Swollen Chehalis Doesn’t Impede River Run Revelry

“Don’t go over the falls,” the stranger warned as he pushed my kayak out into the swollen Chehalis River. “The river’s too fast this year. Don’t go over the falls.”

I paddled around a fallen tree and out into the main current, the river chocolate-milk brown after days of rain. A steady downpour completed the sodden scene, with a National Weather Service flood watch a few hours from taking effect.

Saturday marked the 40th annual Pe Ell River Run — and my first. This year, it was a peculiar rite of a spring, less a celebration of the season’s arrival than a scoff in the face of its tardy advent. Scores of paddlers plied the swift waters, a slapdash flotilla of revelers not bothering to take notice of Mother Nature’s gloomy sensibilities.

The River Run has reached its fourth decade with no organizers, no website, no registration or start times. People just show up in Pe Ell on the second Saturday in April, hop in the Chehalis and float the 10 or so miles to Rainbow Falls State Park. According to the event’s lore, it started as a birthday party with four friends who were joined by more and more people as they continued the tradition each passing year.

When The Chronicle volunteered me to take part in this year’s Run, I reached out to one of the most active posters on a Facebook page promoting the event. When should I show up? Where should I put my boat in the water? The standard launch point, I was told, is Kevin’s house, because the River Run is the type of event where everyone is assumed to be on a first-name basis. Expressing puzzlement, I was offered some more helpful instruction.

“Just drive into Pe Ell and follow the boats,” I was told.

My informant, Brandi Morrison, has been doing the River Run every year since she was 13, though her pregnancy kept her off the water this year. Her father, Pat Morrison, has been paddling it even longer, 25 years by his estimate. This year, he said, marked the fastest the Chehalis has ever been running for the event. Still, the Run would continue.

“I had people call me and say, ‘Did they cancel the River Run?’” said Pat Morrison. “I go, ‘How do you cancel the River Run?’ Nobody's in charge, nobody's in control.”

That haphazard spirit was evidenced on the river, where seaworthy kayaks were joined by Walmart rafts, paddle boats and fishing dinghies. Some paddlers sported unicorn costumes, and a trio on a raft passed around a gallon-sized glass jug of what appeared to be moonshine. Some stayed dry by draping a plastic canopy over a makeshift frame of PVC pipe, keeping an all-important speaker system out of the rain. Another boat moved along with a tiny black sail and a skeleton in the bow. 

“This ain’t no race, it’s a party,” said Pat Morrison.

This year, though, the event ran more like a race, the turgid Chehalis plunging this absurd armada forward at a more-than-leisurely pace, most of the traditional party beaches submerged beneath the high waters. I passed the snapped blade of a paddle, then a pair of rubber duckies. Further on, I rescued a forlorn can of Busch Light as the flotsam continued. 

My sturdy kayak — borrowed from Chronicle reporter Jordan Nailon — cruised past the sluggish rafts and fishing craft, even without much paddling. This wasn’t a race, but I was, inadvertently, winning. 

The river narrowed as the left bank ran into cliffs, occasional waterfalls shooting their rainy runoff into the channel. Rapids churned the river, and I angled about in search of the smoothest water. I passed an empty paddle boat lashed to a tree, its occupants nowhere in sight. 

Paddling through one turbulent section, I plunged into an eddy and was spun 180 degrees. As water splashed over the sides, I paddled furiously and straightened out. On the opposite bank, a man called out.

“Have you seen my friend?” he shouted. “He lost his boat.” 

I shouted back that I hadn’t as the river pulled me downstream. This, I would learn, was the order of the day. Capsized craft and their soaked crews were found up and down the Chehalis. Pat Morrison said he was “pulling people out all day,” including one man who he found clinging to his overturned kayak.

“I thought he was just drunker’n heck,” Morrison said.

It turned out the man had been in the water for some time and was barely responsive. After several miles, Morrison succeeded in guiding him to shallow water where he could stand up, then instructed him to walk up the bank for help. The river pushed Morrison downstream before he could offer more assistance. He later learned the man was found passed out, hypothermic, along the shore, and an ambulance was summoned. A first responder friend informed him the man had been taken to the hospital and was recovering.

Thankfully, my kayak stayed upright, and I continued along toward Rainbow Falls. As the roar of the upcoming falls reached a crescendo, a pair of bystanders appeared along the bank, ready to help paddlers out of the water. I passed them by and continued toward the falls. 

The right side of the falls seemed to offer a smoother approach, so I kept to the side and rode a chute of water down. My kayak landed with a slap, and the current sucked me into the churning center as waves stood up to greet me. My bow dived through one wave as it emptied its contents into the boat. In an instant I was facing backward as another wave came over the side. I fought my way out of the chop, still turned upstream, and pushed toward the rocks and calmer water on the right bank.

Once ashore, a pair of park rangers helped me pull my water-filled kayak onto land, informing me that I was the first to reach the falls. In two hours flat, it may have been some kind of River Run record. I lashed the boat atop my Outback, changed into dry clothes and awaited the paddlers I knew weren’t far behind. I chuckled at the ominous warning I’d received about the falls. 

“That wasn’t so bad,” I thought.

An hour went by, and the only paddlers who showed up came by car, bedraggled groups who had capsized or quit early. No one could believe I’d gone over the falls. New to the area, I guess I was too dumb to know better.

Finally, after an hour, a boat came around the bend. Upside down. The empty vessel made a wobbly passage over the falls, perhaps the lost craft of the man whose friend had hailed me on the bank a few miles before. 

Soon after, a cheer went up as a raft came into view. The pair inside made a beeline for the center of the falls, lurched over and walloped the waves below. One occupant tumbled into the water, and the other stabilized the raft and paddled downstream after his friend.

Not far behind, a bigger raft approached — the trio with the giant glass jar of an indeterminate beverage. Their behemoth made it over the falls without incident, and they paddled on unfazed. 

According to Brandi Morrison, we may have been the only ones to try the falls this year.

“Never during the River Run is it this high,” she said. “Nobody made it down this year, because everybody was having a hard time. I've never seen anything like it.”

The difficult conditions didn’t seem to sour anyone’s vibe, though, perhaps due to the fact that many of the boats seemed more purposed to transport a cooler than run a waterfall. Everyone was sloshed, in one way or another, and no one seemed to particularly care. And so this event-that’s-not-an-event rolled on, a community gathering because it always has, celebrating spring in defiance of its absence.