Here we are manning the front of the boat, while our expert river guide, Curt, steers the back.
On Friday, Dennis and I decided to raft down the Arkansas River. In particular, we ran the Brown’s Canyon portion; 12 miles of mostly 3rd class rapids with two awesome 4th Class Rapids to cap it all off!
We decided to go with the Acquired Tastes Rafting guides because they had availability last minute AND they promised to include two awesome class 4 rapids; Seidels Suckhole and Twin Falls. Since we had done some pretty advanced rafting up in Canada, we were ready for adventure!
Our guide, Curt, was really mellow and made the whole trip a ton of fun. About 2/3 the way down the river, we stopped and had a very nice, ample sandwich buffet with chips and cookies, to boot! I was really happy that we had rented wetsuits with booties as the water was very cold and we were soaking wet the whole time!
After the rafting adventure, we made our way to the Chalk Creek Campground. The campsite grounds were luxurious; with a small store, horseshoes, a video game room with 4 games, pay showers, the cleanest dish washing sink I’ve ever seen, very nice stall bathrooms, and a creek flowing nearby.
Unfortunately, the camp spaces are fairly standard size wise. Our neighbors’ tents were less than 8 feet from our tent, so we heard kids crying and adults snoring all night long. But, this is fairly typical for car campgrounds on a busy summer weekend, so we just had to adjust our expectations and forget about a quiet night’s sleep.
We set up our canopy over the picnic table, for some additional shade, but there were lots of nice shade trees. They also had firewood for sale, so we stocked up our camp ring for a Saturday night bonfire. I had to wake up at 3:30am the next morning, so we ate dinner early and went to bed. The stars were visible from the campsite, so it was nice being away from the city!
Tags: 3rd Class Rapids, 4th Class Rapids, Acquired Tastes Rafting, Arkansas River, Buena Vista, Car Camping, Chalk Creek Campground, CO, Rafting