Grand Canyon of the Stikine

The Grand Canyon of the Stikine is a seventy-two-kilometre gorge on the Stikine River in northern British Columbia, where the river cuts through sedimentary and volcanic rock in walls up to about three hundred metres deep and narrows at one point to just two metres. Long regarded as unnavigable, it became one of the world’s most storied whitewater runs after Rob Lesser identified its rapids in 1977. Descent attempts in 1981, 1985, and 1990 established key milestones in running the canyon. A proposed five-dam hydroelectric scheme studied in 1980 was opposed, and in 2001 this stretch was protected within Stikine River Provincial Park.

British Columbia · Canada