Steve Hedberg on dry land near Balcony Falls along the James River (Photo by Jeff Saxman)
It took no more than 90 seconds to regret the whole thing. This was the launch of my three-week kayak trip down the James River, and as my wife and two daughters stood at the water’s edge waving goodbye, I became overwhelmed with regret at the realization that I was putting everything on the line — and in that moment, it was clear they were everything.
Beginning at the headwaters in Botetourt County in September of 2017, I set out to paddle as many of the 320 navigable miles of the river as I could manage in three weeks and to do so alone, all so I could create a series of paintings and multimedia pieces reflecting my experience. The James River is near and dear to many Richmonders, and I’ve spent a good bit of time biking and hiking around it. During recent years, I’ve read about various challenges to keeping the river healthy: unidentified floating foam, risks associated with coal ash ponds, the Atlantic sturgeon’s near extinction and return, and the Lynchburg train disaster that spilled thousands of gallons of crude oil. I read these news stories with little context or understanding of the James beyond Richmond city limits. The only way to fix that is to better know the river.
Being alone is what made it a challenge. That sank in as my family disappeared. I’m an idiot. What was I thinking? I can’t turn back now after making such a big deal about my big river adventure. My racing mind began to ease as I listened to the tranquil sounds of trickling water and the drizzle lightly tapping the kayak’s deck. I started thinking logistics. I’d need to shed some weight from my kayak. The cooler with 5 pounds of ice was probably a bad idea, but ditching it would mean no half-and-half with my coffee.
The growing hum of rapids forced me back into my anxious state. On my first attempt at navigating the rapids, I found my kayak cockeyed and spinning backward, with the stern caught in the rocks as water began to rush over the deck. I popped the skirt and pulled one leg out of the cockpit to stabilize things. I found myself at the mercy of the forceful current. It took all my strength to guide the overloaded kayak to the calm waters along the riverbank. And then I realized I needed to do it again. If I planned to spend three weeks on this river, it seemed imperative that I prove to myself I could prevail. As I successfully made it through the Class II rapids and into the pool below, I crossed into my new temporary life.
One of the paintings resulting from Steve Hedberg’s voyage is “Temporary Living,” created with acrylic and black walnut ink and measuring 36 by 162 inches on three panels. (Image courtesy Steve Hedberg)
It took every bit of the three weeks to figure out how to be good at this: reading the rapids, not accidentally flipping the boat with 100 pounds of gear strapped to it — which I did once — and minding the tides in the lower James. But it was packing that seemed to take most of my mental bandwidth. Finding efficiencies in unloading and reloading the kayak, setting up the campsite. Packing the dry bags became an art. It took me more than once to make sure my peanut butter and jelly sandwich wasn’t accidentally in the wrong dry bag in an unreachable hatch, with three more dry bags tied on top.
As I figured my way through the journey, I found myself settling into the comfort of living in a tent. The cicadas and crickets were my white noise as I fell asleep, and I woke to the crisp, cool air, chirping birds and the trickle of the river. At sunrise, I’d sit on the riverbank and drink my pour-over cup of coffee as I thought about the day ahead. This was my daily moment of zen.
In the end, I paddled 270 miles of the James. I saw a swimming black bear, a breaching sturgeon just a few feet in front of my kayak, dozens of bald eagles, even bored teenagers lighting fires and shooting guns on a Sunday afternoon. I was practically accosted by motorboats. I paddled up to the statue of Capt. John Smith at Jamestown, visited the VCU Rice Rivers Center, camped on the battlegrounds of Fort Pocahontas, slept on a river beach in the gorge at Balcony Falls and witnessed the most beautiful sky that was destined to be painted. I also ate 21 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and lost three hats, a pair of sunglasses and a camera lens.
These were my unique experiences. But the profoundness of the James lies in the collective journeys it has hosted over thousands of years. Native Americans lived off of it, wars were fought on it, the slave trade thrived and died on it, and factories have spewed toxic waste into it. I witnessed beautiful vistas as the James carves through the Appalachians, and saw soda and beer cans floating on the river’s surface as I passed over tires below.
Despite the good work put into improving the river’s health by organizations such as the James River Association and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, the battle to keep our waterways clean always has its challenges. Maybe if we all got to know the James better, we’d treat it more like our good friend.
Richmond magazine’s former creative director, Steve Hedberg is a visual artist and novice kayaker whose love of travel and adventure began during his childhood as son of a U.S. Foreign Service officer. To view his James River paintings, photos and video, visit stevehedberg.com/confluence.
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