The Trip Report:
This canoe run took place two years ago. Over time, with the number of canoe trips, many memories merge and fade. From this trip I have few general recollections from the trip, and one specific one that I will remember for some time.
The power of water is diverse and immense. Over time it is helps destroy mountains, cut out deep valleys through rock. It generates electricity for millions of houses. It has the power to keep you alive, just by being present for you to drink. At it's worst a river in flood is a true disaster. This article demonstrates the power of water on a normal river on a normal day. No disasters here...
The canoe trip was on the Elbow river in the city of Calgary Alberta. I'm not sure at what stage a creek becomes a river, but the Elbow is a river. When it flows into the Bow river you can easily walk across it in most places. There is no point on the river that I know of that I could not easily throw a rock across it as well. That is to say it is a small river, not much more than a creek. It is small, but it does run with a touch of speed, being on the edge of the foot hills of the Rocky Mountains.
I believe our run was an after work run, if not, it was a run that started latter in the day. I know it was Richard I was with, we were a single tandem canoe running down the river. I recall I enjoyed the company, and the trip. These are the general vague recollections, but common for many of my trips.
I don't recall many specific details about the run, I've been down this section of the river several times, and they are all blurring together in my memory. I do however remember the fisherman, the police man, the firemen, the rescue boat, , the traffic jam, the fire chief, and the fact that we paddled the river during the Calgary Stampede, which is to say lots of people watching.
We had just paddled passed the fisherman, an older gent who we find out later fishes here nearly every day. There are lots of them fishermen guys in this city, but usually on the Bow River. Because the Elbow is such a small river we have no real choice but to run through his casting area, oh well, gives us a chance to say hi. Around the next corner we come to one of many bridges over the river (24th st?). From 50m up stream it is clear there is something pinned against the pillar. My fist thought is a canoe, but from a distance we can not tell. As we get closer we decide it is not, some kind of garbage caught up. Then just as we are are about to go under the bridge we realize it is in fact a canoe.
The canoe is a Heleman (sp?), I've been told these can be wrapped around a rock, and then stomped back into shape. This one has been crushed flat, and completely wrapped around the pillar backwards. The seat and at least one gunwale is broken. By the time we see it is a canoe, we are already passing it. On the way to the take out we agree that we will rescue the canoe from the pillar and see what we can do to fix it. Having build my own canoe, I'm confident I'm about to get a free one.
Rich is driving today, a good thing. Rich is one of the those people on the planet that keeps more stuff in his car than the physical size would seem to allow. In addition to our paddling gear, this includes his mountain climbing rope, and the big 'beaner' (sp?) use on the climbing harness (not to mention his mountain bike, his camera, and god only knows what else).
We get the canoe back to the river, and paddle across to check out the situation. The canoe is still there, and so is the fisherman just upstream and in sight. Looking at the canoe, you can see it has completely collapsed in on itself. The gunwale is about 2 inches above the keel. It has been totally crushed by the water, and bent around the pillar. No part of the canoe is more than three inches from the pillar. A complete and utter taco situation.
The water is running strait into the pillar, here it is actually quite deep for this river, a channel about 8ft wide, and 5 feet deep, and running fast. We can not wade out, but that is okay - we have a canoe. The river is fast enough that we can not get to, and hold our position at one of the sides of the pinned canoe by paddling ferrying across. On the other side of the pillar we get the rope tide on, with me paddling my guts out, and Rich doing the tying. I'm pleased we do not end up taking a cold swim. Although it is difficult, we manage to get it tied up, but only get a loop around one end, and moved to the center of the canoe.
The fisherman watches as he fishes. So currently we have only one spectator... later there will be more.
We do not have the gear to do a Z-pull. But we try pulling it off to the bank. As expected it does not even move a millimeter, and completely ignores our efforts. Expected, as we both feel we know the power of the river, and know there is no way we can pull against it... but really we had no idea. The canoe could have moved at least a bit, just enough to acknowledge out existence.
Obviously we need to pull the canoe up out of the water, and not up against the current.
Soon one end of the rope is up on the bridge. Lots of people are going to the fair grounds for the Stampede. We could not pull the canoe against the water, but figure we should be able to pull it up, so that we are not fighting the water.
Still the fisherman watches.
As Rich and I are jerking and straining on the rope, we can not see the canoe, as it is beneath the overhanging deck of the bridge. We holler down to the fisherman to see if we are moving it with our efforts. He tells us it looks like it's coming up... maybe an inch or so.
