Welcome to Wapiti River Guides

Welcome Friends, Past and Future,

A bugle is a bull elks way of advertising or calling to an available cow elk. Likewise, our website  is a call to you for revealing that we are out here looking for other people interesting in traveling down the river with us.  No telephones. Just a call from the wilderness. Make a dory story, your story. Become "one" with the "river."

Wapiti is a Shawnee Indian word for elk.

The bugling challenge of a noble bull can send a sharp shiver down your spine. It represents the same sense of awe and wonder that will chill your soul on all of our river trips. Our company name evolved from the fact that we used to float rivers to hunt elk. Now we only float to take pictures of them and other wildlife. Like an elk’s bugle, our call to you is to be our guest and soak up the many  mysteries and sublime beauty of raw nature. Trips are more than just whitewater thrills.

We are Gary & Barb Lane. We own the company and will be your hosts on most every trip we offer.   Highly personalized itineraries allow you to avoid crowds and enjoy more unfettered elbow room. Our back to nature getaways are professional journeys without the commercial feel. Small group travel is the only genuine way to achieve this more authentic experience of nature.

River’s We Run.  Idaho:  Lower Salmon River.  Oregon:  Grande Ronde River and Owyhee River. Whitewater thrills, fishing trips, scenic journeys, chukar hunts, and special natural history theme trips, is our main focus.  

Do we have the best guides in the world? How can we, when most of our competitors already seem to have them all. But we do have dory boats that are older than the younger guides of other outfits. Would you rather travel with a 25 year old guide, or a guide with more than 25 years  of experience?

But what we say matters little, compared to what others say:  “One of a kind experience: June 19, 2009 – Wapiti River Guides is one of those amazing vacation “finds” that you run across every now and then. This is a small outfit, which has been in business for over 30 years.  The owner and river guide, Gary, is the reason that that this outfit is so special.  Gary is a professional and extremely knowledgeable about the river and the natural nature around it.  He is college educated in wildlife management, but several decades ago he adopted the Native American lifestyle… We felt 100% safe with Gary, he is clearly a pro and knows every drop of water in the rivers of this region.  Needless to say, the scenery is stunning beyond belief.  You will be amazed every second of this trip.”  - Sara Sawyer – Austin, TX 

Our Style & Concept of Outdoor Travel: Our world view of the pristine and remote areas we visit by river travel is akin to First Nation peoples attitude about nature.

Wilderness is a foreign concept to First Nation native peoples.  Nature is home and understood to be the foundation of all life relationships, their interconnectedness, and cyclic character. Only linear thinking civilizations that separate themselves from nature by erecting walls and paving over earth, lose understanding and compassion for those things they can no longer feel. 

With us, you can get back in touch with earth, yourself, and family. Come to the river.  Feel its pulse.   Soak up its medicine.  Rekindle your relationship to the natural world.

What truly matters?  The amount of pleasure and personal satisfaction you will enjoy on one of our trips,is the bottom line to our success in serving you.  Boiled down, life is all about relationships: how you behave with yourself, others, and nature. There is nothing better to help restore all life energy, than the river’s good medicine.

Rivers make good medicine with us, we make good medicine with rivers.

For more photos and profile see our facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/Riverdoryfun

or for more stories & personalized experiences & nature observations
see -             Gary's  new Blogs:

http://wapitisriversedge.wordpress.com/

River Time with Nature's Apprentice

or

chukarama.wordpress.com

Chukar Vortex

Fishing, Wing-shooting, & River Running 
with Naturalist/River Guide
Gary Lane