Floating the Truckee River - Mayberry to Crissie Caughlin (Washoe County, Nevada)

I've never been a very strong swimmer and so when my friend, Ash, suggested floating on the Truckee River some evening after work, I was interested, but a bit apprehensive. For those that are unfamiliar with the term "Floating", it simply refers to riding an inter-tube or other inflatable flotation device down a relatively calm section of river. Think of it like white water rafting for beginners. This time of year, the Truckee River, which flows through Reno on it's trip from Lake Tahoe to Pyramid Lake, is moving pretty slowly and it's difficult to find an area that is more than three or four feet deep. As a matter of fact, I think of it as more of a creek than a river, but that comes from my growing up on right on the Mississippi River. 

As I'm always up for trying something new, we made arrangements to meet up with other friends and do a group float. We stashed my jeep at Crissie Caughlin Park and then drove Ash's car and the tubes to Mayberry Park just west of Reno. After inflating the tubes, loading up a few beers trip, and then walking them over to the river, our voyage began. Initially, we tried linking the all of the tubes, but this proved to be challenging as we encountered and got stuck on river boulders along the way. We quickly decided to detach and just let the river have its way with each of us individually. 

While the water felt cold initially, we quickly got used to it and it actually became quite pleasant in the late summer sun. While there are a number of small rapid sections and even the remains of an old dam to float over, it would be difficult to get seriously injured doing this at this time of year. That said, coming up on those underwater boulders backwards can leave one with quite a sore backside. It's totally worth it though. As we made our way down the river, we one person would get ahead only to get caught on a boulder and be passed by the others. This went on for pretty much the duration of the trip, until we finally saw the dead white tree on the southern bank, marking our exit back at Crissie Caughlin Park. We paddled our way towards the shore and then extracted ourselves and the tubes form the river. We covered about 2.5 miles in just short of two hours (pretty slow going), but it was exhilarating and I look forward to doing it again before summer ends.