Adventures on the Stikine River Alaska
A massive transboundary river located outside Wrangell, Alaska. The Stikine is lined with snow capped peaks, massive waterfalls, granite rock faces, and sand dunes, and is home to all five species of Pacific salmon, moose, bears, tons of bird species, and even sea lions during certain times of year. Spending a day (or more) on the Stikine is truly wild Alaskan experience.
The Basics
The Stikine River is a major transboundary river that originates in British Columbia Canada and terminates in Southeastern Alaska between Wrangell and Petersburg. The Stikine is a truly wild part of Alaska where you can see incredible wildlife, migratory birds, glaciers, waterfalls, and great fishing. The river is home to all five species of pacific salmon, steelhead, and many other types of trout.
Travel up river is normally done by shallow draft jet engine boats. Because of moving sand bars, logs and other challenges, you should go up with an experienced guide or local. There are a couple companies in Wrangell that will do tours and also drop off/pick up services on the river from Wrangell; Breakaway Adventures, Muddy Water Adventures and Alaska Vistas. Although the locals normally travel in uncovered skiffs up the river, the tour boats have cover and usually some heat to make the journey a little more comfortable.
Exploring the Stikine can be done as a day trip to hit the major highlights or as a multiday adventure. There are many private and public cabins throughtout the river and you can also go on independent or guided floats down the river all the way from Telegraph, Canada wild camping along the way. Access to different areas on the river can be limited by water level, which fluctuates based on rainfall, snowmelt, and freezing. Keep this in mine when planning your trip to the Stikine River, you might not be able to access all the areas seen on various photos or advertised. Even if you don’t get to all the little streams, the river is still beautiful and impressive.
Three Ways to Explore the Stikine River
Day Trip up the lower Stikine River:
It’s also possible to go up the Stikine River on a day trip from Wrangell or Petersburg. Travel the river enjoying the scenery. You can get out on the sand dunes and explore. There are also the Chief Shakes hot spring, which make a great place to spend the afternoon soaking in the hot pools. If there isn’t too much ice you can get close to the Shakes Glacier or even if there is it is still a beautiful part of the river to see with big tall snow capped mountains and massive glacier carved rock faces. Travel by massive waterfalls along some of the rivers main channels. You can also stop along the river and fish. Its a great spot for fly fishing.
Depending how many people are on your tour the guides are often willing to work with what your interests are and tailor to the tour to different people’s desires or even drop people off at different locations and come back later to get you. For example if you wanted to spend a few hours at the hot tubs, but others did not, guides can drop you off and then come back to get you later at a set time. Just keep in mind depending on the level of the river some places might not be accessible during your trip. Even if the tour can not go up the smaller offshots of the river a trip up the main channels is still incredibly beautiful and worth the trip.
Camping on the Stikine River Flats
There are six forest service cabins located on the Stikine River Flats. The Little Dry Island and two Gut Island cabins can be easily accessed from the Blackerie Point boat launch outside Petersburg, by boat or kayak. Although you need large high tides to be able to make it close to the cabin. The Sergief Island Cabin, Koknuk Cabin and Garnet ledge cabin are also located at the mouth of the Stikine on the river flats, but are located closer to Wrangell, Alaska. By jet boat all can be accessed pretty easily from either location, but require large high tides. When you make you reservations for the cabins on recreation.gov they give specific information on the size of tide required to access each cabin. Many of the jet boat tour companies will drop you off at the cabins.
Stikine River flats forest service cabin locations
To reach the Gut Island cabins, we launched our kayaks from the Blackerie point boat launch on Mitkof Island outside Petersburg. It took us a little over an hour to paddle there. You should launch about a hour before high tide, so that you can paddle on slack water and avoid the most current. Big tides also mean lots of tidal current, that combined with the flow out of the river can make for some difficult paddling if you do not time it correctly. If taking a skiff you will also need to go at high tide, in order to get to as close to the cabin as possible. You will have to navigate your kayak up a small channel on the flats to reach the cabins. Charts and GPS devices are a must to help you find the channel entrance. This is a trip for people with some kayak experience.
The gut island cabins are great if you have a larger group because the two cabins are within a minute walk of each other, so you are close without having to fit into one cabin. Spending a few days on the river flats is a great experience. At high tide you can paddle up the little sloughs exploring the flats. You can also walk for miles and miles through the grass exploring, looking for animals and birds. I recommend spring time before the grass gets too tall and you can listen and see all the migratory birds. You also get great sun on the flats so it it is nice, set up your chair in the sun and spend the afternoon relaxing.
Multi-day trips on the Stikine River:
One of the best ways to explore the Stikine River over multiple days is by renting a cabin through the Forest Service. There are six cabins available for rent the Twin Lakes Cabin, the Rynda Cabin, Shakes Slough Cabins 1 & 2, and the Mount Flemer Cabin close to the Canadian border. Reservations can be made on the recreation.gov webiste here. Many of the same companies that offer tours up the Stikine River will pick you up and drop you off at the cabins on the river. If you do not have your own jet boat you will not be able to explore the river by boat, but there is great fishing and you can wander the areas around the cabins just be wildlife aware.
Another great way to explore the Stikine River is to float or kayak the river starting in Telegraph, Canada. The trip takes about a week depending on speed and how many times you decide to camp. For the first part of the trip there is wild camping along the river side, but once you get across the border to Alaska you can rent the cabins described above so you have a real roof over your head. There are a number of comapnies that can transport you to Telegraph by jet boat, but there is only one company Alaska Vistas that does guided trips down the Stikine. You should have some experience with wild camping, kayaking or rafting, and wilderness first aid if you want to do this trip alone. It is best to have some experience even when going with a guide. The best time to do this trip is June through August, but is subject to weather and river levels.
Stikine River Forest Service cabin locations
