Planning Spring Rafting Trips

Christmas is done... and along with the turmoil of trying to create that special holiday atmosphere of loving, giving, peaceful co-existence with all members of the family. Arguing over the minutea of past slights and silly ancient family history, we still all sit down at dinner and praise the All Mighty. We stuff our faces with familiar family recipes and we honor and respect each other's idiosyncracies. Talk around the table this year was about the weirdo weather we are experiencing in Northern California. Lots of rain! And the rivers came screaming back up to high water springtime conditions. Weird. The North Fork American was flowing above 3,000 cfs while the South Fork American River stayed at an unreal December level above 5,000 cfs. Up North, the Cal Salmon rose to 6,000+ cfs!

Snow started falling again on Monday and some of us headed up to Kirkwood for a day of skiing and snowboarding today. With all the rain and ground saturation, we should be in very good shape for all dam controlled rivers such as South Fork American, Middle Fork American and Tuolumne River this spring and summer. Reservoirs will be healthy; especially in Northern California! Just remember that the majority of storms seem to come in January and February. We definitely need more snowpack for a longer spring runoff!

Our families and friends are planning several rafting trips this season. In the spring, we are looking to do a private river trip on the Illinois River in Oregon, then commercial river trips on the North Fork American in California, the California Salmon River near the California/Oregon border and then we will do a family and friends re-union on a two day South Fork and Middle Fork American in late July. This should satisfy all the die-hard paddlers in our family, but also it will allow us to include the younger kids and some grandparents over on the American River. This should be a great river rafting season for everyone!