Alsek River Day 7

July 12, 2012

Pat and I in the foreground.

We are halfway through the trip. The big nerve racking, butterflies in your stomach rapids are now behind us. The water is much bigger now with the glacier melt from Lowell, several rivers, and many creeks adding to the flow. Waves and holes are random and big and avoidable.


We had a great day of paddling today! Nice whitewater, lots of wave trains but no BIG holes. Camp is just above the normal Range Creek camp. It is a nice small bench. We set up camp, eat lunch.

In the evening John, Pat and I go for a walk to look for clear water (not glacial). There is a waterfall just upstream of us, unfortunately it is on the other side of rock wall (our side) cliff (far side) and a fairly deep but narrow channel of the creek. We head up the bluff behind camp (not the rock wall) to see if we can hike up and around to the source of the waterfall and the channel. There are beautiful, deep green lakes dotted throughout the bedrock bluffs above the river. Amazing views up and down river. We bushwhack through big alders to the top of a ridge hoping to see into the valley behind us but the alders and poplars are even more dense at the top. This has been a theme of our hiking so far on this trip. We do see a den across the bedrock bluffs on another ridge, seems kinda large, maybe wolves (we saw footprints) or wolverine but not large enough to be bear, we think.