Sam Freihofer stood above V-Drive Rapid, the last major rapid of the Stikine River in Northern British Columbia, contemplating whether it was more dangerous to hike around it or to run it.
Stikine means “Great River” in Tlingit, a tribe native to the Pacific Northwest coast of North America. It is said to be the Everest of kayaking, set in a deep canyon with jagged rock faces on either side, called the Grand Canyon of the Stikine.
The vertical cliffs make it nearly impossible to exit the river should trouble arise, and the many dangerous obstacles, holes, and drops leave almost no room for error. On the contrary, hiking the stretch would introduce the risk of slipping and falling off a cliff into the water, which is quite possible in wet, rocky terrain, especially while carrying a kayak.
V-Drive is named for its grade on the International Scale of River Difficulty. There are several grade-V rapids throughout the 45-mile stretch of the canyon. Grades range from I-VI, with VI being near suicidal.
“It looks un-runnable,” Sam said. “But to hike around it was more dangerous, so we ran it.”
As Sam plunged down the steep decline of V-Drive, he got typewritered toward the left wall, having little control over what the river wanted to do with him. He could see nothing aside from endless water flying at him from all directions. Paddling as hard as he could and knowing that any error or lack of effort could be the end of him, Sam arrived clean at the bottom.
He had survived the craziest kayaking trip of his life. All he had to do now was watch the rest of his eight-person group from six different countries paddle down V-Drive.
Then the 30-hour drive back home to Missoula.
The 22-year-old New Hampshire native goes to school at The University of Montana and lives on Front Street with a few of his friends. Sam’s room is across the backyard in what used to be a toolshed. The fence that spans the yard is lined with 10 kayaks, accompanied by several lifejackets, wetsuits, and dry-suits.
The room itself is cozy. He recently finished putting drywall over the insulation and framed the previously open windows. It’s a good-sized room, there’s a bed, a couch, a couple dressers, a TV with a box of VHS tapes next to it, a coffee table, a coat hanger made of deer hooves, a heater, and a big, red dry-bag to take on river trips. All the essentials.
The couch faces the inside of the door. Its white paint has been chipped and peeled through the years into a pattern that looks like reptile scales. The door itself commands attention, saying “I’m the coolest, oldest door you’ll ever see.”
A large, orange comb that he uses to tidy up his long, thick hair (slightly reminiscent of The Beatles’ when they recorded Please Please Me) sits on the nightstand next to his bed.It should be noted that his hair is longer and messier and he in no way achieves their clean-cut look of the time, also in part due to his forest-thick facial hair that doesn’t take until 5 o’clock to show up.
Sam paced around his room vacuuming and picking up various things that were strewn about. “I think there’s a reason why my girlfriend hasn’t come over in a while,” he said with a chuckle.
He then reached behind his nightstand and pulled out two obscurely shaped and painted pieces of driftwood. “My grandpa would always collect driftwood and paint it so it looked like weird animals,” he said as he showed off his own works of art, a snake and a manatee.
Sam grew up in a small town called Lyme, New Hampshire. His favorite activities were swimming and catching frogs. His father, Dan, loves being outside and has always encouraged him, his brother, Will, and his sister, Sarah, to get outside every day.
“That’s something that’s really important to me, to get outside as much as possible,” Sam said.
Dan and Will taught Sam to kayak when he was 6 years old. His skills now far exceed theirs.
In addition to kayaking, Sam was a standout lacrosse player. He made the 8thgrade all-state lacrosse team when he was in 5thgrade and captained Team New Hampshire in high school. However, two knee injuries a few years apart stifled his lacrosse career.
After his first knee injury at age 14, it clicked with him that kayaking was going to be his main activity moving forward.
Shortly thereafter, Sam attended the World Class Kayak Academy. Based in Missoula, they drove through Canada and then down to West Virginia, floating various rivers along the way.
The next year, he traveled with a group to Africa to paddle the White Nile in Uganda and the Zambezi in Zambia.
“In the Zambezi Canyon, we put in right at the base of Victoria Falls,” Sam said. “Huge rapids.”
