Main Salmon Lodge River Trips
The Ultimate Combination of Adventure & Rustic Luxury!
Are you thrilled about the idea of spending five days on a wilderness whitewater adventure, but not so thrilled about the idea of having to camp each night in order to experience that? You won’t want to miss this unique Main Salmon River trip! You’ll enjoy all the excitement of a multi-day whitewater journey, but stay inside each of the four nights we’ll be on the river. The lodges provide everything you’ll need after an exciting day of whitewater, scenic walks, sun, sand, and relaxing. No need to bring a sleeping bag–each lodge provides sleeping accommodations, multi-course dinners and hearty breakfasts.
Riverside lodges, a Unique Experience
A little Main Salmon history: most of the lodges along the Salmon River are located on 
inholdings of private land that date back to homestead days. When livestock-raising faded away at the end of the Depression, these homesteads became sportsman’s lodges, with a hunting and fishing focus. They are supplied by backcountry air strips or, sometimes on the Main Salmon, by jet-boats. The history of these lodges make you feel as though you have stepped back in time, while still enjoying all the modern conveniences of an all-inclusive lodge.
End your Salmon River Whitewater Rafting Adventure With a Lodge Stay
A variation of the lodge trip is to spend five days floating with us on the Main Salmon down to Shepp Ranch, then spend several days there. Their rooms are very nice, and their meals are wonderful. You can take horses on a trail ride, fly-fish in the stream that passes by your door, take a jet-boat ride, sun on the beach, help milk the cow, feed the pig, weed the garden, pick peaches, and soak up the history of the site—which has an in-use cabin dating back to the 1870s. After your stay you can fly from their airstrip to town, or ride a whitewater jet-boat down to the end of the road to meet your shuttled car.
Lodge trips on the Middle Fork of the Salmon
On the Middle Fork, we can schedule one or two nights at lodges, but usually cannot spend all nights in lodges. That may change, so contact us if you are interested. Lodge trips are especially suited to spring and fall, when nights can be chilly. See Outdoor Idaho’s great program about our Salmon River Lodges.
Lodge-to-Lodge Fall Steelhead Fishing Trips
Lodge-to-lodge Steelhead Fishing Trips can be arranged on the Main Salmon River in mid-to-late October on which we stay in lodges each night instead of camping. We use the McKenzie River drift boats on these trips. The lodges offer a degree of comfort over camping at this time of year, especially if the weather turns marginal. These Idaho steelhead fishing trips take place within the River of No Return Wilderness Area, which is more isolated than the Lower Salmon. We see bighorn sheep and other wildlife here. We will see some jet boats, but they thin out a few miles from the launch site.
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