Hello Bend! The safe passage channel of the much anticipated Bend Whitewater Park open recently so we had to float the river on opening weekend to check it out! In the past, we had to get out of the water & walk our tubes around the damn, which was a bit of a pain. Not anymore, as we are now able to ride our tubes straight though & enjoy the “rapids” which thrilled my 7yo son, but scared the crap out of my 5yo daughter!
Tons of people turned out at the Colorado Ave bridge to watch the new activity in this part of the river. The whitewater channel isn’t quite open yet, but that didn’t stop adventurists from jumping in to enjoy the ride from the “sandbar”.
Want to check it out yourself before the season ends? Here’s the scoop…the water is super low right now. If possible, stay to the right. Our tubes went to the left, and we got stuck on the rocks in several areas & the netting at the bottom of one of our tubes ripped. I would keep kiddie kayaks out of this area. The rapids are pretty fast, and they can get stuck on the rocks. I watched 2 kids that had to be helped and one of them was standing on the side crying once he was back on shore. It looked like single tube riders had the most fun so unhook before you go under the bridge. We had a double tube & 2 singles hooked together and well, you know how that went. Big multi-person tubes looked to be a lot of fun as well as they seemed to go over the waves & rocks fairly well although a bit slow.