Whitewater With Kids; Floating the Lower Salmon River

As our children grow, we reach important milestones, many to do with travel. Although the girls both joined us on adventures starting as small infants, these were necessarily less risky. As they’ve grown in ability and maturity, we’ve been able to move from playing in creeks and short walks on beaches to snorkeling with turtles, ski trips, and exploring cultures. This year has seen the leap into scuba diving and white water rafting; not shipwrecks or the Futeleufu, but real adventures. We found the perfect first big raft trip for children in Idaho’s Lower Salmon River.

The river is what one would call pool and drop, with rapids large enough to take seriously but short enough that anyone who comes out of the boat will quickly reach calmer water. Many rivers have long stretches where if a child were to fall in or the inflatable kayak to flip, it would be some time before they could be picked up. Having stretches of slow water allow time to recover from a mishap or to jump in and float beside the boat.

The campsites are sand beaches with eddies and slow water. The Salmon River is not dammed, so the water flow varies extremely. These high waters bring sand and deposits it in slow back eddies formed along the banks. When the water level drops, these beaches are a perfect site for tents and chairs placed for keeping feet in the water. The slow pools make perfect swimming holes, with boulders to jump from and swirls of upstream eddies which carry swimmers donning lifejackets in circles.

River trips bring families together. Physically. Electronics are left behind, cell phones do not work in the canyons of remote rivers. No video games or text messaging. Everyone participates, meals are shared, and the stresses of everyday life are left behind. Nobody runs off to the golf course or leaves others behind while they shop. Shared memories are created.

For those of us who know whitewater and either have our own equipment or feel comfortable renting it, there are no permits required. Many of the popular rivers offer individual permits only by lottery, and the application must be in well in advance. The Lower Salmon, however, offers the unplanned alternative. On short notice, this trip can be put together and enjoyed.

I am sure we will explore many other rivers with our children in years to come, many of them call to us. This trip was the perfect introduction for them, now they are hooked on whitewater.

If you go- shuttle service is provided by All River Shuttles in White Bird. They also give out a very helpful sheet of river notes, following up on what is missing from the BLM’s boaters guide book, available through the BLM Cottonwood Field Office.

Also, I have written a description of this river section on Trazzler as a part of a blog competition. Please, check it out and add it to your trazzler wish list, voting by participation… Here’s a copy of what I posted there:

“Canyon walls of columnar basalt, pillars reaching skyward or tumbled sideways; stone hexagons stacked at the current’s edge. The river rushes, pulled by the relentless force of gravity toward the sea. Terrain changes and the river calms; channels of slow water where large eddies form along sand beaches. The roar of whitewater fades and is soon replaced by laughter and shouts as rafters leap into cool water. A hush falls, broken occasionally by a riffle or the descending notes of a canyon wren. Silence not experienced in everyday life, void of the electrical hum of appliance or motorized sounds from traffic. In evening, after tents and camp chairs line the beach, rafters again leap into the water. Boulders become jumping platforms for cannonballs and the back eddy carries the swimmers in circles. Life slows with the current, and all that exists for a brief moment is the sand, the camp, and the Salmon River flowing past.”

Coming soon to the main Gill Adventures site are photo galleries and an article about our Lower Salmon trip.