Ski to Sea

Whatcom County's annual Ski to Sea race will be held as usual on Sunday on Memorial Day weekend. The race is a team relay consisting of skiing, running, mountain biking, road biking, river canoeing and sea kayaking legs. Probably not in that order, and maybe one other event, too, I forget. As a plodding commuter and leisurely tourist I avoid such competitive events. I've heard it's one of those things everyone who lives here should do once, but no one's been eager to draft me.

The canoe event on the Nooksack River ends at Hovander Park, about a mile from my home, and just a little down river from Ferndale's Main Street bridge. Last week some news stories reported a log jam in the river near the start in Everson. There is also a potentially dangerous log jam piled up against the railroad bridge in Ferndale (photos below). Water levels are low now, but can change quickly in case of heavy rain or a warm spell that melts snow in the mountains. Over the winter the water rose almost two-thirds of the way up the blue paint streak in the photo below.

A week or two before last year's race, a work crew (possibly Burlington Northern?) was out on the river in three small boats, using cables to pull logs loose from the pile. They let some of the logs drift down the river, a few others were anchored to the bank with cables, to prevent erosion, I guess. The pile was smaller and more compact last summer. This year it seems larger, and more raggedy and uneven.

The Nooksack River looks fairly calm in this part of the county, but it is fast, murky and deep, there is a lot of debris and sand bars, and conditions can change fast. A few years ago a woman drowned during the race when she became trapped underwater in a log pile.

The photos above were taken last Monday, the 14th. This week we're having a rainy spell, and apparently the spring thaw hasn't come to the mountains yet, because the river is a bit lower today (Monday the 21st). Below is a new photo of the Ferndale woodpile:

Tuesday afternoon, May 22 - A warm spell must have come to the mountains. Today the water level in the river is several feet higher. The sandbar and much of the log pile is submerged like the bottom of an iceberg.

More debris is coming from upstream, including logs and old tree trunks with bare roots attached. Some flows around the pile, taking small branches and brush with it, but some of it sticks.

The large tree trunk sticking up diagonally in the photos below bobs up and down in the current, with water backing up behind, then welling up around it.