River of Golden Dreams - Type one fun paddleboarding

By Christian

The "River of Golden Dreams" is a cute little paddle down the river between Alta Lake and Green Lake, entirely within the resort community of Whistler. We paddled it once before, in a rented canoe, which was a nice paddle but a quasi-fiasco of logistics and an attempt to avoid tourist pricing. We now own a beast of a canoe, but also (more recently) two SUPs. Line really wanted to try it again on the paddleboards.

We started with casual swimming at Alta Lake, bringing everything with us that we'd need for the day. After a good time at the beach we decided it was time to head off, so we plopped everything into a dry duffel and an IKEA bag and paddled to the outlet of the lake. Initially I just towed the bigger kids on the inflatable dragon which seemed like great fun for everybody, until we got a little ways down the river and F started freaking out about the tiny insects minding their own business on the lily pads. I brought her onto the paddleboard, which helped a bit, but didn't rectify the problem. Fortunately we soon came to the low-water portage section, after which was the confluence of cold mountain water coming down from Sproatt/Rainbow. No more lily pads, no more critters, no more problems.

The rest of the paddle was great. Just enough current to make things interesting but never really threatening (although we did pass some canoeists who'd managed to capsize). We even saw a group of (at least) 3 beavers happily munching away. Doing it again I'd definitely take paddleboards, and it even got us thinking about the possibility of a longer river trip with them, once the kids are bigger. The maneuverability, light weight, and good visibility from the paddleboards was a nice change of pace from our 20' long, 100 lb, family canoe (especially on such a small creek). We finished a bit later than planned, but the kids had a great time in the splash park while Line walked back to get the vehicle.