Final trip report by Luke Vollmerhaus about his Classic Alberta Whitewater Trip

Final trip Report

Day 1 and Day 2, 3 and 4 trip reports can be found by clicking on the links.

Well, we ended that with a bang, and a few bumps. To get to Boundary Creek you have to paddle 8 km down the west side of the lake to the American border (hence the creeks name) and hike 3 km up hill through some of the densest bush ever, scouting all the rapids along the way as the canyon is very deep and difficult to scout once on the river. When we finally got to the top of the run sweaty and fly ridden we practically dove into the cold stream. The first couple of drops and a short portage went according to plan and were a blast. Unfortunately the poop hit the spinney thing pretty quick after that. 

There was a series of drops known as Cavity Search that didn’t look like much from atop the cliffs above. They looked considerably larger from the point of view of the troughs of the holes they created. We ran them in a train Liam made it through Zac caught an eddy mid-way and due to a blown boof stroke I got beat in all three holes finally swimming out of the third. I lost my boat and paddle downstream but was throw bagged by Liam from the river side. As he was throw bagging me his boat slid back into the river and went downstream with mine. Now we were in a bit of a pickle: one boat two paddles a camera and in a canyon where hiking a boat out wasn’t an option. So we took the natural course and filmed and set safety for Zac down the rest of the run assuming our boats (which washed downstream far too fast to catch) would make it to the lake. Once at the lake we managed to collect all of our gear minus my prized paddle: a beautiful Sho Gun from Werner. Out came the break down and we paddled back to Waterton. 

As tradition dictated I dutifully accepted a bootie beer and we talked out the situation and other possible ways to have handled it and came to the conclusion that we took the safest most reasonable course of action. Looking back at the trip I give it an A++ only one swim and a couple of beat downs despite some very high class river running. I look very forward to paddling with this crew again ASAP! Keep an eye out for our video edit from Mr. Liam Fournier! It will be sick as his films always are.

Keep a paddle in the water!

Peace,

Luke