Leaving the Lodge -- McCarthy Swimming Club

We load the Wildlander one last time from Pedersen Point, the road back to the lodge bearing the fresh prints of homo sapien sapien in black sand and slate gravel. Four years ago I walked onto this beach for the first time: now I watched it recede with the soft familiarity of hundreds of drifts into the waters of Aialik Bay. 

An icefield spills glaciers of impossible size down the mountains and into the sea -- black bears bluntly push through thickets of alder and spruce to the side of the lagoon. A bald eagle perches, watching, as seals and otters stream lazily in the dark water. Addison Peak, still unclimbed, collects clouds rolling off the gulf of Alaska -- all of this is familiar. 

Fours years is a long time, even in a place like this. Yet I stay grateful -- this has been the classroom for a world of experience I could never have expected. Here I've  moved forward into the new as a person and as part of a community, constantly expanding and subject to the rewards and pains of growth. 

And now -- into a new season. 

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I turn back downstream just before the first big wave. My personal, inflatable raft twists perfectly to the splash of my paddle, placed just upstream beyond the backpack lashed to my bow. 

Waaaait a minute. is that an upside-down raft, off right? Red helmet bobbing about fifteen feet in front of it. Ah! Must be Rachel... Collin pushes towards her, is sucked into the same disaster hole, and starts a torturously slow roll to a swim himself.

Maybe I should avoid this. 

I can barely eek left the hole that's just munched Collin. Wham! A face-shot of glacier water stings my face, paddle just far enough in the water to keep my raft aright. Then wave-wave-wave... In the clear. Man, this is a bit more exciting than sea kayaking. 

I turn upstream.

"Woo! Swimmmmahs! Bill, you got the paddle?"

Collin has scrambled back into his seat. Rachel is adrift. I look behind me, and now Kelly floats river-left, about 20 feet in front of her upturned raft. Dear God this has wrecked us.

I drag Rachel's boat to shore, and we all recover in the Wrangell sun to slightly damp gorp. I've never been on a river like this before -- it's my third day of solo whitewater ever, actually. The next day we reach Chitina and drive back to McCarthy, officially trained up to float the Susitna River for the better part of the upcoming month.  

Got to throw a rock, apparently. 

On the McCarthy road. 

The put-in at a glacial lake at Kennicott Glacier.

Packraft camp. 

Packin' the packrafts.

Walkin to the put-in. 

We begin the Kennicott soon!

Sandy camp beside the Chitina River. 

Starting the climb for the up & over to McCarthy Creek. It doesn't look like Killian has his paddle shaft in his pack...

On a ridge of Pourfree Peak (sp?). 

Pourfree Peak ridge, looking at the Kennicott and Root Glaciers. 

Copper miner windows. 

Part of a coper mine infrastructure above Kennicott.