In a paddle boat, your experience is superlative when the crew paddles in perfect unison. You don’t have to paddle as much. You don’t have to paddle as hard. And, you can move that raft around the river like a ninja driving a Ferrari. Guys in the raft will either try to overpower each other or overpower the guide. You’ll see these boats limping herky-jerky across the river, getting stuck on rocks and paddling way more than they have to, just to keep the boat straight.
This borrows a bit from my next point, but the ladies listen when you explain proper paddling technique. Experienced rafters know you don’t paddle with your arms; you use your whole body. If you don’t, your arms and your back are spent after the first few miles. The ladies know they’re not going to overpower the river with their biceps, and they’ll almost always pick up on good paddling technique. That way, they’ve still got the same amount of power in the final rapids that they started with.
There isn’t a river trip invented that doesn’t have a college education’s worth of history, geology, literature, philosophy and ecology. I believe that when you compart just the right amount of this information, at just the right time, it adds to the soul-stirring beauty we see along the banks. Certain paddlers aren’t as open to this information, like, say, when they’re stuck on rocks. (See item No. 1 above.)
Building on those last three points, wonderful things start to happen in a paddle boat. See, sometimes the boat needs to be a little sideways going into a rapid. Sometimes, it’s more important that we don’t paddle and we let the river work for us. Part of the thrill of these river trips is going outside your comfort zone, and you have to trust your guide about when and where it’s safe to do that. Once that crew of ladies realizes their guide is on the up-and-up, they invest into their river experience wholeheartedly. I don’t think there’s a bank that pays bigger dividends.