A police car goes by, the lone officer looks at us as we are yanking on a rope. It's stampede time in Calgary, there are lots of people out. lots of funny looks coming our way as we grunt on the end of the rope. With some fast talking, soon we have 4 others helping us pull. We are making the canoe come up. Mr. fisherman figures a good 4 or 5 inches. We are all heaving, but the helpers are loosing interest. The same police car goes by again, he also gives us a funny look. One end of the canoe has come up, but the rope slips off.
We are back canoing and trying to tie on, we spend a long time getting it tied as well as we can. The fisherman is no longer just watching, he is over talking to us. I guess what we are doing has become more interesting than the fish. He tells us that the canoe has been there for about a week, and that we are the 5th or 6th attempt to free the canoe. The last guy was a fisherman that tried to wade out, his wading pants filled with water and he 'shot' down stream as his pants became filled with water and flared out like a parachute. Up until now he was the closest to success.
After getting it tied on, we are back on top of the bridge. We are not screwing around any more. We bring Rich's car on the bridge, and using a double figure eight tie the rope to the bumper, with Rich's big honkin' carabener(sp?). We've stopped both cars and pedestrian traffic, just in case the rope breaks. We figure, another few seconds and the canoe is ours.
The rope is not fed through the guard rail properly the rope pulls down into a crack between the concrete plates of the bridge. A large piece of concrete falls into the water. Opps... it was cracked already and was doomed to fall anyways, we just sped it up by a year or so. The rope is not transitioning a 90 Degree bend, and some what pinched. It's not going no where.
We untie, and let traffic flow again. The police car goes by again just after we get traffic flowing. He must be starting to think something is up, cause he is really looking at me this time, as rich is walking back from his car, he just moved off the bridge.
We talk, Rich tells me and the fisherman, who has now decided what we are doing is way more interesting than fishing, that he was hitting the gas pretty hard. The canoe does not seem to have moved. We figure the rope was caught in the concrete, we decide that we need to run the rope trough the upper part of the metal hand rail. That should reduce the friction, allowing us to pull the canoe up.
Once again we have the rope tied to the car, pedestrian traffic is stopped again but car traffic only in one direction. Rich is driving forward trying to pull the canoe out, but the rope now pull from his hitch upwards. He cant get enough traction, as the car lurches a bit but does not gain any ground. The rope is scary taught, and lifting the car. Then the police car drives up, and stops. Officer friendly, rolls down his windows and asks in voice sounding both confused, exasperated, and maybe even interested, "Just exactly what are you guys doing?". We tell him we are trying to rescue a canoe wrapped on the pillar. He tells us "Stop.. just stop, your gonna kill someone, wait here."
So we unhook the rope, Rich drive the car to a near parking lot. The officer pulls over at the other side. He's decided to call in the pros. Yup, the fire department is coming to try. Rich and I are surprised; first that we could not pull the canoe off with the car. Second, that the fire department would come for something like this. The officer tells us that we need to remove it or someone will get hurt or drowned trying to get it.
The fire truck takes a long time to show. About an hour. About 30 minutes into the wait, chit-chatting with the officer he asks "wait-a-minute, how come you guys are dry?". We answer with a confused question. He explains that if it is our canoe, why are we not wet from falling in the river. We tell him “It's not ours, we just found it”. He did not seem to appreciate our enthusiasm for getting what looks like a piece of junk off the bridge pillar so much after that.
Finally the fire department show. They end up bring the jet boat up river. Two divers are in the water re-tying up the canoe again. Using our rope as a rescue line encase they get swept down stream (and one does). After about 30 minutes the get the canoe tied, and seem to have done a much better job than us. This followed about an hour of trying to get the other end of the rope to the jet boat, which is having trouble holding position in the fast and shallow water. At one point the engine died, and the boat floated way out of sight down stream. Must have sucked in to many rocks.
The plan is to and then tie the other end the jet boat, and go down river and pull one end of the canoe upstream through the current, and get the canoe off. They almost, but never succeed in tying to the jet boat – probably lucky for them.
It is getting dark. Rich and I are still on the bridge, there is a continuous crowd of 20-30 onlookers, everyone seems to stop to watch for a minute then move on. 5 or 6 cops, 8-10 firemen.
The firemen, including the deputy chief who eventually calls off the canoe rescue due to darkness. He's standing next to me, and I comment that I doubted they could pull it off with the boat. He agrees "There is no -bleep- way they can pull it off with that boat. We'll come back tomorrow with a block and tackle".
I suggest they just cut the canoe in half... it was pretty mangled anyways.
Next week we ran the river again. The canoe was gone. I wonder how they got it off?
