10 Days

Adrift Adventures is excited to team up with its sister company Stand Up Paddle Colorado to offer a raft guide school /river intensive unlike anyone offered in the USA.  The course will take place on 3 rivers in Colorado and Utah.  It will cover the disciplines of River SUP outfitting and guiding as well as whitewater paddle rafting and rowing.  Whether you are looking at being a raft guide/SUP guide professionally or acquiring the skills, knowledge and comfort to be able to outfit your own private river excursions, this represents the right opportunity for you.  The intensive/guide school will start on the Colorado River and then progress to Split MTN Canyon on the Green River.  After the first 3 days, the group will embark on one of the most cherished and revered river sections in the American West, the Yampa River.  On this 4 day multi day trip, the participant will not only continue to practice and implement the whitewater skills they are learning, but they will get inside working knowledge of what it takes to pull off multi day river trips.   After the multi day trip is over, there will be 3 more days of Split Mtn paddling to wrap up training.  In total it is a 10 day intensive that includes world class class 3 whitewater and 4 day overnight trip on the Yampa through Dinosaur National Monument.

There are guide schools all over the USA offered by outfitters and obviously some are better than others.  Other than trying to cover the minimum, we believe a full immersion is needed to get the repetitions,  hours, river miles, paddle time and proper guidance so that the correct foundational skills can be nurtured and engrained in the participant.  Offering SUP takes this course into another stratosphere.  By the end you will have the hours, miles and skills to be able to competently run safer private trips and or work for Adrift Adventures or another outfitter.

River Training Goals:

1. Expose trainees (all levels of experience) to the fundamentals of whitewater guiding, rafting, paddle boarding, river navigation, river safety and self- rescue.
2. Advanced SUP river navigation, instruction, scouting and safety.
3. Assist in choosing the necessary equipment for maximum safety and the creation of a proper fluid mindset that assists in preparing for the unexpected when recreating and guiding on rivers.
4. Leadership and confidence training, learning to recreate in the outdoors as a group that functions with respect to the elements and the ultimate well being of everyone on the trip.
5. Fitness and conditioning

SUP Paddling Goals:

1. Discover the History of SUP
2. Be able to discuss and name equipment and uses
3. Be able to demonstrate, describe and teach basic to intermediate stances and paddling techniques
4. Basic Rescue
5. Fitness and Conditioning

BLM/Park and Rec’s Requirements for River Trainees (Greatly exceeded by course offered at Adrift)

A guide shall have a minimum of fifty hours of on river training utilizing paddles and/or oars, and any other equipment that the guide will be using on regulated trips. Of this fifty hours, thirty hours shall be with a qualified guide instructor aboard the same vessel with the trainee. The remaining twenty hours shall be with a qualified guide instructor on the same training trip. Twenty hours of training shall occur on the river on which the raft guide/SUP guide will be guiding regulated trips or on a river section of comparable difficulty.

Minimum Raft guide training shall include the following areas of instruction:

1. Rigging and maneuvering the vessel;
2. River currents, eddies, and waves;
3. River hazards;
4. Types and causes of river rapids;
5. Scouting and running rapids;
6. River rescue and emergency procedures;
7. Minimizing outdoor recreation resource impacts; and
8. Proper fit, wearing and use of personal flotation devices.

Links for ACA Curriculum for Levels 1-3:

• • Level 1
  • Level 2
  • Level 3