Tubing down beautiful waterways has become a tradition for tens of thousands of local residents and visiting tourists during the beautiful summer months across the South Okanagan. (Left to right) Tucker Robertson, Shawn Kostiuk, Kevin Robertson and Austin Robertson are shown floating on the Kettle River just outside of Rock Creek last Friday. (Trevor Nichols photo)
I had never been tubing in British Columbia before and it was with blissful ignorance that my partner and I set out this past weekend to experience one of the Okanagan’s great summer leisure activities.
With visions of spending an afternoon floating peacefully down the river we threw some towels in a bag and took off.
Tubing, for the uninitiated, consists of dropping an inner tube into a river and riding the current.
Laying on the water and letting a river pull you gently along is relaxing and a refreshing way to spend an afternoon, making the activity popular for tens of thousands of local and visitors during the stifling hot Okanagan summer.
There are a few popular tubing locations around the Okanagan Valley.
While Tourism BC sends most who ask to the Penticton River Channel connecting Skaha Lake and Okanagan Lake, I had heard rumours that the best tubing in the area is on the Kettle River in Boundary Country.
We arrived in the quaint town of Rock Creek with the blissfully naive notion that we could simply amble up to the local gas station and rent some tubes. We were very wrong.
After talking to a series of bemused store clerks, we realized while there were plenty of high-tech and pricey tubes for sale, no one was renting.
We also made another glaring organizations oversight. We only had one vehicle.
Tubing down a river for a couple of hours takes you quite a distance, so once you are ready to get off you need to have arranged a way back to your starting point to collect your things.
We learned the hard way that one of the first rules of tubing is to bring two cars.
Dismayed by our misfortune and embarrassed by our complete lack of proper planning we decided to leave.
On our way out of town we ran into the Robertson family, who were splashing along the river in inner tubes.
Trish Robertson filled us in on what we had missed.
She told me that a big group of she and her friends come down every year to tube the river and confirmed that it was the best tubing around, both for its relative privacy and the beauty of the river.
The best place to start your tubing journey, she said, was upstream at Kettle River Provincial Park. From there you float for a lazy three hours back to Rock Creek, where many like to make a weekend out of the trip and camp for the night.
This year the river is low, meaning the current moves a little slower and tubers have to occasionally pull up and walk a few feet or risk battered buttocks. Robertson said that the normal three-hour ride now takes much longer.
Because of our failures near Rock Creek, I was determined to wet my toes in the world of tubing, so we decided to head to the popular Penticton River Channel.
The Penticton Indian Band-run Coyote Cruises offers tube rentals and shuttle rides for six dollars apiece on the river, which makes it great for families who don’t want to bother arranging for their own tubes and transportation, and under-prepared reporters with poor planning skills.
According to Anona Kempe of Coyote Cruises, more than 100,000 people tube down the river each year.
We parked at the sendoff point on Riverside Drive and a gaggle of teenage employees set us up and got us on our way. Once my butt was in the tube and I began drifting down the river I realized the fuss had been worth it. The water was cool and refreshing and the current lazily pulled us along at about walking speed. You can steer the tube somewhat by wildly flailing your arms like paddles or just let the river do the work for you. We shared the trip with a few other groups who floated nearby – one boisterous family who screamed and splashed their way down and a group of teens who lounged on a giant raft. There was also a hoard of plucky ducks who circled us, presumably looking to pilfer snacks.
It took about an hour to make it to the shuttles, where Coyote employees helped us disembark.
A group close to us continued past us. They were heading all the way down to the end of the channel at Skaha Lake, where they no doubt had the foresight to park an extra car.
Their laughter rang out as they splashed by in their fancy rafts complete with paddles and coolers. It must be nice to think ahead. All in all, it was a wonderful experience and now I know what all the fuss is all about when it comes to tubing in the beautiful South Okanagan. Next time, we’ll plan better and I have absolutely no doubt that we’ll have an even better time.
TREVOR NICHOLS
Special to the Times
A large group of tubers floats down the Penticton Channel waterway on Saturday. (Trevor Nichols photo)
