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| Boater enjoying the Chetco River, photo courtesy Northwest Rafting Co. |
7 January 2013 | Ashland, OR -- In 2002 Allen Wilson’s outfitting business on the Chetco
went up in smoke with the Biscuit Fire. His trail route into the Chetco through
the Kalmiopsis Wilderness filled in with fire killed trees – thousands of them,
leaving a crucial 3.5-mile section of trail, already on rugged terrain,
impassable for a human, nonetheless a pack-string loaded to the brim with boats
and gear.
But in recent years, perhaps in part to Oregon Field Guide’s
expose on Wilson’s outfitting business, the Chetco started getting some
attention from boaters, especially Zach Collier, owner-operator of Northwest
Rafting Company, based in Hood River, OR.
“I had paddled the North Fork Smith,” Collier says, “And the
Illinois, too. I wanted to know what was in between.”
Collier’s wonder-lust brought him to the Chetco’s headwaters
first in 2011, when his party got lost but ended up at the Chetco via an
off-trail adventure down the Slide Creek drainage. Collier was inspired by the
Chetco and the remote mountain scape it took him through.
“I wanted to show it to others,” he says. So he applied for
a commercial permit with the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest. And he
waited.
Then last week, retiring Gold Beach District Ranger Alan
Vandiver submitted a decision memo giving Collier the green light to operate
for one year. In the memo, Vandiver describes the decision as “one of the most
important of my career.”
The memo also gives the outfitter strict mandates to
preserve the area’s pristine wilderness character. Northwest Rafting Company will pack out all
human waste and ashes from campfires, maintain the trail within established clearing
limits, and keep group sizes to a maximum of 12, according to the memo.
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| Volunteer Sarah Shmigelsky scales up one of the lighter sections of the route |
Collier plans on running a trip this June with two clients
and four guides, but he’ll have to wait for a 30 day comment period after the
news hits local papers. Then he’ll have to get to the Chetco, on a trail with
thousands of logs on it, arranged some places in continuous stacks higher than
six feet called “jackstraw.”
“Access is the big hurdle,” explains Collier. “Well go in a
few days and do trail clearing first,” he says. Concurrently his crew will be
running supplies, including boats, toward their launch site on the river. “Then
guests will just have to navigate the trail with a small pack.”
Collier says his plan has been met with largely because of his
company’s stringent leave no trace practices.
“We think Northwest Rafting Company has proven to have
wilderness ethic,” says Joseph Vaile of Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center. He
says KSWild’s biggest concern is spread of the Port OrfordCedar disease, which
travels on the wheel wells and tires of muddy cars.
Collier plans on driving his guests up a steep, sometimes
muddy road to the Kalmiopsis Wilderness boundary.
“Using that road in wet conditions is about the worst thing
you can do to spread the disease,” says Vaile. “We want to make sure that
doesn’t happen.
Among the conditions set withVandiver’s decision, Northwest
Rafting Company crews must wash all their equipment before even entering the
forest. Collier won’t enjoy any privileged access to the road, so his company
will have to wait until the gate opens just like anyone else.
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| J.R. Weir of Northwest Rafting Co on the "emerald green waters of the Chetco." |
Given all the restrictions and logistics, it could be hard for
Collier to make the trips pencil out. He says it’s not about the money.
“I love seeing new places,” he says. “I like pushing the
boundaries and getting to new places. That’s what this is about.”
Vaile says he’s optimistic about the proposal. “The more people
that know a place, the more people appreciate it,” he says. “Once you see the
emerald green waters of the Chetco—well. It’s just a very special place.”
The trips will last five days, says Collier. The float will be 18-24 miles, depending on flows.
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