Worst and most dangerous river trip I’ve been on in 20+ years. I grew up on the AuSable and have canoed, kayaked, and/or tubed down almost every single one of Michigans rivers and the rifle specifically several times before.
We paid almost $200 for tubes for 5 WOMEN plus a cooler tube. Upon arrival we were told it was cash only, which we were not told ahead of time so we had to leave to try to find an ATM to pull the cash, annoying but not a huge deal. Then we wanted to purchase some water proof phone cases and the woman who was working was sweet but just filling in and didn’t know anything and it was just very awkward. Then they told us to go wait by our vehicles to be picked up by the van in 15 min, and THEY FORGOT US there (they admitted this). We finally get picked up and they take us to the drop off point. When we pulled off the side of a high traffic road main road at a bridge over the river and we honest to god thought it was a joke. It was not. The 5 of us women had to haul all of our tubes and coolers down 100ft (min), very steep and narrow “path” getting legitimately stuck between trees because the tubes are double the width of the path, easily. The drop in point was a swampy mucky seaweeded area directly under the bridge with massive rocks we had to crawl over to get into the water. It was not even remotely an actual access point. The driver made several comments about how people don’t normally start from there… so why the heck did they take us there?? It made zero sense!!
From there, the river was not taken care of at all. No less than 5 trees down completely blocking the river to where we had to get out and climb over with 7 tubes (including the coolers) without losing them to the strong current. One women In our group got literally stuck in a downed tree while also being dragged by the current over massive rocks and has bruises and cuts all over. Her tube also popped as a result. Thank gold she was able to ride on top of the cooler tube for the last hour of the trip.
There were also a lot of large rocks on shallow areas making it really hard to just chill on the river, you were constantly fighting the large rocks or trees. I understand they can’t change nature but a heads up of the conditions would have been good to know ahead of time as we would have just not gone or picked a different part of the river to tube down. They shouldn’t be letting people pay to use this part of the river it is a major safety hazard and seems like they’re just trying to make money regardless.
The worst of it all though, upon getting to the pick up spot, the driver asked if we had fun to which we replied honestly it was not a good trip the river was jammed up someone got hurt and their tube popped to which he started making comments about “not everyone should be allowed on the river” and “some people just can’t handle it” as if it was our fault that they allowed us to pay them to take us without any sort of a heads up. He was extremely rude and condescending to the point I got very upset and told them we needed our money or a portion of it back, we exchanged some words in the van and he pulled over and literally kicked the whole group out of the van LOL.
Going back through the other reviews, it seems that they have been aware of the downed trees for literal years and still allow people to go out without warning, very sad. Extremely unprofessional. Money grabbing, trolls indeed. Go to Whites or Russell or literally anywhere else. These are some hills have eyes people for real.