 Things to Consider When Buying and What to do With It When You Finally Have One.
I’ve been floating rivers for almost 30 years now and have logged thousands of miles. In that time I have seen boat materials, designs, accessories, and techniques evolve and improve. And down through the years I have been asked time and again for my thoughts and opinions on what boat is best, what should I get with it and the like. So I thought I’d put a bit of thought into it and see if maybe give novice boat buyers and floaters a few ideas. There are a number of boats on the market today and on fly fishing boards, in fly shops, or on the river you will encounter those who are thinking about buying one. Most will have, at best, floated with a guide a few times. But as they become more serious about this sport they often want to branch out on their own. Unfortunately this often means that skills at the oars are limited, and understanding how to fish from a boat is based on what that guide told them on thus and such river 6 years ago. Add to this the often confusing “advice” from internet boards about which boat is the best and folks are left scratching their head. This piece will focus on rafts and Drift Boats.
Raft MaterialsA typical raft set up will include a rowing/fishing frame either from the manufacturer or from an after market frame maker. The tubes should be multi-chambered if it is for serious river use and they will probably be made of PVC, or better yet, Hypalon. Hypalon has better UV resistance than PVC and greater structural strength and most rafts using this material are actually neoprene covered by a thin layer of Hypalon. And there are a few other things to consider when buying raft regardless of the construction material. The first has to do with the term “Denier”. The higher the denier number, the stiffer and more durable your tubes will be. Additionally, a higher denier material will be more responsive and maneuverable on the water because the tubes are stiffer and less prone to deformation by the pressure of the water. Another thing you need to look at is chafe guards. They will be located on the bottom of your tubes and for anything resembling bony waters you will want them. Also consider that at some point you will need to patch your boat. If your repair kit is for a PVC boat and you have a Hypalon boat you will have a miserable day when the inevitable leak happens. One other thing, if you have a PVC boat make sure you store it, when not in use, out of the sun and away from anything that could generate ozone such as a furnace or water heater. Raft design There are two basic raft designs. One is the classic that you see on almost any whitewater trip. These will have a kick tail front and back meaning that the front and back are “bent upwards” and higher than the center of the boat. What this means is that when the boat hits a wave it will tend to float up on it rather than knife into it and will float down the wave rather than surf or plane when you exit the wave. This simply means that you will have better control and more surface contact. The typical raft of this type will have one of two types of floors, integral or self bailing. An integral floor is welded to the tubes with closed seams and a self bailer is laced in with open seams. This is something you should consider as you plan your purchase. If the waters you float most often are flat then a raft with an integral floor will work just fine for you and cost less money. However, this boat will not treat you as well if you are in heavy water because it is after all, a floating bathtub! In this case you might consider spending a bit more and getting a self bailer. The water drains out through the open seams and you don’t end up trying to row a sea slug to a place where you can bail. Then there is a Cataraft which is two tubes held together by the frame and straps. Cats will tend to be smoother in heavy water because they don’t have a kick that takes the full force of the wave you just hit. Also, they are almost impervious to suck holes that can fold a classic raft in half. Cats are also more maneuverable than the classic raft and respond to the oars with less effort simply because they have less contact with the water. They also often require a much heavier frame because you are trying to bind two independent parts together. Another disadvantage to Cats is that they have this thing about turning sideways into the wind. Having rowed a variety of rafts and drift boats, I know that all boats seem to want to do this, but a Cat will take you to the edge of war with any strong breeze or wind. The Frame If the main point of your boat is to fish from, you will want a frame designed to accommodate this passion. Typically this frame will be made from Aluminum tubing and will include at a minimum seats and oar locks. Additionally, most of today’s frames are sectional and will be assembled using what is called a quick pin and secured to the tubes using straps and “D” rings. This will get you down the river but you might consider some additions to the basic frame package to make your fishing experience a bit more enjoyable. These include casting platforms that you can stand on, thigh braces, swivel seats, a place to hold a dry bag and cooler, and maybe rod storage. For the casting platform I prefer Diamond plate because it is light weight and strong. As for the thigh brace, well as for the thigh brace. The thigh brace