A fun play run with an optional bigger rapid at the start.
Class
III(+), IV if doing the first rapids
Scouting / Portaging
Easy
Time
1 hour
When to Go
Summer
This information was from Claudia's old book, and was out of date regarding access. It has been updated but things may change regarding access.
Directions: Head up Highway 99 to Mt Currie, stay straight at the Chevron Garage and continue up Pemberton Portage Road. Just as you leave town, immediately before crossing the railroad tracks, turn right and drive for about 100m on a gravel road (watch for wash-outs) to a larger area and park. This is the take-out.
To the put-in, return to the main road, turn right (north) and drive for 6km to a bridge over the Birkenhead River. This is one of the put-ons.
To add about 1.5km of class III-IV rapids to the run, continue north for about 1km across rail tracks. After 100m there is a left onto a gravel road marked private property for First Nation. About 200meters towards the river there is land under the powerlines which is not First Nation Parcel land, you can park there and walk around the private property (YEX'WLOA). This is a sensitive spiritual area that must be respected or all access to this area could be lost, take extra care during fishing season.
This gravel road is quite over-grown and will pin-stripe your car so you may want to drive a bit further up the main road until you see the river again and find somewhere to park and enjoy an extra warm-up rapid or you can park just downstream on the main road and put-on below Harry Dick's rapid.
Level wise the Birkenhead can be run a low as 12cm/s but around 20-25cm/s would be low enough for most, above 35cm/s it is medium flow and above 50cm/s it becomes very continuous with not many eddies and it is harder to rescue boats.
Description: This is a lively run with many waves, boulders and holes. At high levels, it is rather continuous and eddies are few and far between. Later in summer and falls, the level drops and the run gets rather bony - but comes up fast again with rain.
The main drop at the top near YEX'WLOA is known as the Harry Dick's rapid, named after a First Nation man who used to live at this spot and was very friendly with the local kayakers. It is a fairly straight forward Class IV drop which you can inspect from river left, it's best to have some speed into it.
Harry Dick's Rapid
Below here are some excellent small boofs to practice on before the river mellows out for a while before picking up some extra volume from Owl Creek and some steeper gradient with some fun boofs and playwaves.
Classic Birkenhead fun!
The take-out is a little hard to spot so be sure to inspect before paddling.
