Whitewater Rafting
Whitewater rafting’s latest news and product reviews. Paddling Life keeps you informed on what’s new in whitewater rafts, rafting competitions, rafting industry news, and much more.
Evergreen
Inside AIRE Environmental
Sure, AIRE makes awesome inflatable craft for everything from whitewater and touring to fishing. But did you know that it also has a sister...
Inflatables
Testing the AIRE Sabertooth
Want to sink your teeth into the perfect R2ing rafting machine? Try the new frameless AIRE Sabertooth, suitable for everything from kids to Class V…
Evergreen
Real Tips from Real Rafting Mothers!
Moms know best…especially when it comes to taking your kids rafting. Behold the following Real Rafting Tips from Real Rafting Mothers before the next...
Events
Curtailed by COVID: AW Fall Event Roundup
It’s been a wild, wooly and wet year as far as events hosted by venerable river conservation organization American Whitewater. But it’s still finding...
Events
Great Gore! (Kids Rule, Hilleke Swims, and More!)
Even with pandemic restrictions in place (i.e. no rager blowout party at nearby Rancho del Rio this year), AW’s classic downriver race through Gore...
Events
Honoring Rafael Gallo: Go Fund Me Launched for RAFA, IWHOF and IRF
Rafa lives on. Rafael Gallo, the former conservationist, rafting advocate and owner of Costa Rican outfitter Rios Tropicales who passed away from pancreatic cancer in...
Paddling Industry News
Flash Flood Kills Rafter in Grand Canyon
A 29-year-old woman was found dead and others were injured following a flash flood July 14 in Grand Canyon National Park, according to the National...
Destinations
Rafting Season Strong Despite Low Snow, Pandemic
While snowpack levels are below average across much of the western U.S., rafting outfitters are anticipating a solid season coming up as COVID-19 restrictions...
Paddling Industry News
New A-DASH Program Helps Address Sexual Harassment, Discrimination in the River Community
Hot bodies and cold whitewater rapids have been the recipe for river romance for decades. But what happens when sexual advances are not welcome...
Inflatables
RMR Rafts Celebrates 10th Anniversary
While 10 years isn’t much in the lifespan of a river, it certainly is in the raft industry, with RMR popping the Champagne on...
Destinations
Montgomery (ALA) Whitewater Park Breaks Ground
Make me an angel, that flies from Montgomery... Those words by John Prine come in the form of a new recirculating whitewater park coming to...
Whitewater Rafting
NRS Launches Leaders in Environment, Access and Diversity (LEAD) Ambassador Program
Northwest River Supplies (NRS) is disrupting influencer marketing in the outdoor industry with a new kind of athlete-ambassador network called the Leaders in Environment,...
Destinations
CN’s Magpie River Declared a “Living Entity”
Ranked by National Geographic as one of the world’s top ten whitewater rivers, the Quebec’s Magpie River now has the same rights as other...
Accessories
When was the last time you practiced setting up a Z-Drag?
So you've got your Z-Drag kit prepped with rescue rope, webbing, pulleys, carabiners, and cordage. But when was the last time you actually took...
Destinations
Top 5 Whitewater Rafting Day Trips
Got some pent-up pandemic jones to go rafting? You're not alone. Try one of the following five top rafting day trips in the country... Chattooga...
Paddling Industry News
Rafting Community Loses a Legend with the Passing of Rafael Gallo
The international rafting community lost one of its biggest stalwarts and promoters with the passing Tuesday, March 23, of Rafael Gallo, founder of Costa...
Whitewater Rafting
International Rafting Federation Launches First Internationally Recognized Para Rafting Classification and Rules
The International Rafting Federation (IRF) has now officially recognized the need to make raft racing available to as wide a group of people as...
Events
Excuse Me, Is This Your Disco Ball? Whacko Items Found on River Cleanups
Every year around the country, river advocacy groups, outfitters, paddling shops and more host river cleanups to pick trash out of their local waterways....
Canoeing
Charlotte, NC, to Get Yet Another Whitewater Park
The kayaking and rafting in Charlotte, N.C., is about to get even better. Thanks to Duke Energy, the region is about to boast another major...
Paddling Industry News
End of an Era: Famed Costa Rican Rafting Outfitter Rios Tropicales Closes Down
The pandemic has hit home for river runners—especially those who love paddling Costa Rica’s beloved Pacuare River. Ríos Tropicales, a pioneer on the Pacuare and...
Paddling Life Exclusives
Choo-choo Chew on This: Colorado’s Browns Canyon Threatened by Oil Trains
Paddlers taking to Colorado’s beloved Browns Canyon of the Arkansas could soon see the iconic wilderness whitewater run jeopardized by trains full of heavy crude...
Destinations
It’s River Permit Time! (Link to Resources Here!)
It's river permit season, all you freeloading dirtbags.
Ensure your chance to keep getting invited on river trips by actually applying for, and hopefully pulling,...
Destinations
New River Gorge To Become National Park
Get ready to raft in a new national park. West Virginia’s New River Gorge is set to become the nation’s newest national park, thanks to...
Evergreen
Top Rafting Reads (for this COVID Christmas)
Looking for some great rafting reading to get you through this COVID-confined Christmas, and spark your juices for the upcoming paddling season? Our friends at...
Latest news
Great Alabama 650, the World’s Longest Annual Paddle Race, Kicks off Oct 1-11
The world’s longest annual paddle race is set to test the mettle—and blister threshold—of core-to-the-bone paddlers Oct. 1-11 in...
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Tales from the Cripps: Episode 3. Tales from Honduras
Episode 3. Tales from Honduras
Today, let’s travel through time and space to Central America in the 1990s. My guest...
Quinfecta: Jackson, Marr, Voorhees Bro’s Notch 5 Laps on the Stikine
Cross Canada’s Stikine off the big water bucket list for Dane Jackson. Paddling Jackson’s new Gnarvana creekboat, His Daneness,...
Must read
The Ultimate Guide to How to Store Your Raft
Owning your own whitewater raft is an amazing experience...
Middle Fork Salmon Blocked by Debris Flow
Planning a late-season run down the Middle Fork of...
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Paddling Life’s Wintertime Kayak Review!
You expect a lot of things when you decide to review whitewater kayaks during December in Colorado. Staying warm definitely isn’t one of them. We packed up the quiver and drove to the Barrel Springs and Shoshone sections of the Colorado, still running thanks to a malfunction in the turbines of the nearby powerplant. Call us weenies, but it was the first time either of us had kayaked in Colorado in December (it was also the first time we’d ever used pogies on bike handlebars as part of the shuttle).
End of an Era: RIP Martin Litton (Feb. 13, 1917 – Nov. 30, 2014)
He lived to be 97 years old, and floated the Grand Canyon in a dory for nearly 60 of them (in 2004 at age 87, he broke his own record as the oldest person to row the Grand Canyon). River runners and environmental activists lost one of their most beloved companions with the Nov. 30 death of Martin Litton at age 97 at his home in Palo Alto, Calif., with his wife, Esther, at his side…
In His Own Words: Doug Ammons On Jeff West’s Death on the Stikine, Plus: His Take on Ben Marr’s First D of Site Z
After long challenging the world’s best, British Columbia's Stikine River claimed its first life, that of Jeff West, 42, owner of Chattanooga’s Ace Kayaking School, on Tuesday, Sept. 11. Just before attempting his one-day solo descent, West kayaked the stretch with Stikine pioneer Doug Ammons, who was heli'd after a nasty swim. PL caught up with Ammons -- the first person to run it solo – for his take on his run with West, Ben Marr’s subsequent first descent of notorious Site Zed, and one of the biggest badges of courage in whitewater...