should be vertical or perpendicular to the frame. Fish from a boat with a forward leaning thigh brace and you will find out why! With such a brace you will feel rather unstable and will tend to drive your knees into the braces uprights to counter this feeling. Imagine how your legs are going to feel after an 8 hour float doing a constant isometric exercise! That fine bottle of Talisker that was supposed to last the whole trip will be downed the first night after a day like that. I also like braces that have horns, preferably curved. This allows you to shift your position from side to and still maintain a sense of stability even in rough water while you cast. And speaking of casting, this ability to shift your position is exactly why I like swivel seats. Believe me, a day on the South Fork of the Snake in 100 deg. temps will mean that you will want to plant your backside yet still be able to fish in comfort. Choosing a Raft The first step is considering what type of water you want to float. The next is looking at if you want to float by yourself, with a friend, or with three of you in the same boat. Another thing to think about is if you want to float late into season on waters that are skinny. Keep in mind that my one man outcast starts to rub at about 2”, a two man Scadden will do it at about 3 to 4” (depending beer guts and how many burgers you ate the night before). And with my 14’ NRS Cat and my Drift boat we’ll probably be getting out and dragging it through 5” to 6” of water with three people. The single greatest advantage of floating in a two or three man boat is that everybody gets the chance to fish as you switch out on the oars. Then you also need to consider your budget. PVC is a perfectly serviceable material and will work just fine for the casual floater, as long is it is stored in a protected area. If you are going to spend a lot of days on the water then opt for Hypalon. Also think about the length of your boat. The bigger the water, the bigger boat you can get away with. But for most fly fishing waters you’ll want to stay with a boat that is 16’ or less. Drift Boat Construction Materials For years there were three materials that drift boats were made from – Aluminum, wood, or fiberglass. Today that has expanded to the HDPE welded seam structure of Boulder Boat Works, the roto-molded approach of Hog Island, and the carbon fiber/urethane boats from Freestone. I’ll be honest here and tell you point blank that I do not like Aluminum boats. They are loud, cold during the hinter year, and blazing hot in summer, and will sink like a stone if you swamp them. They also stick to rocks like liquid nails. On the other hand you can beat the living you know what out of them and they are very easy to maintain. Compared to that a material I love is a wood boat, yet they are outclassed by Aluminum in the maintenance department. A wood boat is a labor of love and should only be used where rocks and obstacles are not often an issue. A wood boat built by a master has the warmth, the glow, and comfort of casting a Gillum, Payne, or Leonard grass rod. You love it but you are also a bit afraid of it as well! Fiberglass is, well, fiberglass. Unromantic, strong, and a darned good material to build a drift boat out of. Fiberglass will hold up to most of the waters many of us float yet it will still often require fixing nicks in the chines with either gel coat or even resin/fiberglass patch followed by wet sanding. Then along came HDPE (High Density Poly Ethylene). This is a material that has been used for years in the storage and containment of hazardous wastes and chemical storage because you almost can’t get it to react with anything. And it also has some pretty impressive structural strengths as well. Another advantage to HDPE is the fact it is hydrophobic (won’t wet out) so it has a much lower coefficient of friction than just about any other material on the water. The relationship between that and handling should be fairly obvious. And a few other things about this material, you can slam it into a rock without concerns about damage, and UV from the sun won’t do anything to it! The new player in this field is Freestone Boat Works. Their boats are carbon fiber with an overcoat of polyurethane. They look like a classic glass boat yet should have a friction coefficient close to that of HDPE and durability greater than that of glass. Yet all of this means nothing if you can’t get the boat down the river. Drift Boat Design  Clacka touts their tunnel hull, Hyde will tell you how the slope and design of their stern provides lift, and Joe boat maker will tell you yada, yada, yada. Through the years the things that I have found that really count tell me that such things play only a small role so don’t get sucked in by them. Of more importance are things like oar/rower location, sharp or rounded chines, and off center stability. I’ll start with the latter. If you are fishing along the left bank of a river, invariably you will have both fishermen leaning in that direction. This results in more “bite” on that side as the hull digs into the water from the weight imbalance. If you are floating with a guide you hear “center up” being barked which means shift your weight to the center line of the boat. With today’s boats this is not near as much a problem as it was with older boats, some of which were downright scary to fish from. And some of this has to do with the sharpness of the chine.
