I had the opportunity to take a kayak tour on the lower Green / Duwamish river.  We launched from a small shoreline park in South Park and embarked on a journey through the river and it’s story with Cari from the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition.  It was an interesting education about the human impacts on this great river and the amazing way that wildlife struggles to survive in this urban jungle.

What a contrast from the Middle Green River.  As the river flows downstream forests give way to fields and then suburban sprawl, followed by shopping malls and freeways.  Then there is the industrial zone where the Green becomes the Duwamish and flows into Puget Sound.  It is hemmed in on all sides by industrial buildings, marinas, levies, and roadways.  In nooks and crannies there are islands of wildlife habitat primarily due to visionaries such as John Beal who worked to restore some of the streams and riparian habitat in this part of the river.

Amidst the industrial sludge and urbanization salmon leapt out of the water.  A river otter swam by our canoe. An osprey flew by with a fish in its talons as the roar of a jet engine filled the air.  The osprey landed on a nest perched high upon a man made stand to feed the hungry baby ospreys.  Herons stood quietly in the pockets of shoreline habitat.  Ducks, pigeons, and seagulls lined up on an old barge sitting in the waterway.

Behind the edges of green habitat were large warehouses, power lines, and shipyards.  We paddled by an old Boeing plant built on stilts in the river.  For years they dumped their toxic waste into the waterway.  The site, now a superfund site, is waiting to be dismantled, cleaned up, and restored into marine habitat.

A finger of water curved into an inlet.  We followed it back amongst blackberry lined shore and hanging tree branches to find a stream pouring weakly out of a culvert, behind a chain link fence, underneath a roadway. 

As sunset settled upon the river lights started poking out along the shorelines The cloudy sky became a gunmetal grey with edges of blue with warm glowing orange from the sun’s goodnight.

We paddled downstream through the sounds of city life and back to the small patch of a shoreline.

For more info on the

Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition visit their website at: www.duwamishcleanup.org

Alki Kayaks:  http://www.kayakalki.com/photos.html