Wooden Boat People
By McKenzieDriftBoat.com
Drift boat camping trip
Hi Guys! I am trying to get a summer drift/camping trip planned in central or southern oregon. My trip could be 3-5 days depending on the area. Does anyone have any suggestions as to which river and where to put in and take out. My family would prefer a nice drift up to class II and places to stop and camp, not formal camp grounds but that would be fine too if they are there. I have drifted the Clackamas,Sandy,Nehalem, Tillamook, Nestucca, Siletz, and others and am just looking for a good excursion with our new boat. Any help would be appreciated, Thanks again your help is really appreciated.
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Roger Fletcher on
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It will be hard to find water as docile as Class !!. The Deschutes from Warm Springs to Maupin, and from just below Shearers to its confluence with the Columbia is great running and fishing water, but you will run into Class !!! and IV water in each of the two runs. An alternate option would be to camp below shearers Falls and make some daily runs to Max Canyon, pull the boat, return to camp and repeat then run again, and again. The water in that stretch would be manageable for you, and depending on time of year, the fishing can be very good.
Southern Oregon presents limited options for what you desire. While the only stretch of the Rogue I have run over the years is the wild and scenic section, there is about 30 miles of river above Graves Creek, before you hit the controlled area, You would need to do a little research re camping spots, but that stretch should be negotiable for you. Sixty miles further north is the Umpqua. I would stick to the main branch. Do some research on the stretch between the confluence of the North and south forks to Elkton.
It has been a while a long time since I've run it, but the John Day River is an attractive river. As I recall there is one Clas III between Servcie Creek and Clarno. The John Day, however, experiences summer time low water, and the the best time to run it is early to late spring, depending on snow pack in the Blue Mountains.
Still another option might be the Willamette. It runs south to north through the heart of the Willamette Valley. We used to do family runs from Armacher Park on the McKenzie to Peoria. One could take a nice three to five days to float and camp that stretch all the way to Salem. There can be some pretty good fishing too, especially for smallies.
If you can identify a target I'm sure there are those on the forum who can offer more detailed suggestions.
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Permalink Reply by Bryan McDade on
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Thank you, I will look into these places, you are right I also feel I need to narrow my interests but wanted to see if anyone had a great drift idea in mind. I can run higher classes of water but really dont want to push it with the family. thanks again
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