I like a boat with rounded or soft chines. They bite the water less and I’ve found that they maneuver better, and are less prone to the vagaries of current. A boat with a soft chine is also easier to crab. What this means is that you are pushing one oar blade under the boat while using the other oar to maintain the orientation of the boat relative to the bank. The way to envision your grip on the oar used for crabbing is to think of reaching and grabbing a bar that is parallel to the gunwale of the boat with an overhand grip. You then put the oar in the water and push away from you so that the power of the stroke pushes water under the boat. This slides, or crabs the boat either away from, or towards the bank. In doing this you will often find that the nose of the boat will tend to turn to the side of the crabbing oar so use the opposite oar to maintain the desired orientation. I’ve also found that the location of the oar locks and rower can make this easier. Some boat makers take a two pronged approach to this. With their boats you have two or more positions for the oar locks and, you can adjust the position of the seat to accommodate the physical stature of the oar man. What I don’t like about this approach is that you shift the fulcrum for the oars as you move them fore or aft of the beam (widest part of the boat). This in turn can reduce the power of your oar stroke. Other boat makers take the approach of a car seat. The oars are stationary at, or just behind the beam and the oars man can move his seat for comfort and control. Amenities For a raft you will need to consider such things as coolers and dry storage. Dry storage will either be a dry box or dry bags, both of which can be purchased from many sporting goods stores or from the manufacturer. With drift boats you will have some dry storage as part of the package. Also think about an anchor system. These are standard on drift boats but will be an extra for most rafts, with a few exceptions. Many of the Outcast or Scadden kick boats come with them built into the frame and other kick boat makers are now adding them. In drift boats there are two basic approaches to the anchor system. One is a center mount with a foot release and the other is a side mount with a rope chock. I’ve used both and don’t really prefer one over the other. A couple of things to keep in mind with anchors though. As you pull your anchor in coil the rope in such a way that the part of the rope closest to the release is always on top. This prevents the potential for a snarl that can have some very unpleasant consequences. These consequences are also the reason that you should never tie a knot in the end of your anchor rope. At some point in your boating life you will drop your anchor in water where you shouldn’t have, or you will inadvertently release it. In fast or heavy water this can result in the aft being pulled under water and swamping the boat if you have snarl or knot in the rope. Better to lose your anchor than your boat. Another thing you will need to decide on are locks and oar keepers. Oar locks come in two basic types, pin and clip and open. Pin and clip keeps your oars in position yet have the disadvantage of making it difficult to feather your blade or slam your oar home again when that unexpected rock dislodges it. An open type provides for the greatest amount working the oars but also means that you are going to give your forearms a workout as you work to control the blade. Also, for the open type you can get keepers that mount to your oars. These are basically plastic pieces that screw into the shaft with a raised section that fits between the “horns” of an open lock. This serves to lock the oar blade in position yet still allows you to pull the oar in and feather with minimal effort. Basic Oaring Your best friend in floating a river is the back stroke. The mistake that many beginners make is that they think they can row around and avoid an obstacle by pointing the nose of the boat past it, and rowing forward. Now your forward rowing speed is coupled with the current speed and more often than not you are going to slam into the obstacle! Instead, you want to look down stream, look at current tongues, decide river right or left. Then point the nose of the boat at the obstacle and back row – with one note of caution. If the current is flowing in a direct line between you and the obstacle, you will not beat the current and likely end up wrapping. So instead point the nose of the boat slightly to the left of the obstacle if you want to go river right and slightly right if you want to go river left. You do not want to fight the current but back row slightly across to it. Rock Gardens In rock gardens you have three choices – pinball, wrap, or slow down your float. When you float down a tongue or chute, look for an eddy behind a large rock that you can pull into and sit down in. The more you slow down your float the more prepared you are going to be for what is down stream of you. Sometimes you will find that you are almost at 90 deg. to the flow as you make a couple of powerful strokes to get into this eddy. Another thing to think about is that often large rocks or rock walls have a pressure wave in front of them. The water in the pressure wave is actually stalled, or moving upstream so use its energy to your benefit. Sometimes you will need to place the nose of the boat up on this pressure wave, make a strong back stroke, and spin the nose using a scissor stroke (both oars moving in opposite directions). The bottom line is, slow down your boat so the river isn’t coming at you too fast. This will let you read the water and plan a few moves ahead. Big waves The water in a wave over about 6’ is almost always flowing back down the face of the wave. What this means is that as you float up the face of the wave and approach the top, gravity and water are going to try and force your boat back down the face. If this happens you will flip as the downstream current catches the tail of your boat. The point of this is that you need to row at big waves. You need to build momentum to crest them and overtop. If you passively float into something like this, you will go for a swim, and lose or chase your gear. So as you set up, look at the wave, if it has any sort of an upstream curl at the top, row at it hard. It is also a good idea that when you come into something like this that you have all gear stored and secured before you get into it. And a note of caution. Whether you are looking at big wave or a big rock with powerful water flowing over the top of it, DO NOT HIT IT SIDEWAYS! Always square the nose of your boat to and hit it front on. Fishing from a Boat  For the oars man, this means putting the boat in a position where your buds or clients can actually cast to the prime water. And more often than not, that will be to the same side of the boat and this can actually be a very real headache from time to time. If you are floating 30’ off the bank, the guy in the front of the boat is trying to shoot a cast almost straight down stream into that great looking eddy, and the guy in the back of the boat is trying to lay his in at that seam straight out from the oar lock. If they do it at the same time you are going to have a mating of the flies. This can also have some positive benefits however as you try to untangle this mess as you think – Hmmm, if I combine the feature of this fly with that feature from the other, it just might work. That aside, there have to be rules to fishing from a boat. Other books and articles have talked about them but they can not be stated often enough. The first for me is the corner of the eye rule.
