On a work trip out to my home state (MN) I couldn't resist but to take a couple of extra days to head up to the North Shore and do some Minnesota creeking. After making a few calls to some friends and finding some people to paddle with I would soon be on my way.
Once I arrived in MN I started hooked up with my friends who just came back from the North Shore and they said everything was getting really low. I would have to find the last of the creeks running and scrape down them. Getting a little bummed I could still run the Cascade River, a river that is run at low flows and consists of five waterfalls, each one seemingly getting harder. I studied up on it and couldn't wait to get up there; I love waterfalls, especially when they’re easy to get to.
So early Monday morning Heather, Andy, John and I headed up to the Cascade River to just plain huck ourselves off some waterfalls. The closer we got the more excited I became, finally creeking in MN! On our way to the Cascade we passed creek after creek after creek each time peering into the gorge below right before they flowed into Lake Superior.
We finally reached the Cascade River and walked to the takeout to check the level, as we got there Andy just froze and said you've got to be kidding me. The river that was normally run at thirteen to eighteen inches below was now flowing at two above. He looks over at me and said it would be the highest it'd ever been run, it was even high on the upper section. So we ran up and looked at the last falls, Lovers Leap, a thirty plus foot plunge that fell into the right wall and spit out a narrow shoot. On river left it boiled into a cave that flushed behind the falls, it looked terrible from straight on. So we went up one more drop (number four), which is normally portaged due to the massive hole at the base. We looked at it and as soon as I walked up to it I knew right away I'd never run it at this level. At lower flows than this, five out of five professional paddlers had to get roped out of the drop, luckily in their boat because forty feet down stream is Lovers leap. We talked about it for a bit and Lovers Leap looked runnable from the top, but we decided it wasn't exactly the drop we would like to start out on.
So after some thoughts we headed south and stopped at the Onion River. Walking up this one was pretty amazing, I looked between the trees and saw the biggest slide I'd ever seen in my life. I looked at Andy and asked if we could run the whole thing. "Yep", and I looked back at the slide and still couldn't believe it, this thing was massive. It put anything on Big Timber in MT to shame, and that's tough to do. So we hiked up and looked at it but Andy thought it was too low, I reluctantly agreed and we moved on. I was so bummed, I love slides, and this would have made one epic photo and video shoot.
At this point we were in disbelief; this creek was only five miles away from the last one we looked at that was way to high. Andy now confused wasn't sure where to go, so we headed to Two Island River. We walk up to the first drop and Andy asks, "What do ya think?" "I say lets do it" so we told everyone that it was a go. The drop was about 25 feet, the first part sliding five feet into a five foot vertical into a fifteen foot vertical. We got our cameras set up and Andy went first, he went right where he wanted to. I scouted it a little bit more and went up to fire it off, my line wasn't so pretty. I slid down and went off the five footer that pushed my bow right and pitoned the right wall making me fall off the fifteen footer sideways. I eddied out and as soon as Andy came up to me I just said, "That's Bullshit, I'm going again!” I hiked back up and Heather wanted to go next, her line was perfect. Then Andy and I went back up and both ran it again, both having perfect lines.
We headed down stream running some class III-IV rapids and get out above another slide, this one being about twenty feet. It was a pretty easy slide that at the base disappears into a huge culvert, it was about two hundred feet long with a pretty sharp turn in it. As Andy was getting into his boat he broke his back band; he then decided not to run it. So I went up and lined up for the slide and slid right into the tunnel, the water was going fast but was really shallow. I came up to the turn and the water banked off the wall and went sharp right, at the point things were getting really dark. I hit the wall and banked to the right, suddenly things were getting lighter and soon I dropped into Lake superior. I sat at the exit of the tunnel waiting for Heather, I start hearing something like a boat hitting rock and suddenly I hear a huge "Thwap!” and I thought to myself, sounds like she's at the turn, soon she came skipping out of the tunnel. We paddled on Lake Superior to a boat-launching site and got picked up by John.
That night we were trying to figure out what to do the next day. After many discussions and ideas, we just had to wait to see what the water was going to do the next day. We watched the weather outside and it just kept raining and raining, but the next day it was supposed clear up. In the morning it was drizzly and foggy, not what we wanted. So we took off and checked out the Brule River, we wanted to look at Devils Kettle (run only once) and then check out the falls below which had never been run. As we pull up to the river it looked really high, but we went up to check out the falls anyway. We arrived at the first falls and it had a ton of water. I looked runnable but I didn't want anything to do with it with that much flow, this drop has a huge slide lead in, into a twenty-foot falls that looks shallow. So we continued up to Devils Kettle, this is a very unique drop, half of the river falls into a hole on the river right side and disappears. They have yet to find out where the water goes. So if you end up here you’re done for. The line is river left off a veil folding over to river right. This drop has been run once by John Kiffmeyer, We all decided not to run it and took off to the next river.
Andy started talking about a drop that had never been run, mostly because it needed a ton of water and it was a really shallow landing. We went there and it looked good to go, so we all decided to run it, Andy and I ended up running it twice and Heather ran it once. It was a pretty big slide into a vertical fifteen footer; we had to be really careful because it was so shallow at the base. When we first got there Andy took a log to check out the depth of the pool, he stuck it in and it went in about three inches. I really didn't need to see that, I mean I already new it was shallow, no need to rub it in. We started center and worked our way far right onto a boil where the main current was. We all had great lines and a ton of fun, but we needed to head out so we could run some more stuff.
So we packed up and were trying to figure out where to go next, everything was so high. We decided to check out the Onion again, Andy didn't think it would be in, so just he and I ran up quick to check out the level. It was definitely higher then the day before but was it high enough? We started walking up the trail and came to an opening to check out the slide, with the fog being in place the slide just disappeared into the fog, it looked amazing. So we hiked up a little farther to the base of the first major part of the slide it was a lot higher. Andy thought it looked good and asked what I thought; "It looks good but what about the hole at the bottom"? "I think we'll have enough speed we won't even notice it". Now the main thing I was worried about was ending up slightly out of control and landing in the hole sideways. You couldn't swim here; the current would pull you right into the next slide and if that happened you would have more broken bones then I would like to imagine. After a little discussion we decided to run it, so we went back to the car to get everyone else. We set up the cameras and got ready to go, Andy decided to go first. He made sure we were ready and started his hike up to the top, we sat half way down the slide waiting for him to come over the horizon line. Finally we saw him, bolting over horizon line bouncing down and dropping into the first pool. He was in the current and wasn't able to eddy out so he went directly into the bottom part of the slide and hit an eddy a few hundred yards down stream after that.
Andy hiked back up and I talked to him about the drop, he said it was really big and fun, so we went up and scouted the top part of the slide. I now decided to run it, they set up the cameras while I finished scouting, finally they were ready and so was I. I got in my boat and gave a whistle blow to let them know I was ready; I pushed off and entered the slide. I was right on line, as I entered the steep part of the slide I launched off a small vertical and reconnected about fifteen feet down then dropped into the base of the first part of the slide. I was able to eddy out right away and Andy helped me out of my boat. When I reconnected I hit hard and hurt my back on the impact, so I got out and stretched for a bit. Heather and I scouted the last part of the slide and she decided to run it, she put in and took off down the slide. I watched as much as could until she disappeared. I hopped on right after her and had a great line, and met her in an eddy down stream, we hiked out and met everyone at the car. We talked about our lines while packing everything up and headed home.
For the first time since I moved away from Minnesota I actually found myself wanting to stay. There was too much stuff to run to leave right now, so many waterfalls and no time left. I can't wait to go back! Check out more photos here Stay Safe
~Nate~