This was quite a relaxing and comedic tubing adventure that we had down the Puntledge River of Courtenay, Vancouver Island. We saw thousands of salmon spawning and it was quite an amazing experience.
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My name is Jesse St Louis (AKA Infamous JSL) and I'm an actor that likes to go on awesome adventures between gigs. I've been called a "no frills Bear Grylls" but mostly I've been called an Actor. Traveler. Smart-ass.
We are still on Vancouver Island.
Today we're in the town of Courtney
and we're gonna be tubing down the Puntledge River.
The put-in is right below the fish hatchery here
and there's several different options.
You can get out at 45 minutes,
an hour and a half down the river
and the furthest distance is about two and a half miles.
Walk back to the car.
Luckily, after our adventure
at the Umpqua Narrows of Oregon,
we are tubing experts.
Come prepare with our own tubes,
our own PFDs and our own GoPro.
So we're ready to get into some tubing
here on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
So Sam just said,
is there a waterfall up here?
And I feel like that's something you should know
before you jump in the river in a tube.
You kinda know if there's a waterfall up here.
So apparently we don't.
But this is a popular tubing area.
We just don't know if there's a fork right here.
So we're not sure.
We missed that little detail.
Should we go left or right at the fork?
But there are vultures flying overhead
waiting for a little tuber meat.
The salmon are swimming up river to spawn.
And that is fascinating to see.
I'm assuming that's why we see a bunch of dead salmon
on the floor of the river
or the riverbed as most people call it.
Intense whitewater on the Puntledge River.
Oh, see, yeah, this, I don't know.
That bird's like, these people are gonna die.
What's up, buddy?
We're just tubing.
Don't pick my eyes out.
This is also the best time to see bears
because of the spawning salmon,
though we have not seen any bears yet today.
However, Sam almost thought she saw a bear.
Turns out it was just a dog playing fetch.
But black bears can actually appear white
as well as brown and a few other different colors, yellow.
And the white black bears are known as spirit bears.
There's some rocks.
Oh, we're gonna get caught on this rock.
Oh, look out.
There she is, the tubing master.
Tubing like there's no tomorrow.
Yeah, they call that the shuffle butt technique.
I don't have a helmet on, but I am gonna go head first.
So not sure if this is,
okay, well, we're stuck on a rock immediately.
Now we're not building any momentum.
Whatever the opposite of momentum is,
that's what's going on.
I believe it's called no-mentum.
Not too hot, pretty clear skies.
Nice move, honey.
You dodged that one.
Of course you're hitting rocks.
Why did you go through Boulder Alley over there?
Nobody tubes through that.
This is like class three.
Oh, yeah.
Interesting experience going backwards.
Oh, big rock coming.
I can't see what's coming, but it doesn't sound good.
This is not a way that I would recommend going
because it's fine in the deeper water here,
but once you hit that shallow, you're gonna be in trouble.
Although, it is rather relaxing.
Put your feet up.
You can say we've pardoned that.
This is your banded bull.
It works.
It works, so.
So where do you go from?
Infamous.