When you are in a boat with more than one fisherman, it is no longer just about you. So if you see out of the corner of your eye that the guy at the front or back of the boat is about to pick up and back cast, and you want to do the same, have the courtesy to wait a second before you do. It will not cost you fish and it will save you a great deal of the frustration of untangling leaders. So just pay attention to each other, and cast accordingly. And there is actually a really easy way to determine your casting angle. Simply look at your casting brace. Both front and back that angle described by the corner of that brace is the angle you want to cast at. Using this rule, the angler in front will find that they get a great drift to a just behind a point parallel to the oar locks. And the angler in the back of the boat gets the same drift to a point just aft of the boat. Then when both pick up, the backcasts are parallel, and flies don’t mate. Of course this will vary a bit based on the angle of the boat towards shore. Now if you are in a one man boat I’ve found that the best position to fish from is facing (perpendicular to) the bank. This allows you the greatest range of casting options as well as rapid response to current changes using either fins or oars. If you are in a boat with only an angler in front, cock the boat that the nose is at an angle linear to the corner of your eye if you were looking straight down stream. Too much beyond that angle and your fisherman will be making sidearm casts and less than that angle he will be making cross body casts. In a boat where you have fishermen fore and aft, square it up to the bank or very slightly point the bow towards the shore you are fishing. This provides the greatest opportunity for both fishermen along the lines of the rules mentioned above. Another consideration for the oars man is distance. It is imperative that the one at the oars keep those fishing within the distance, and orientation necessary to effectively fish. This also includes such things as pulling the oars, basically getting them out of the water once the boat is tracking. And any shift in the boats position should be handled by minimal oar work just to get it back to track. These oar strokes will include crabbing or feathering the oars to make minimal disturbance to the water. The Bottom Line  In our, the fly fisherman’s, ideal world we would all have a float tube, a one and two man kick boat, a raft tricked out with a fishing frame so two can fish, and a drift boat. But then again we’d also have a lodge in Patagonia, one in Montana, and a beach house with a flat right out the door too as we fly back and forth. You get the point here. If you buy a one man kick boat but your fishing buds don’t have one then your days floating will be by yourself. This isn’t bad as most of us enjoy that day alone on the water yet….! To be honest, the best days on the water most of us have has as much to do with camaraderie, the shared snip of Scotch, or dinner and a beer as we regale each other with tales of our day on the water. There is also something about busting your glutes at the oars as you try to get the guys in the boat into fish. So it comes down to things like what kind of water are you going to fish the most? Do you want to do it alone or with buds? What kind of budget do you have? When it gets right down to it, buy the best boat you can afford. This is more critical with rafts than it is with drift boats as a higher quality raft will almost always be more expensive. This is not necessarily true with drift boats.
With drift boats, you have a little more leeway. With RO, Clacka, or Hyde you are going to get a good glass boat. Montana Boat Builders will make you a beautiful woody that you are going to pay for. Or you can buy the kits or plans and build your own. And for plastic boats you have Boulder Boat works, Hog Island, and Freestone Drifters. Each uses different technologies, and each builds a heck of a boat. And if you talk to some of the guides up in the Pacific North West you will often here some very good things about Willie’s aluminum boats. Unlike rafts, there are no Sevelor’s of drift boats. Copyright Dan Wistrand 2007; Photos Copyright Kelly Palmer 2008 Dan Wistrand a.k.a. NPBorn |