Salmon. Little did we know what was about to happen.

We started picking up new team members and grocery shopping and driving the 8 hours to the put-in at Corn Creek. Driving next to the river we notice how massive a lot of the holes and waves are. Excited. That night we dine on pre-prepared burritos and beers. The whiskey is already half gone. Its raining.

Me laughing: "were so screwed"

In the morning the Corn Creek Shoe gauge reads 6.7. We were to head out and meet three other boats later in the day and have dinner ready for em when they arrive. They never show. We set up a plethora of tarps and ready for the rain. It comes and we get cold so we fire up the best accidental idea Ive ever seen: a 3 hour instant light log. It seems like the river is rising.
In the morning our campfire seemed quite a bit closer to the water than it did last night. I think the water came up the bank 15 feet or more. We estimate its close to 9 feet now, and confirmed that when the giant trees coming downstream started having rootballs. That’s what the ranger said is the indicator for 9 feet. River still rising. With the trees and debris coming down in 5 minute intervals we decide to sit this out instead of rowing with 60 foot trees. This is about the same time I get made fun of for commenting on the burnt trees coming from a burnt area. It never ends.

Later that same day we meet with the other 3 boats that camped 45min above us. With us being out of beer and them having two kegs and a lot more we try and persuade them to our best ability but to no avail. We take note of their gear; shorts, sandals and rain jackets. Our drysuits hanging on the line suddenly seem warmer than they were the day before. They take off, and we learn later, flip a boat and lose some gear and beer. Swimming in 38 degree water doesn’t sound very fun.

Before and after (9ft). Later the
next day the water was
above the downed tree in the foreground (12ft)

Around 7pm that night we witness something quite freaky. A yellow Hyside raft drifts by us, no people and no gear, just a frame. 30 minutes later a purple Maravia floats by, fully loaded and geared but upside down. Fuck. Night time falls fast and the water still rises. Were out of beer.

A nice 50 footer

Our tarp city at Blackadar

The next day we pack up as the debris flow has stabilized. Water still high. Like 12 feet on the Corn Creek gauge high. Like 84,000 cfs high. About time for diapers high. (Note: the biggest water I ever ran before this was in the Grand Canyon at 12,000 cfs in an 18 foot raft) As we head down the river at 12-17 mph we notice all the rapids are gone and the flats have monster eddies and super monster wave trains. Now in 14 foot boats we play everything extra safe. as we near Salmon Falls we see it, a purple boat caught in a eddy. We manage to eddy out and rope it in, remove the debris, drink the remainder of the found whiskey, fix the oar locks and I hop inside. After a few very fast miles, horizontal rain, and dodging wood we find ourselves headed right into one of the largest and longest wavetrains I have ever seen. Tim's 15.5 foot raft disappears and seems like its never going to reappear. Matt freaks out as his son is on that boat and is invisible for seconds upon seconds. It finally reemerges at the next crest. Holy shit.

Im solo rowing the purple boat and find out how easy it is to almost flip on a continuous scale. We make it. I wish we had beer.

We end up at Yellow Pine Bar and see a road from teh river to a nice little house on the cliff. Stopping there we inquire about what we should do with this boat and find out our friends fates and that one is waiting below at the campground so we head there. Turns out one of three boats is there as the flipped one was chased down by the second because it had wallets and keys in it. Bad choice. Drysuits were the deal maker today, thank you NRS!

The Gang: Matt, Levi, Michael, Chris, Timmy, and Mr Stinky

As we start setting up camp we notice the outfitters we spoke with earlier but nobody is there. No customers, no guides. Turns out as the water was showing no signs of receding the company flew its customers out, as the next class II rapid, Whiplash, was way too big and dangerous to continue without getting crazy and tying the boats together in a diamond rig and drifting through somehow. I didnt get it. Something about a giant tongue and 8 foot eddy fences and never escapeable eddies. I get it. We need beer.

When the guides returned from their hike to whiplash a beautiful blonde walks over and introduces herself. Turns out shes the daughter of "old man river" and was on the cover of our river maps. Nice. This chick is tough as nails, and appareantly not to impressed with us. As she walks back to her camp I chase her down for a "very important question"..... "do you guys have any extra beer that the customers left?" "No", she responds, as everyone there was extremely Mormon. Damn, stumped again. It begins to rain again.

The next day one of the boys and I get to hang with the awesome couple watching the Yellow Pine Bar awaiting radio communications from Whitewater ranch about our proposed road evacuation. We got to sample a ton of Homebrew and tour the property. The only way into this place is via jetboat or small plane for which theres a private landing strip that is far from flat and all grass and rocks. Neat.

After unloading and taking out at the awesome Whitewater ranch, we somehow borrow a 3500 and trailer and drive out with the rest of the yahoos. Life is good. Somewhere on the drive out we drive next to 40 miles of amazing high class IV creekage. Life on land is pretty good, and freezing wet. What an awesome trip! Going again on Sunday!