Victoria Times Colonist 18 Dec '04

Dreaming of a whitewater Christmas
The dull, rainy days of winter are perfect for kayaking adventures

"My wife is sitting at home doing a puzzle this morning and she asked me, 'Why do you want to go paddling on such a miserable day?'"

My friend Al Dumas is telling me all this as we're standing in a morning downpour at the bridge over the Puntledge River in downtown Courtenay, pulling on neoprene wetsuits and organizing paddles and kayaks for a shuttle to the top of the river. Water drips off the hood of his jacket as Dumas sings the praises of the dreary skies:

"After all these years, I told her I'm not going to explain this anymore: This is a beautiful day for kayaking! You couldn't ask for better."

Blame it on global warming or El Nino. Whatever the reason, old man winter this year is a little slow to come to Vancouver Island. It's December, and most of the snow we're supposed to have in the mountains has fallen as an ugly drizzle. What's an outdoor lover to do? Take a lesson from Dumas.

Dumas's wife may not appreciate it, but this soggy weather is perfect for Vancouver Island's lesser known winter sport: whitewater kayaking. When others have packed up their water sports gear and are watching the ski reports with prayers for a dump of "pow," or preparing to hibernate with the latest spinoff of The DaVinci Code, Vancouver Island's growing ranks of whitewater kayakers are eagerly at their computers watching B.C. Hydro's online river gauges rise, unpacking the Gore-Tex dry suits and neoprene gloves from summer storage and rubbing their palms together in anticipation of an early Christmas gift of the white stuff - white water, that is.

More and more folks are joining paddlers like Dumas, a retired civil engineer who moved to the Island from the B.C. Interior. At age 64, Dumas paddles two or three times a week. "I think a lot of skiers are looking at this rain and thinking, 'Maybe I should learn to kayak,'" said Dumas.

Whitewater peaks here when most Canadian kayakers' boats are collecting dust in the garage. A top-of-my-head rundown of the Island's classic whitewater rivers produces a list too long to count on fingers: the Oyster, Brown, Puntledge, Cowichan, Gordon, Stamp, Englishman, Nanaimo, Nimpkish, Gold, Koksilah and more. And there are new runs being pioneered every year.

Besides excellent rivers that run all winter, what Vancouver Island kayakers also have going for them is a level of support from river agencies that is unique in Canada. The Vancouver Island Whitewater Paddling Society (VIWPS), established in 2002, has won the ear of B.C. Hydro, fisheries agencies and the provincial government. "We have a totally different world on Vancouver Island," said Shayne Vollmers, president of the VIWPS. "You're talking about some of the most spectacular things that have happened in Canada with regards to communications between recreational users and Hydro."

The VIWPS, based in Nanaimo with about 60 members, speaks up for paddlers whenever a new hydro dam proposal crops up for one of the Island's prime paddling runs. The society has also participated in a water use plan for the Puntledge River in Courtenay.

The Puntledge is one of the best rivers in Canada for freestyle kayaking - a form of the sport that involves complex spins and flips on river waves, similar to the tricks in ocean board surfing. The real fun on the Puntledge happens when the river is flowing about 85 cubic metres per second (CMS), an exceptional level that only comes about seven times a year when B.C. Hydro needs to spill water out of Comox Lake. Kayakers just wish Hydro would give them a heads-up, and consider releasing on weekends so all that whitewater doesn't go to waste.

"We worked at it very hard," said Vollmers of the VIWPS' efforts to sell B.C. Hydro on kayaking. "Bigwigs at the hydro companies didn't really understand what we were talking about. We had to compare it to a great game of golf or an excellent powder [skiing] day."

The VIWPS even played kayaking videos at meetings to show power company executives what the sport was all about. When there's a well-times dam release, B.C. Hydro gets "thank you" e-mails from happy paddlers. Head office is listening. Visible results include new real-time river gauges on and water release forecasts on the B.C. Hydro Web site that allow paddlers to plan their playtime.

And on May 14 and 15 next year, B.C. Hydro has tentatively agreed to release the magic number - 85 CMS - for an entire weekend on the Puntledge.

"It's written in water," jokes Dumas. If it's a dry year, Hydro can keep the taps closed, but so far this May's release is a go. The VIWPS plans to hold a grand whitewater festival that weekend, bringing paddlers from all over B.C. to show off Courtenay's potential to the kayaking world. And hopefully show off the economic potential of free-flowing water to the number crunchers at Hydro.

Dams or no dams, Vancouver Island will remain a kayaker's paradise. Even in summertime when the rivers dry up, the paddlers stay wet, taking up sea kayak paddles, or migrating to the whitewater of ocean surf, tidal rapids or B.C. Interior rivers such as the Thompson.

So, signing up for a whitewater course from one of the Island's many paddling schools may be the best cure for Seasonal Affective Disorder this side of a ticket to Hawaii. In a quality dry suit or wetsuit you'll be warmer on the river than you are walking downtown in jeans. You can head out into winter storms smiling when others are dodging for cover.

But while you are dreaming of a whitewater Christmas, your friends might get tired of hearing about the joys of rain, which was the refrain that new VIWPS member Ian Smith repeated to me last Saturday morning. He echoed my morning conversation with Al Dumas a few days before. Rain had washed out weekend plans at the ski hill. The flow of traffic was heading out fo the bush with Christmas trees on roof racks while 10 of us were heading in with our kayaks, this time to run the rain-swollen Nanaimo River.

Smith is an enthusiastic paddler who took up the sport just a year ago.

"There's not too many outdoor sports that are better in the heavy rain," he mused. But kayaking gets better.

Well, maybe not always better.

Thanks to our beloved rain, we found the Nanaimo flowing 10 times the level it's normally paddled. We deliberated over the view from the logging road bridge at the put-in. Water flooded the riverside trees and the current was a turbid monster sluicing downhill with all the singular intention of a charging locomotive.

Half the group gripped their paddles and took off on one fast and wild ride on the gravity train. The rest of us turned back to the warmth of our cars to wait for a drier day.

Kayakers may love to tell you about how much they love rain, but even they can get too much of a good thing. Sometimes it is a good idea to stay home and do a puzzle.

The Web site for VIWPS is www.surfkayak.org.

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