Truckee
1. Alpine Meadows Road to Floriston (Floriston Run)
| Difficulty | II-III |
| Length | 27 mi |
| Avg Gradient | n/a |
| Gauge | Truckee R a Farad Ca |
| Flow Rate as of 27 minutes | 1250 cfsrunnable |
| Reach Info Last Updated | October 7, 2025 |
River Description
The Floriston Run of the Truckee River offers options depending on your skills, the water level, and time available.
Several intermediate access points provide a range of choices. You can either make it a long day trip or just do a couple laps in the evening to enjoy the waves at Floriston.
The Truckee River emerges from Lake Tahoe where ancient lava flows dammed the river valley and gave rise to the lake as we see it today. From the lake the river continues on its journey from the mountains to Reno eastward into Pyramid Lake in Nevada.
Class One fun from Lake Tahoe to Alpine Meadows. The whitewater section is generally considered to begin at River Ranch or Alpine Meadows Bridge just under a mile downstream, and from here the river flows at a good pace along Highway 89 with some fun Class II/III whitewater before tapering off as you continue on down to Truckee.
Low bridges are a hazard and in the past local agencies have closed this section of the river to Recreational boating at flows above 1000 cfs.
AW and Tahoe local boaters question the legality of initiating this closure in the past but we would require a local volunteer to pursue this further (contact AW's California staff if interested).
Once you reach Truckee, the river runs along I-80 but this is a beautiful valley and it's still a scenic float down toward Boca Reservoir.
One of the most popular section is from Boca to Floriston. Here the river gains flow from Boca Reservoir, which also extends the paddling season. The Boca to Floriston run contains class II rapids for 5.5 miles before you reach a short boulder-strewn canyon at Bronco Creek. This long class III rapid (pushing class IV at higher flows) is a lot of fun and provides a good technical challenge before tapering off with some nice play spots as you pass under I-80 at Floriston. There are remains of an old diversion dam here. If you don't have a shuttle, this is a great destination rapid as yo
River Features
Put In
Town Run River Access
Take Out
Trip Reports
Log in to add a reportFrom Tahoe City to Floriston the Truckee is best considered as 6 sections, with many variations possible:
Tahoe City to River Ranch: Class 1 with many raft tourists in the summer. (Use Tahoe City gauge)
River Ranch to about Bridge 4: Nice short class III- run. (Tahoe City gauge)
Bridge 4 to above town of Truckee: Class I-II, starting out II+. (Truckee gauge)
'Town Run' through Truckee down to Glenshire: Class III (Truckee gauge)
Glenshire to Boca: Class II+ (Truckee gauge)
Boca to Floriston: starts out class II, then to III- as you enter Floriston Gorge, then Jaws and Bronco at Class IV. Many people call Jaws & Bronco only Class III, but this stretch is very familiar to the local boating community and is run frequently. Viewed without this familiarity effect, I agree with Bruce's comment earlier, and the Holbeck / Stanley book with their IV rating. (Use Boca gauge.)
Then downstream of Floriston, the run down to Farad has nice gradient starting out Class III with the blown-out dam rapids.
Ran this as a three day, two night overnighter [partially] with fellow packrafters Sami Feld and Andy Rich and some innertubers. This shuttle was fun – I staged a bike at the Amtrak station in Truckee on my way to park my car at the put-in, Silver Creek. I then paddled all the way to Reno, getting a Lyft to the Amtrak station, training back to Truckee, and biking back to Silver Creek.
The funnest sections are near the town of Truckee and near Floriston for sure – we portaged Jaws but will get after it next time!
400cfs is too low in my opinion– there was a lot of scraping, but mostly in the section after Floriston.
The Floriston Rapid, which is the last half mile of this Truckee section, is closer to a class IV than a III. A less experienced boater expecting III would be in for a surprise. I have run the Floriston Rapid dozens of times over 15 years, boated all over the country with some international experience, and boated a lot of III, IV and V's . Holbek and Stanley claim 'the last half mile is a good class IV rapid'.
Surfing under I-89 at Floriston.
Looking upstream at Bronco at Floriston.
I-89 across the Truckee at Floriston.
Surfing at the site of the old diversion dam at
Floriston.