Low river levels thwarted our ability to paddle the John Day this year, but we still wanted to spend some time on the river.

We’ve camped on the lower Deschutes multiple times, but never thought about bringing our boards. This section of the river runs from south of Maupin all the way to the Dalles. Much of it has a service road paralleling it with various BLM campgrounds dotted along. The scenery is spectacular with red rock and deep canyon walls that reminds me of sections of the John Day. This section is also dotted with class II-V rapids and is popular with rafters and drift boats.

There was also a 15 mile section on the map (Pine tree to Macks canyon) that shows no named rapids. That said, The water was also a bit low (3600cfs) and at these levels, there were some obviously “spicy” areas.

We camped at Beavertail and decided to shuttled a few runs from Pine tree back to camp. The sections near Jones Canyon and just before the curve of Beavertail were the most interesting. Both delivered some large wave trains that took some real balance. However, I was able to stay standing on 2 out of the 3 runs I completed. The curve to Beavertail also have a large drop that I would consider doing if I had brought a helmet.

The remaining 8 miles to section to Macks looked equally fun, but we decided to save that for another trip.