He remembers the canyon cliffs towering 200 feet above him and the villagers standing naked on the river banks. The young ones would throw rocks at the kayakers, yelling “mzungu,” which means “white boy” in Swahili. One kid succeeded in hitting Sam in the head; fortunately, kayakers wear helmets.
Sam said the White Nile was less intense but equally awesome. He and his group stayed on a tropical island below a world-renowned wave called the Nile Special.
“It was frickin’ badass,” Sam said. “At the time, it seemed like the ultimate trip; a dream come true.”
After Sam reinjured his knee during his junior year of high school, his kayaking volume continued to rise and he was having a lot more fun. He called it a blessing in disguise.
But Sam’s frequent kayaking expeditions haven’t left him void of injuries either. Since he came to school in Montana, he’s been able to kayak regularly on the West Coast, which means frequently driving to Washington to run big waterfalls. In the whitewater community, this is called “creeking,” running steeper, lower-volume rivers. “Trying to push the limits,” Sam said. “It’s just you and your buddies, there’s no lift tickets, no safety, which is why it’s cool.”
A spring break kayak trip to Stevensville, Washington left Sam with two compression fractures in his spine. “Structurally it’s still intact,” he said.
The injury happened when he dropped a 60-foot waterfall called Money Drop and landed upside down with his back facing downriver. “It was the biggest shock I ever went through,” Sam said. “Worse than rolling my car,” which he’s done more than once.
“When Sam goes out, it’s gonna be in a tornado of flames,” said UM Lacrosse Coach Tucker Sargent, a lifelong family friend.
After living in White Salmon, Washington for a year so he could paddle the White Salmon and Little White Salmon rivers, he travelled to Chile to paddle the Palguin, the Nevados, and “another river.”
The coolest part of that trip for Sam was “breaking the language barrier.” In other words, he hooked up with a girl who didn’t speak English. “That was pretty awesome,” he said.
As Sam has elevated himself to the top of the sport, his expeditions have become increasingly dangerous; as is typical in any action sport.
His most recent expedition was paddling the Stikine in September 2013, a river that most people only hear about. Sam’s brother, Will, said that it would be like “a double-quadruple black diamond” in terms of skiing.
“I’ve studied it my whole life,” Sam said. “There’s lots of stories of crazy stuff happening.”
Sam described it as the scariest river in North America; the scariest river he’s ever seen.
“I knew that I could maybe do it, but to make the decision that I was actually going to do it, that was scary,” he said. Making the decision meant that he was going to spend five days in a car, spend over $1,000 on gas, and sleep outside in unpredictable weather for three days. Unpredictable in this case means varying levels of cold, wind, and rain; only bad things.
Ten months of the year, the river has too much volume for anyone to run it. During the runnable months of early fall, the water level can still fluctuate by 10 feet in one day.
Whether a rapid is runnable is largely dependent on the water volume, and walking around a rapid, known to kayakers as “portaging,” is nothing to be ashamed of. However, much of the time, the Stikine won’t allow you to portage or even get out to scout a rapid. “You just have to run it, whether you want to or not,” Will said.
The river, that has a sign at the put-in saying that it isn’t navigable by any craft, was first attempted in 1981. The first successful descent down the Stikine was in 1985 and, as of 2006, there have only been 15 successful descents.
“It’s dangerous no matter how good you are, anything can happen,” Sam said, outlining the reasons why he was scared the whole time. “There are lots of spots where if you get caught, there’s a good chance you’ll die.”
But Sam is still alive and still paddling.
In his decorated kayaking career, Sam has been pictured in several magazines, including Bomb Flow magazine, National Geographicas the photo of the week, and Men’s Journalfor running Metlako Falls in Oregon, the tallest waterfall ever run in a two-person kayak; it’s 82 feet high.
“Kayak Sessionat Toketee Falls,” he said, naming another magazine. “That was the coolest.”
But there’s nothing to be made of it, no money, just getting your pictures in magazines. “I know a lot of people at the top of the sport and they’re just normal people,” Sam said. “The most fame you can achieve is to be known by other kayakers.”
Although Sam is proud of his kayaking skills and achievements, he says it’s still all about the experience.
“At the end of the day it’s just really fun.”