Happy Cheap

The Happy River can be done for less than $300/person, even without pilot friends and their boats (which could bring price down even more) by judicious use of walking and timing. For example, assuming that the mail plane from Skwentna to Anchorage leaves on Tuesdays:

1. On Thursday, charter a wheel plane (like a 206) from Willow with 4 people going lean and light to land at Puntilla Lake airstrip (i.e. Rainy Pass Lodge) early in AM. Here leave a cache of food and shelter for rest of trip to Skwentna so you can hike upstream and run the best bit of the Happy. Follow awesome horse trails to above Sheep Lake. Ask Shane [one of the stars of the reality show "R 5 Sons"] at Rainy Pass Lodge for trail beta. Looks to be 15-16 miles up to above Sheep Lake; carry just one overnight worth of food/gear. Maybe sleep in cabin/wall tent at Sheep Lake? but watch out for bear there.

2. Friday, float Happy down to crystal clear Indian Creek -- my favorite part -- lots of granite boulder gardens and beautiful views of mountains. River's a beautiful color as it's not mucked up by Moose Creek's glacier melt yet. Follow good horse trail back to Rainy Pass Lodge to get remainder of gear, hike back to river and camp [or pay $100/person(!) to sleep at lodge].

3. Saturday, paddle and play down to end of Happy (side trips en route....Glacier Creek?)

4. Sunday, paddle down to Hayes River (side trips en route) on mighty Skwentna. Moves pretty darn fast -- we made it from Happy to Old Man Cr in less than an hour.

5. Monday, paddle to Skwentna. Again, very fast float, if a bit chilly and sometimes sleepy -- wake yourself up by standing in the boat and/or hitting eddy lines and corner stacks.

6. Tuesday, catch mail plane (check on times and days) to Anchorage, or have pilot friend pick you up in boat or plane.

Happy Daze YouTube Video

Three Happy Days for $300

Gordy Vernon, Thai Verzone, Brad Meiklejohn and I stood on the scale at Willow Air. It read 810, ten pounds too many. Brad wore his “Sheri Dry Suit” (a much-coveted Alpacka prototype) and held his wooden Sawyer paddle (28 oz). I wore blue Crocs Jazz gave me for Fathers’ Day. Tossing aside Thai’s PFD and helmet, our throw bag, and half my food we got to 700 pounds of people and a 100 pound pile of gear.

Thai convinced the pilot to let him include his PFD and helmet, two safety items that Gordy left behind. Gordy also left all clothes but the single layer of Expedition Weight Capilene on his skin, one extra shirt and what no-longer passes as a “dry-suit”. But Gordy's a four-time Wilderness Classic winner and has no insecurities to pack.

Our plan was to fly-in and fly-out to run the entirety of the Happy River in three days for $300 each. The Happy (Class III+) is one of four rivers in Fast and Cold that Embick gave a rating of 5 stars. It’s 32 miles from its birth as a crystal stream to its gray wedding to the milk-chocolate Skwentna. There’re alpine, granite boulder gardens, forested floating, and canyon paddling. The river’s never hard, always moving, always happy.

It’s the best intermediate-level packrafting river I have yet encountered.

Three of us had history with the Happy, of sorts. Thai had bruised a boat and a relationship during an epic run of Honolulu Creek, a consolation trip when his plans for the Happy fell through in 2006. Brad has longed for the Happy for years, going so far as to once offer a fly-in subsidy. My own experience with the Happy extended back to 1989. Mark Stoppel and I walked to Puntilla Lake from Healy as “Noodle Eaters en route to Lake Clark”. With our boots worn out from 3 weeks and nearly 300 miles of wild willows and rocks, we thought maybe we could float out the Happy in our open Sherpa Packrafts, but instead struggled through game-free brush to the Skwentna, intimidated by the sound of whitewater deep in canyon.

On this trip we found the granite boulders’ drops and tongues and the schist canyons’ waves and corners exhilarating and fun, while the water in between with its big boulders for play and practice were instructive for boosting skills and confidence. On the way down to our pick-up at Finger Lake the four of us got our ya-yas out on a side trip that included steep creekin’ down Glacier Creek canyon (2 miles, 225 feet/mile, PR 5+) and a nostalgic-in-style, braided bar run of Old Man Creek (1.5 miles, 100 ft/mile, PR 2), first descents both.

We’d all be more than happy to pay $300 again for what’s an ideal use of a packraft: a lightweight trip down remote rivers that offer fun side trips as walk-up and creek-down runs. So jacked up on the trip were we afterwards that Thai and I did an 11 PM run of Ship’s lower canyon on our way back to Anchorage. Yee Ha!

I’ll be posting video on YouTube …...

Happy River Packing

Ran Ship today with Brad M. Forgot my drysuit and swam the "Sticky Little Kitten" hole.... Later gave advice to three hot-shot yakkers headin' in to do Ship, too....times are changing when we packrafters give advice to hardshellers....

Brad and I are planning to do the Happy with Thai and Gordy Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Our flight-in has an 800 pound limit. Here's my sub-200:

Me, naked
165.1 pounds

Food (might dump to 4 pounds or less)
6.0 pounds

Camping stuff
5.5 pounds
Shelter, Go Lite Hex-3, w/ 6 Ti stakes 28 oz
Gallon cookpot w/stuffsack, TP, lighter, spoon, water bottle, toothbrush, floss, needle, lighter, firestarter 17 oz
Sleeping bag for 2, synthetic, Backpacking Light "Arctic 1000" 24 oz
Wool socks, medium weight 4 oz
Wool bottoms, Patagonia "Wool 2" 6 oz
Bug headnet 2 oz
Camera, Pentax, “Optio W60” with Gorillapod 7 oz

Paddling Clothes (all going)
4.6 pounds
Hooded insulated jacket, synthetic, Backpacking Light "Arctic 1000" 11 oz
Insulated pants synthetic, Backpacking Light "Arctic 1000" 8 oz
Polyester pants, light colored, Patagonia 7 oz
Wool bottoms, Patagonia "Wool 2" 6 oz
Wool short sleeve top, Patagonia "Wool 2" 4 oz

Smartwool "Hoody" 10 oz
Insulated hat 2 oz
Wool socks, medium weight 4 oz
Patagonia boxers 2 oz
Innov8 Mudroc 180 trail running shoes 20 oz

Pack
2.25 pounds
Vintage, Cascade Designs Seal pack 21 oz
Liner Wx-Tex Dry Bag (65 L) 10 oz
Sleeping stuff Wx-Tex dry bag (15 L) 5 oz

Rafting kit (all going):
14.5 pounds
Red “Yak” w/bow line, Fun Rail, ’08 deck, dial-style closure 99 oz
Werner “Shuna”, 215cm, 4 piece carbon fiber paddle 32 oz
MTI Livery PFD rigged w/knife, whistle, and retrieval line 16 oz
Old whitewater helmet 13 oz
Vintage ’96 Kokatat Gore-tex Dry-suit w/goretex socks 59 oz
Throw rope w/fanny belt 17 oz
Three (4 ft x 1, 5 ft x 2) lash straps 2 oz