Penobscot River Rafting & Tubing

Update to 3*: We finally received a copy of the video. Completely unprofessional experience. Seriously. Stay away. Used to be a good company, has gone downhill. When you go rafting with one of these outfitters, the price you pay includes the opportunity to purchase trip photos at the end of the day. It’s a given, this is the same with every company. That is, there is a photographer, and that photographer takes pictures along the trip, and at the end of the day they show you a slideshow of the pictures and then you can buy them. After our trip, we waited around for around 30 minutes before the guide came out and apologized for the wait, and said they were having technical difficulties and would instead email the media to us, and it would be free of charge for our troubles. This was the first week of June, it’s now the last week of July and we still haven’t gotten the pictures. What’s worse, we’ve been lied to several times, and were told that the pictures were mailed on a thumb drive. Twice, we were told this. And I say “we” because they were supposed to send a drive to myself in Texas, and a drive to a family member in Maine. Neither of us received a thumb drive either of the times they were “sent.” It’s highly unlikely the post office would lose two thumb drives, two times. Now they’re saying that they’ll upload them to the cloud, and we can just download them. GREAT! That’s what we asked for the first time. No need to deal with snail mail! It’s 2022 after all. Well, it’s been a week already and still no link to download. We’re now getting the run around about it being busy, and not being able to get to it. Well, this literally would take 5 minutes to do. The company uploads pictures to their web portal for people to purchase literally every single day, so, why can’t you upload our photos? I truly don’t get what the problem is. I’ve gone rafting with this company several times, organizing each of those trips and bringing the company many customers over the years. Well, this is my first time rafting with them under their new ownership and it’s clear as day. I will not be back, and I will not organize any future trips with them. Trip photos aside, our raft guide was the River manager. He obviously had a lot of experience on the River but was more focused on training the two new guides than providing a great experience for the guests. I won’t say it was bad, it was a good trip. But our guides in the past were focused on the guest interaction, talking about the natural history and overall just engaging with us a lot more. On this trip, we had the two new guides riding with us too, and he was more focused on their training than our experience. I understand they need to learn, but annual guide training is over and when there are paying guests on board, the priority should be on their experience. This 1* review will persist until I have a copy of the trip photos that we were promised.

Penobscot Adventures is a well run rafting company. They were safe, organized, had great communication, and our guide Garrett was not only knowledgeable about the river but sensitive to the diverse wants of our boat. We all had a blast. I highly recommend this company without hesitation.

So fun!! Amazing time & a great company. Only giving 4 stars because they booked an odd number of guests & one person had to sit in the center at all times of the whitewater rafting. Pretty lame since they charge such a premium price. Other than that everything was wonderful. Delicious food & even a vegetarian option.

My family and I recently did the Full Penobscot River rafting trip which consisted of the lower part of the river with smaller rapids, a break for lunch, and the finishes on the upper portion with much more intense rafting. Check-in was quick and easy as was renting wet-suits, which we did. Our guide Sawyer was fantastic; a lot of fun, and extremely personable. The lunch was excellent, far better than what we expected. The mosquitoes were pretty bad at the lunch spot however so I would recommend bringing bug spray with you on the bus/van and spray yourself down when you stop there. The second half of the trip, the upper portion, was fantastic and perfect for adrenaline junkies like us. In fact my family and I had such a great time that as soon as we got back to base camp at the end of our adventure we signed up for the ½ day upper portion for the next day. The Half day trip picks you up at Abol Bridge where they bring you to the lunch spot for a bite to eat and then off to the upper section of the river. Luckily we got Sawyer as a guide again and he did not disappoint as the group we ended up with that day was a bit more adventurous than the day before. The fact of the matter is that no matter what company you use they all take the same river, what separates one company from another are the people, and Penobscot Adventures have some terrific people working for them. On both our trip we felt like part of their collective family. I highly recommend them and would definitely use them for rafting trips in the future. This was the highlight of our Maine vacation by far! A shout out also to Joe and Logan for their efforts as well as Dan and Maureen for running a top notch company.

Epic adventure. The morning was spent on the lower river and was a good starting point as we had never rafted before, it is pretty calm. Nate was our river guide and very nice. We stopped for a delicious lunch- wear long sleeves rafting, the mosquitoes are insane when you stop for lunch. After lunch, Sawyer took us to the upper river. EPIC!! Sawyer is an amazing guide and also hysterical-had us laughing the whole time we weren't paddling! He really knows what he is doing! Four of us got tossed out of the boat on E hole and he got three back in with no problem. I "swam" down the rapid and he picked me up in the calm water. They say if you fall out in a rapid, you feel like you are in the water for an hour but the max is 45 seconds until the rapid ends and they were 100% accurate. Felt like an hour but I have a great story to tell. You just get carried down the river and the rapid ends as quickly as it started. YO SOY FIESTA!!!

Amazing time! Brian was very entertaining and knowledgeable about all aspects of "The River Experience". Penobscot Adventures will be the rafting company I refer my clients to. Being a ski instructor for 25 yrs, I am a customer and impressed with Penobscot Adventure's professional guide services. We will be back Dan, Maureen and Brian Thank You!!

Today was our first time white water rafting!! Sawyer was our guide and he made our trip awesome!! Epic times!! Great lunch!! I will be going through this company again and again!! LETS GET WILD!!!

Penobscot Adventures is a "family" starting with the McDonald's and adding to it are the guides. Each person wants the customer to experience the thrill/awe/confidence/fun/ beauty/spiritual connection that being on the river brings to a person. As a repeat customer I'm warmly greeted and oftentimes hugged when I arrive at base camp. I feel like I'm "home" spiritually and energetically.The guides Seabass, Special Will, Little and Tiny Joe, Sawyer, Jabba Ben, Butterfield, Willis, Brian, Alby, Big Joe, etc.-and there's no significance to this order bring their own unique perspective to one's rafting experience. Maureen and Dan are warm, friendly, and genuine people who happen to be the co-owners of the business. They are the "remember you by name" and make you feel like more than a customer. I just happened to select this company using a Groupon voucher and I never went to another campany. I share my passion for rafting with my daughters and the veterans I'm privileged to work with. A former boss teased me about being an "adrenaline junkie" but I'm really a "spiritual and energy junkie" that the river and surrounding nature brings me. I recommend Penobscot Adventures to anyone who expresses an interest in white water rafting. It's important to live your life and not your age... don't have regrets over the things you didn't do. So if you have the slightest inkling about going rafting, then run don't walk to your phone and call to schedule a trip. You'll never regret it and look back thinking it would have been nice to have done this sooner.