Golden Canyon Run of the South Fork Clearwater, Idaho 2000. A good end to a Class V swim.

Submitted by sparcplug on Sun, Feb 8

Nothing was making sense, the hole, which I thought I was stuck in, wasn't very big , and even though my first roll attempt failed, I had switched sides and tried again. That roll failed also, so I stretched out and tried to grab the current with my blade. Why am I not hitting any rocks I wondered? I knew I was grabbing current from the Maytag effect I felt against my body. I needed air, so I tried to resurface on one side for another roll attempt. I couldn't make it back to my boat on that side, so I tried on the other side, maybe I was closer, but I couldn't wait any longer...

Mike, who had waited below so long without seeing anything of me, had already gotten out of his boat, and told me later that as he had passed me, he had seen that the flat stern of my SPARC had gotten stuck on a downstream rock. Even though he could see the boat once he stood up, he said he never saw it move. He thought I was pinned upside down.
 
One more failed roll attempt and I was out. I came up right next to my boat, grabbed it and it came out with only a gentle tug. Go figure ...??? But now I was in the thick of it, hitting many MANY rocks. I remembered another swim from a long time ago where I rescued myself by paddling my body with my paddle. I tried to get away from the boat to try that, but kept bumping into the boat. The rocks kept coming, and since I couldn't get away from the boat, I crawled up on it to protect my body. I lost my grip on the paddle in doing so. It wasn't easy to hold on, but at least now the only thing I was hitting was my knees. 
 
Mike was yelling at me to let go of everything and swim, and once I spotted a rather largish micro-eddy, I gave it a try. I think I missed that one, but succeeded in getting one of the next ones. After Mike made sure I was OK, he started running down the road after my gear. 
 
Moments later a pickup pulled up, it had some company name on the door, but I didn't notice what it was. Out jumped 3 kayakers in full gear, and they explained that they had been ready to put on when a utility truck had stopped and the driver told them "One of your buddies is in trouble downstream."   So here they were, offering assistance. I thanked them, told them I had swam, but I was OK, and asked if they could head downstream to help Mike rescue my boat. My paddle had rescued itself and ended up in an easy to reach spot.
 
They too disappeared downstream. I went back upstream and tried to figure out where I’d been, as well as recover from my oxygen deficit and examine my injuries. Where I thought I'd been looked benign, so what had happened? Mike told me later that my stern was against the rock, and my bow was still in the hole. Apparently my boat's length, the alignment of the planets and all other conditions were just perfect to hold me in the same place. While my body was whipping in the current, my boat had been rock solid the whole time...
 
Shortly, the truck with the now three grinning guys reappeared. Mike and my boat were in the back. I thanked them all heartily, and asked if I could give them a few bucks for their troubles. The driver said "No", and explained that he was a Perception Rep. “Once he had seen it was a Perception boat”, he went on, “he knew he could rescue it, and the rescue was all just part of Perception's warranty!!!”  
 
NOTES: 
1) Conditions that day on the Golden were low water, 2.4' on a painted bridge abutment gauge downstream in Harpster.
 
2) The SPARC is a Perception boat name “acronymed” from “Small Person's All River Craft.”
 
3) The very same evening that Frank (WKCC newsletter editor at the time) asked me to write up this story for the newsletter's initial “Extreme Corner” article, I picked up and started reading "The ACA's River Safety Anthology : Accounts of Rescue and Tragedy On North American Rivers" by Charlie Walbridge and Jody Tinsley, @1996. Charlie Walbridge himself, has an account of a run on Golden Canyon, where one of his friend's lives was lost. The effect of reading Charlie's account chilled me to the bone. I realize how lucky I am to have swam there, and to have gotten out with only bruises on various parts of my body. Charlie mentions that the Golden run "Also, significantly, ... is very deceptive when viewed from the road that runs alongside."   Both Mike and I have that same feeling. My swim was "caused" by very "freak" circumstances, but any swim on class V could be fatal. So even though the current name of this newsletter section is the “Extreme Corner”, and my swim ended with a happy and even funny ending, I wish to state that in no way does WKCC's inclusion of this article, or any future articles, downplay every boater's need to: be safe on the rivers, get proper instruction including self rescue / swift water rescue training, boat within their capabilities, constantly assess their own performance on the water, and be honest with themselves about whether or not they should be on the river that day.
 
A personal account by Kim Bates