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St. Maries River, January 25, 2003

By Brian Burns

The timing for a St. Maries trip this season has been difficult, to say the least. With a drastically reduced snowpack, and a freshet that happened sometime in the dead of winter, trips on this river have been run immediately after rain events.

Unfortunately, Jerry Williams' SCKC trip was several days after the last rainfall, and the river was dropping quickly. By March 29th, it was flowing at 953 cfs, according to the Santa gaging station, and Jerry was thinking about a change of venue, possibly the St. Joe Tumbledown section. After hashing it out at the meeting spot and interviewing some locals about the condition of the St. Joe road, Jerry decided to run the St. Maries, even if it meant some rock scraping. I've run it at 800 cfs and still had a good time, so I was happy with his decision. It turned out to be a fine level and all seven boaters (Marlene and Jerry Williams, Lindy Swartz, Pat McElwain, Gabe, Chris, and I) really enjoyed the day. The weather was beautiful (58°F) and we actually saw several other boaters (rafters and canoeists) running the river.

Many thanks to Dolly McElwain for running shuttle, and to Jerry for putting this trip on the 2003 schedule!