Smith River, Part 1/4
In June I had the extreme pleasure of being invited to join a group of 10 other people on 4 rafts to travel for 5 days, 4 nights for a total of 59 miles on the Smith River in Montana. It was so much fun that we all agreed to to enter the lottery for a permit for next year -- and probably every year after that!!
The permitting process is run by the Montana State Parks, though the river itself traverses through a mix of public Forest Service and private lands. Campsites are assigned by the permitting system. More details about the river can be found at https://fwp.mt.gov/stateparks/smith-river
The put in is at Camp Baker, and 5 days later the take out is right before Eden Bridge -- assuming you don't float past and miss it!! We stayed at the following campsites:
Night 0: Paul and Jane's (former West Glacier neighbors) house in White Sulphur Springs, a short drive to Camp Baker in the morning Night 1: Upper Scotty Allen (mile 12) Night 2: Lower Bear Gulch (mile 29) Night 3: Parker Flat #3 (mile 37.9) Night 4: Middle Rattlesnake Bend (mile 47.4)
I was invited along by our neighbors Paul & Christine, but did not really know the rest of the group at all, at least at the start, but by the end of the trip we had bonded into life long friends. Part of the rewarding experience of the adventure was getting to know and grow new friendships. This certainly culminated at the campfire on the last night, where few inhibitions between strangers remained, but more on that later 🙂
*THE TEAM:
*There was a natural divide amongst the team based on age.
The /youngins/, left to right Lyndsey, Lane, Jacee, Isaac, Melanie, and Austyn. They are obviously youngsters, sitting outside soaking up sunshine.
The /elders/, from left to right. Paul, Christine, Penny and Keith (and myself not in the photo). They are obviously not youngsters, with little skin exposed sitting the shade.
*DAY 0: West Glacier to White Sulphur Springs*
I'm in Paul & Christine's truck that is towing their two rafts, heading from West Glacier to Great Falls where we will pick up Paul's sister Penny. We then continue on to White Sulphur Springs to spend the night at Paul & Jane's house, who generously let us stay there while they were out of town.
The accommodations are great. The views of the Big Sky are wonderful. The beer at Two Basset Brewery http://2bassetbrewery.com/Home.html are excellent. And the sleeping bag on the couch will be more comfortable than the next 4 nights in the tent.
*DAY 1: Camp Baker to Upper Scotty Alan, 12 miles
*The 22 mile drive to Camp Baker on the dirt road takes about an hour. Arrangements had been made with a service to transport the vehicles to the take out.
There had been quite a bit of rain on the east side, so the river was cresting and running very high. I was in the green raft "Pickle", with Paul, Christine and Austyn at the start. The red raft was named "Strawberry", the purple raft was "Grape", and the gray raft was .... well gray.
There were a few things we learned right away as we launched. The biggest was that none of us had experience rowing on a river, at least with rapidly moving water. Another was that if you take a careful look at Pickle, there is no leg room for whoever is rowing due to a cooler being positioned in the way. The strength in rowing should come from legs, not arms!!
Paul asked if I wanted to row first. After bumping into the banks for 10 minutes in a futile attempt at control, I was relieved of rowing duty and Paul took over. He fared no better rowing!!
40 minutes into Day 1 of a 5 day rafting trip, we rounded a corner where the raft was pushed into a wall surrounding the corner. The back of our raft was bumping along the wall, and I was sitting in the rear "crows nest" fishing seat that extend beyond the back of the raft. I crouched forward as much as possible to avoid being hit by the rocky wall as we bumped along like a pinball. I suddenly saw coming up fast ahead a dead tree sticking out from the wall at my head level. I instinctively ducked my head down and put my right arm up to protect my head, which did prevent the tree from hitting my head. My arm, though, snagged the branch knocking me off the raft and into the water. Did I mention this is only Day 1 of 5 days of rafting and 40 minutes into the trip, and already I'm thrown off?
The good news is that I was able to quickly swim and grab the raft line, as Paul frantically tried to row towards any shore, which was challenging considering how rapid the current was.
I do recall that when we did beach, the Strawberry raft was near us. Austyn was transferred to the Strawberry raft as it was larger. Penny was in the water assisting with the transfer, and getting back in raft was challenging in that swift current. The damage assessment was some scrapes and bruises on my right leg, and the toe of my right raft shoe tore giving me the open crocodile mouth look that I would have to live with the remainder of the trip.
All safely back in rafts, we crack open a river beer and continue on our way, still rafting by braille.
My expectations of the what the river would look like were very incorrect. I thought it would be a meandering river through the rolling eastern front range plains, when in fact it is through a cut canyon of steep rocky walls. Magnificent!! This was to continue the entire trip until it mellowed out on the last day.
One of the fears that day was that the high current would cause us to float past our designated campsite. But with the day's experience of rowing we managed to make it to the Upper Scotty Alan campsite. Done with rafting for the day, it was time to unwind at camp.
Our campsite had Canada Geese and their very young goslings living at it. They wandered very close to us. We counted twelve in one brood.
2023 is the last year that the campsites will provide latrines. Beginning in 2024 the rafting will be strictly pack in/pack out. The latrine at this campsite will not be missed!! It was about 100 feet up a very steep, muddy trail where a lonely commode in the woods awaited. The only redeeming feature was its excellent view of the river.
The nightly camping portion of the trip complements the daytime rafting float. It's a time to unwind, crack open a few libations, review the good (and bad) events of the day, chow down, and tell jokes. This first night we had much discussion around how none of the rowers were able to steer the rafts, how fortunate it was we did not float past the campsite, how fearful tomorrow's floating may be, and so forth. I don't recall who made the comment that raft rowing on a river is supposed to be about 95% rowing backwards to avoid things, such as walls, snags, and rapids, but that discussion made an immediate and dramatic improvement in steering starting the next morning and for the remainder of the trip.
The campsite bonding of the group, with even the goslings joining. I missed getting the memo that it was Melanie's birthday, and thus did not have the appropriate Hawaiian shirts in my wardrobe. Happy Birthday!
We brought sufficient firewood with us for the 4 nights, in addition to an enormous amount of camping supplies. The weather the first night was exceedingly pleasant.
