IDAHO’S MIRAGE THE LOWER MALAD RIVER

Hidden among the gently rolling hills and flat farmlands of the Snake River Plain in South Central Idaho, the Lower Malad River is an improbable oasis of continuous, blue-green, class IV whitewater. The Malad remains largely unknown in southern Idaho, let alone the rest of the Western U.S. For the past year, however, word of this fast, fun, dam-released run has been spreading like wildfire.

Words and Photography: John Webster

Short, rowdy, roadside, and just 90 minutes north of Boise, Idaho, a town with a thriving boating community, the Malad River should be on every local boater’s top hit list. Yet until recently, a lack of scheduled and predictable dam releases have kept it under the radar. The headwaters of the Malad are in the Sawtooth Mountain Range, roughly 70 miles north of the put-in as the crow flies. Before the water can feed the whitewater sections of the Malad, it’s poured into Magic Reservoir and distributed for agricultural purposes. Even in a good snow year, flows are infrequent and dam maintenance remains the most common reason for a release. In 2014 a 50-year old turbine needed replacing, resulting in an unprecedented seven months of continuous water. Predictable flows and…

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Kayak Session (Digital) - 1 Issue, KS#54 (summer 2015)

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