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| The Styx Valley: photo by TimmmyT |
There is nothing quite like dragging your boat through the rainforest.
Or through the alpine, up over a pass, and into a new drainage...but that is a story for
another day. There is a run in the Southern Alps of New Zealand that any visiting creek boater
should not miss. This run is good, and to me the hike-in makes it all the better. It is a
great test run for any one new to the coast, anxious to see if they measure up to NZ creeking
standards. It has it all. An almost perfect curve of boating difficulty. From the class V at the top
to the class II at the bottom, you get a taste of it all. So test out your walk-in strategy and
take a journey with me into the Styx watershed.
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| Posse at the put-in: photo by DaveF |
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| EvanJ, backpack set up: photo by DaveF |
We had just driven down from Murchinson to the coast. We passed through Greymouth and
moved southwards towards the heli-kayak capital of the world: Hokitika. It had been raining
the entire drive. We had camped on a beach comprised of river rocks deposited at the mouth of
the Grey River. Now we were at the coffee shop in downtown Hokitika looking to paddle. We ran
into Alex Podolak, a pure "Colorado Kayaker," who had spent a year between 2001 and 2002 making a name
for himself in New Zealand. They had just released the new addition of the NZ guidebook and Alex was
all over it. Wave-wheeling Mauria, running the portage on the Holyford, etc, etc, etc, and with us
being the Colorado river cowboys that we are, we hooked up to do some paddling. We decided
to warm up for some heli-trips with two hike-in runs that are situated in a nice, close proximity
to one another; the Toaroha and the Styx.
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| Grant walking in towards the goods: photo DaveF |
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| Pete amongst the cows: photo by Grant |
The Toaroha is a short hike and therefore a short run, but is set in a beautiful gorge.
More than anything this hike got our legs and our backs warmed up for the afternoon. We met up
at the trailhead for the Styx with some of Alex’s Kiwi mates from his previous trip, Eden and
Johnno. Now, as I mentioned previously, it had been raining all night. Also, it should be noted
that the Styx doesn’t need much flow to be runnable, but the Toaroha does, and it had plenty… so,
you figure it out. The Styx would be CHARGING.
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| Almost to the top: photo by TimmmyT |
The only other vehicle at the park was an oversized camper with a HUGE rack sporting large Riot
and Red Bull decals. We charged up the trail with gusto…or at least at first. I was hanging as
tough as I could with the Kiwi’s, but hanging for the entire five mile hike was going to be tuff.
They were just charging up the trail and eventually I started to fall of pace. Most everyone else
wasn’t even trying to keep pace, but Alex, being the stud that he is, represented for Colorado big
time. As we neared the top we noticed a large piece of the trail missing…actually it was more like a
chunk of mountain that was missing. A landslide form the previous day’s storm had created some serious
erosion. As we looked down from this section of the trail we saw Steve Fisher, Ben Brown and
company, collecting themselves after the first few tough drops, and organizing their numerous video
cameras. This was certainly shaping up to be a BIG day, with some STRONG flow on the Styx! (notice the differnece in water color between
the picture below, from day one, and the action pics from day two).
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| Looking down on the Riot posse: photo by TimmmyT |
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| Pete boofing into the light: photo by Grant |
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| Dave running safety: photo by Grant |
We put on, and from there, everything is a blur. At least I didn’t swim. I remember not
scouting at all because Eden and Johnno knew the run so well. I remember being in an
eddy near the top, looking over my shoulder at the horizon line and peeling out wondering
why I couldn’t see anything but the tops of southern birch trees in the distance.
I also remember being in an eddy above a difficult drop, which required a strong ferry to
river right, out in front of a nasty rock and down through a complex drop. I remember blowing
the ferry, bouncing off the rock, rolling and recovering just in time to catch the last micro
eddy above the next significant horizon line. Basically, peel out and repeat the aforementioned
technique was what constituted my way down for
about half of the ten hard drops at the top. I managed to clean the other half of the tuff stuff. So I was boating about
.500 at this point; an excellent batting average, but a scary way to run a steep and flooding
west coast creek.
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| Trying to stay upright on run two: photo by Grant |
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| Pete boat scouting: photo by Grant |
Luckily the gradient began to ease and we moved into some still demanding, yet less stiff moves.
I was starting to feel better about the day and from there on down it was pure, unadulterated,
non-seat of the pants, but still challenging, fun. Towards the bottom of the class IV stuff where
the gradient really
begins to ease off (i.e. you can see your next move from your boat), we noticed a rope strung
across half of the river. We eddied and climbed out of our boats (for the first time on the
run) to investigate. Apparently Mr. Fisher had nearly been sucked down into a doomy sieve. The
sieve is completely invisible from a boat scout and it is definetly in the easy water compared to that
above. As the story was relayed to me, Fisher made a ninja type boat exit, using all his command of the
force to remove his sprayskirt and exit his boat in an airborne fashion, simultaneously as his boat
was being sucked into the sieve. He landed miraculously on the rock forming the sieve and was eventually roped
to shore. But his boat was intending to remain in the sieve.
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| Evan looking to make a move: photo by Grant |
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| Timbuck: photo by Grant |
Mr. Fisher proceeded to walk out while the rest of his crew paddled to the take-out.
The Kiwi’s, being the "can do" people that they are, continued to try and remove the boat
from the sieve. And just as I’m sure you would have guessed, they pulled the thing out.
It wasn’t looking so good. It had a large crack in the bow and a couple of other dents, but we hauled
it to the take-out anyway. Mr. Fisher rewarded us with a case of Red Bull. While I changed out of
my wet gear in the approaching darkness, Alex and the Kiwi boys pounded five to seven Red Bulls…
a piece.
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| Pete charging it: photo by Grant |
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| Posse playing leap frog: photo by Grant |
Needless to say, that night at the bar was one to remember. A few days later, when the
flow had settled down a bit, we were back at it, and it was a significantly different run. It was pretty much
an entire class easier with even a strong medium flow, but it was still one of the best runs around. The
second run is when most of the pictures are from, mainly because it is much easier to take
pictures when you’re not shitting your board shorts.
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| NZ creeks are refreshing, go there if you can |
CLICK HERE to read "I love to Hike-in Vol. I, A Night of Rain in Fiordland"
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