Deschutes

The access is on river right in the park. It requires a short hike down to the river from the parking area.

Starting from Sawyer Park, there is roughly 1/2 a mile of class II, before you cross under Archie Briggs Rd. This is the start of the first real rapid, referred to by some as Rockafella 1. You can either run straight down the middle, or catch a series of dynamic eddys on both sides of the river. This is one of my favorite class III rapids because it has several fun ways to increase the difficulty.

The river then winds around a corner to the left and passes under a foot bridge. This is the start of Rockafella 2. The general line here is starting left and moving to the center. At lower flows this rapid is quit shallow and can dish out some very unpleasant swims.

The next obvious horizon line is The Wright Stuff, the first class IV rapid of the run. This rapid is made up of a manky, river wide, 4 foot ledge. The cleanest line is down the left side of the main channel, right next to a bush.  One channel right of the good chute is a nasty spot that I have seen many people fall into. This is a good rapid to follow someone on if it's your first time.

A short pool separates the wright stuff from Flumes of Doom. Enter right, catch an eddy under a large boulder on the left. Then, ferry across and boof the rock on the right. You don't want to end up left, as a pin would be very likely. The runnout continues as the river bends around a corner to the left. On the outside (river right) of the corner, there is a potentially nasty boulder seive. It's not an issue if you're in your boat, but it could be bad for a swimmer. Flumes is my favorite rapid on this section.

The river calms to class II+ for half a mile or so. As you pass through a class III rapid with a huge boulder in the middle of the river at the bottom, the river makes a drastic turn to the right and you arrive at T Rex. Make a left to right S- turn between to holes at the top and then run down the center, moving right. You can go all the way right of the ledge, or hit a nice boof flake right in the middle. Don't go left. I have been pinned over there, and I have seen it happen to several other people. It's no fun.

After a short calm stretch, the rapids build back up to class III as you approach Ogre, the biggest rapid on the Riverhouse run. Ogre can be hard to spot until you are right on top of it, but you will notice the most pronounced horizon line of the trip. Ogre can be run several different ways. The easiest is to set up center/ right, keep paddling and hold on. Ogre has a tendency to flip lots of boaters, especially at higher flows. There is a quick recovery pool, but you need to roll up quickly and move to the left for the next ledge. After a couple more class III ledges, the River calms down for a while. The rest of the run has a couple fun class III rapids, but its mostly a mellow float to the takeout from here.

The access is on river left just downstream of the park and the highway bridge across the river. It's a short hike up to a pull out and dirt parking area along the highway.