Impatient

I can unhappily report that as of today, April 25, Sixmile is nowhere near doable. Was hoping to shake the rust off in some low water conditions, and the scouting at the put-in gave me hope, but there is still much snow covering it in the first canyon section. Still maybe two weeks out (pure guess on my part).

Any other early reports, particularly from places that get a bit too sporting in high-water, ie Echo Bend?

From my experience, April is still quite early in the Chugach for rafting. I would check to see if Glacier Creek from tram to Girdwood bridge, or maybe even Kenai River from Cooper’s Landing to Skilak Lake is raftable. They are no where near as intense as 6-mile, or Echo Bend but offer some good water to break the rust off.

I also would check out Ressurection Creek…if you find a GoPro let me know! I lost one last year in a log jam near Hope.

Does anyone have any information regarding the Matanuska downstream of Granite Creek? It might be open to the Old Glenn Highway bridge. It still looks totally bridged upstream from Granite at the big bar between Kings River and Granite Creek. Still, it would be a nice mellow start to the season to float from Sutton to the Old Glenn if there are no ice bridges.

You should try Knik river from the Eklutna tailrace to the Glenn highway. It never freezes up all winter long due to the relatively warm water coming from
the power house. I’ve paddled it in march. if you have a kayak, you can paddle up stream, float back down, and not need to set shuttle.

James

Add Echo Bend rapids to the list of things still with snow bridges on them. Upstream is (mostly) clear, although buttscraping low in places, for anyone wanting a leisurely hike and float. Hike up from ERNC not too mucky. Hiked to Icicle Creek today but didn’t see any reason why even further up wouldn’t be clear.

Thanks for Knik suggestion. I’ve thought of it but I like a little (not too much) excitement if I’m not bringing visitors. :wink:

PATIENCE NEEDED NO MORE!!!

I am happy to report that myself and a friend (Charles) successfully descended Glacier Creek today. The hike in is well defined, but if you had some spik-ies to bring, you might want to; there is a lot of sheer ice. The traditional put in underneath the hand tram has 3 snow bridges across it, so that’s a no-go BUT immediately downstream of where Winner Creek enters, the river has NO river-wide Ice/snow, all of the way to the Alyeska highway. There are a couple tight spots along the way, but all are at least 1-1/2 packrafts wide. There is no wood in the canyon as of today. There IS a river-wide tree about halfway between the end of the canyon, and the takeout. It’s right upstream of the airport. We were able to raft under the tree with only some tree in face action. HOWEVER, at higher flows it could be an issue. The water level was actually fun, and not particularly butt-scrappy. Getting down to the downstream ‘put-in’ we used was the most challenging part of the day. We ended up scrambling down the cliff edge of tundra/ice. We used our throw bag as a repel rope in several places, and it was a god-send. This was no doubt ‘forcing it’, BUT the river itself was actually fun, so if you can’t stand the wait, like we couldn’t, go get it!

Floated Eagle River on Thursday. It was still pretty bridged over, but it was do-able. Quite a few ice dams that we had to get out and scout/portage around, but there were a few fun chutes and obstacles. Put a video up on youtube of some of the more fun parts. (new poster, just search my username if you want to see it, RELspot) Probably needs another couple weeks to be open for real. Campground logjam is pretty gnarly, looks like someone has started cutting a channel on the far right side, but when the water comes up no telling what will happen.

Six mile is open for business, first canyon anyway, no non-naviagable wood. Low water either made for holes I don’t remember from higher levels, or I still suck at this. Anyway, it owned me (again). But it didn’t feel life-threatening, and I think you better paddlers than me (just about everyone) out there would have no issues.

Also can report (it was a busy day) that the Kenai is entertaining too while fishing season is on hold, lot of rocks come out to play at lower levels.

Mighty warm out there boaters. Anyone have any reports of any rivers and creeks open or not?