Welcome to the world of rafting Americas fastest growing vocational pastime what ever your age you can raft!so what do you want to just calmly float down the river or do you want whitewater raft whatever you want to do this country as it all.

All you need to do is do a little planning where do we want to raft that's the first question you have to ask your self !well this country is big and talk about the rivers that it has got well we are spoilt for choice.

From the mighty Colorado river to rivers in Montana Idaho and Oregon "so where do you want to go perhaps if you are a beginner you can try your hand in Idaho on the lochsa or selway rivers they have whitewater but they are not as wild as the mighty Colorado and as you gently float down the river you might want to keep a look out for that black bear and is mate the moose and is friend the elk .

If you are going on your own as a family and not booking with a company that specializes in rafting there some thing that you need to do.

First make sure that you tell some one were you are going buy a map and show them were you hope to be each night and tell them that you will phone them each night" so take your cell phone with you and keep it dry and safe.

That's the first one out of the way the second is always wear the safety clothing that you can buy get the best and wear warm clothing it can get cold as you wind your way down the rivers water attracts the cold.

Also always take with you a spare set of clothing put them in a plastic bag and keep them safe on the raft that way if you go into the water you will have warm clothing to change into.

Now we come the most important part you will be going sometimes in dangerous water so to speak and some rivers can be isolated ;i am talking about the more adventurous family's the ones that want to go to the Alaskan rivers these are very beautiful but full of danger more danger than the ones in all of mainland USA .

For a start you are isolated from every one and the cell coverage for you phone can be non existent ,the weather for a start is a lot different than you can imagine for a start the summer starts that little bit later and it has in the past Court out a few people"so make sure before you go that the rivers are not still frozen in parts .

Take with you a different set of survival tools these are what you need.

Short wave radio.

lighters.

pepper spray you will encounter bears.

These things are essential for survival in the wild if there is an accident .

Again take with you all the other items mentioned and also take with you dry food it just might keep you alive till you can be rescued .

Above all stay together you will be rescued as long as you have remembered the first rule tell some on that you will be at a certain point on the map on a certain day"one good thing to do is to do what i did when i went into the Canadian arctic circle in the summer last year when i got to the last town i went and told the police that i would be back in five days the point of this was if i was not back they could come and look for me and my wife.

so have good vacation rafting do it right and you will be safe there are company's that will look after you .

www.rowadventures.com

www.griffthexp.com

Learn more about this author, Graham Lear.
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