For Father’s Day 2012, we did a family outing down the Nisqually River in south Puget Sound between Olympia and Tacoma. My mom dropped off me, my brother, and my dad about twelve miles up the river, just downstream of Yelm. We coasted down to the river delta, then turned west and paddled to the take-out point at Luhr Beach, where my mom met us with the car.
Route map. Unbeknownst to us, the launch point was actually part of Joint Base Lewis-McChord, and we were unwittingly trespassing.
The Nisqually River was beautiful. Despite the nearby cities and military base, the river itself was free of any development, except for a brief stretch near I-5. The water was moving at about four miles per hour, and even twelve miles above the delta, the river was deep enough that we avoided scraping the bottom as long as we stayed near the center of the channel.
Although we had been warned to expect logjams blocking the route, we did not encounter any difficulties. Even in unwieldy sea kayaks (I was in a Feathercraft Klondike), we were easily able to handle the twists and turns of the river and avoid rocks and snags.
Dad and Nathan kayaking down Nisqually River. We were the only boats out here today, which is normal for off-the-beaten-path trips like this one.
Kayaking Nisqually River. Around each bend of the river, the natural scenery grew more and more beautiful.
Storm clouds over Nisqually Reach. When the dark stratus clouds roll in, the entire landscape is drained of color.
Kayaking Nisqually Delta. The Nisqually is so wide and flat there is no distinct boundary between the river and the saltwater..
Highlights of the trip included the large numbers of spotted sandpipers and cedar waxwings, as well as a bonanza of swallows. We saw six of the seven species of swallow present in Washington State, missing only the bank swallow. The best was the large purple martin colony in birdhouses over the water at Luhr Beach.
It was a great trip. The weather was mostly cloudy and not too windy, which are my favorite conditions for paddling, and the river was fast and twisty enough to keep us alert without posing any risks.
One minor screwup was that we put in at the Fort Lewis Road bridge over the river, and it turns out this road is actually part of the base. Base security forces drove down to talk to us while we were setting up, and they informed us that in the future we should check in with the base visitor center before getting on the river at this point. They didn’t give us any other hassles.
—Alex Sidles