It was on a whim that Maxi Kniewasser and Simon Rutherford climbed into a floatplane that landed them at the put in for the Upper Nass River.
A far northern trip had them exploring the Sacred Headwaters, a basin that serves as the source of three wild rivers: the Nass, Skeena and Stikine. Known as a wild salmon habitat and home to caribou, grizzly bears, wolves and other wildlife, the Sacred Headwaters is an enchanted landscape of mountains and canyons, cut by the curvature of free-flowing rivers.
The 125-mile descent was an exploration, as their spontaneity left no time for Google Earth investigation or advice from veterans of the river.
So it was a surprise on the third day when they rounded a bend in a tight canyon and came face to face with a towering river-wide logjam, with water rushing under and through it.
“We instantly started back paddling to slow down and managed to get out on the logs,” says Kniewasser. “We were a bit in disbelief.”
A quick scout left them with no option but to portage through the beastly tangle of trees. “It was a pain in the ass,” says Kniewasser, since the wet and slippery logs made the portage a slow moving, hour-long scramble.
They balanced along branches and passed their boats through the trees, strategically picking their route, often confused with which direction to take.
Logjams are an expected obstacle for those who do some pre-trip research, a somewhat permanent fixture on the Nass. They’re not the kind of blockage that’ll just wash away one day, says Kniewasser, “unless there’s some kind of biblical flood to break it up.”
Part way through the trek, Kniewasser stopped to pull out “old faithful,” a Nikon B700 with a 24-70 lens. Perched on a pile of branches with his kayak in tow, Kniewasser pointed his camera ahead to capture this image of Rutherford picking his way through, over and under the massive tower of timber.
This article first appeared in the Summer/Fall 2014 issue of Rapid Magazine. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions, or browse the archives.
