San Juan

We ran this in two rafts (14 foot and 15 foot) at 540 CFS on Mother’s Day weekend. We put in at Pagosa Riverside campground where we camped the night before. I would definitely recommend the spot which had hot showers, dishwashing, and $35 for camping by the without much road noise. Above town for a few miles the River was shallow and we got hung up a couple times on sleepers and gravel. There was a lot of evidence of the flood from October 2025 here rock piles and eroded banks. The town section was great with some good class two fun. Seems like there are about 30 or so of these man-made ledges throughout the run down to Trujillo Road at mile 16. The flood had washed out some of them and made them more like rapids with tongues, some of the ledges had recirculating energy, enough to pull the raft backwards a bit, but not keep it. At this flow we got hung up a couple times in the drops one time getting pinched between two rocks and another time when there was a rock directly below the drop that caught our nose. We had done this run one time before at 1000cfs and this was considerably more challenging at 500cfs both because of the boniness and the way the river had changed due to the flood, whole trees in the river at times. Lunch spot is beautiful, about 6miles from the takeout. Constant attention was required to find the river channel, dodge rocks, find sleepers, and scout the rapids from the boat by standing up. We had previously known about Llama falls the 3’ waterfall. It’s similar to others of these ledge drops, and at this flow there were a few of this magnitude at 3’ or so that make your frame slide forward. It’s exciting in a raft and fairly straightforward. This run is exceptional, we’ll be back!