Customer Reviews

Soggy Sneakers: A Paddler's Guide to Oregon Rivers

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Soggy Sneakers along with Paddling Oregon (by Robb Keller) are the two definative books about boating in Oregon.

Soggy Sneakers -published by Seattle Mountaineers-is in its third edition and features over 200 runs compiled by members of the Willamette Kayak and Canoe Club who have run all of Oregon's rivers.

Included are Class 1 to Class 6 runs, with maps and descriptions of flow, gradient, length and character of each run. The book is an easy read and includes information on where to obtain shuttles and the best seasons to run.

The one criticism I have is the book fails to specify which type of craft (kayaks, canoes, rafts) are suited for each run.

Soggy Sneakers has been in print since the early 1980's - and it has stood the test of time better than I!

I was in High School in Eugene while the project was being finished - starting as a project by mentors Gene Ice and Bob Porter it metamorphed into a club based model for a great guidebook. What makes this book unusual is that there are almost as many authors as rivers - insuring that the author is writing not about a river he or she has run once, but usually several times, at several different times of year and water levels.

As such the descriptions are written about favorite rivers and although this does lead to a bit of discrepancy in comparing different rivers that is more than made up by depth of knowledge and enthusiastic writing.

The completion of the book by the Willamette Kayak and Canoe Club, many of whose members are academics at Oregon State University, only adds to the professionalism and usefulness of the book.

And I think they've even got one description written by yours truly left...

My open tandem canoe group used Soggy Sneakers on an exporatory (for us)week long trip in Southern Oregon. We found that the ratings listed in the book varied considerably depending on wether the writer was a kayaker, rafter or open canoeist. When a rafter called it a Class II it was a very different thing from when an open canoe rated it Class II. We got skunked several times before we started looking at the boats the raters were using. An open canoes Class III is a rafter's Class I and a Kayakers Class II. Once we figured that out we found the book very useful.

Whether you are from Oregon, or not. Whether you are a class V boater or a class II, whether you actually plan on running a river described in the book, or just armchair canoeing, this book is great. It is the definitive whitewater boater's guide to some of the best whitewater kayaking locations in the U.S. The descriptions are adequate, yet leave the paddler to do the actual scouting, and the instructional tips in the beginning are great too. I highly recommend this book to anyone who has ever boated, or plans to boat more rivers within the Pacific Northwest.