Hells Canyon Dam to Pittsburg Landing is the first leg: 31.5 miles of Wild river, typically run as a 3-day trip. If your crew is continuing on, the drive from Pittsburg to Hammer Creek is about an hour, and Hammer Creek to Heller Bar on the Lower Salmon adds another 72 river miles, usually 4 to 5 days depending on your pace and the wind on the last stretch above the confluence. Plan on 7 to 8 days total on the water if you're linking both rivers, plus a transition day in between.
Put-ins, take-outs, and daily mileage
Hells Canyon Creek Launch Site, three-quarters of a mile below the dam, is your put-in. It's paved and open year-round, but overnight camping isn't allowed there and there's no potable water on site, so stage the night before at a campground near Oxbow, Oregon rather than trying to launch cold the same morning you arrive.
From there, three days at roughly 10 river miles per day gets you to Pittsburg Landing, which has a 28-unit campground, potable water, and overnight camping if you need to break up the transition. Pittsburg to Hammer Creek by road is roughly an hour.
Hammer Creek is the Lower Salmon put-in. Budget 15 to 20 miles a day for the first few days, then expect your pace to drop once you pass the confluence with the Snake, since the last 20 miles into Heller Bar are flatter water with upriver headwinds that slow nearly every group down. Heller Bar, at Snake River mile 168.5, is the last public boat launch and your final take-out.
Shuttles
The Hells Canyon Dam to Pittsburg Landing shuttle runs the length of the canyon by road, roughly 189 miles, which is why it isn't cheap. Hells Canyon Shuttle handles this leg for most private groups, with a stop at Scotty's convenience store a few miles south of the dam to drop a spare key and settle payment before your vehicle heads to the take-out without you. Confirm current pricing directly with the outfitter before you book, since shuttle rates change year to year.
For the Hammer Creek to Heller Bar leg, All River Shuttles is the standard option for groups launching out of White Bird. That drive is about 116 miles by road, roughly two and a half hours one way. Reserve through their online form well ahead of your launch date, and expect a similar per-vehicle cash-or-card structure to the Hells Canyon shuttle.
If your group is smaller, a jetboat shuttle from the confluence up to Pittsburg Landing is sometimes more cost-effective than a full road shuttle, though by midsummer low Lower Salmon flows can limit which jetboats make the run.
Gear
Links below go to NRS or Down River Equipment product pages so you can buy directly if you need to fill a gap in your kit.
Permit-required gear, Hells Canyon:
- An approved, washable, leak-proof, reusable human waste carry-out system. This gets checked before you launch. The NRS Eco-Safe Toilet System is the standard setup, sized to fit inside a 20mm rocket box.
- A fire pan with sides at least 3 inches high, like The Fire Pan from NRS. Required year-round, even though open fires are banned in the corridor from June 1 through September 30.
- An Idaho or Oregon aquatic invasive species sticker on every boat, available through Idaho Parks and Recreation.
- A U.S. Coast Guard-approved PFD for every person on board. NRS carries adult life jackets as well as sizes for kids, including the Crew Youth PFD and Crew Child PFD.
- A repair kit adequate for the boats you’re running, such as the NRS Pennel Orca Inflatable Boat Repair Kit, plus a pump adequate to reinflate after a patch.
- On any boat 12 feet or longer, a type IV throwable or a commercially made rescue rope with at least 40 feet of line, like the NRS Standard Rescue Throw Bag, and a whistle capable of a four-to-six-second blast.
Permit-required gear, Lower Salmon:
A completed self-issue permit filled out for your whole group at Hammer Creek. One copy goes in the drop box, one stays with you.
- A fire pan, required for any open fire.
- A human waste carry-out system, same requirement as Hells Canyon.
- An Idaho Invasive Species Sticker on every boat.
- A Washington State Discover Pass for every vehicle parked at Heller Bar, available at discoverpass.wa.gov.
Group gear
(shared logistics, not permit-mandated but essential for a multi-day trip this length)
- Kitchen setup: stove, tables, dish wash kit, and a hand wash station, ideally one at the kitchen and a second near the groover.
- Groover units, toilet paper, and cleaning supplies.
- A shade structure or rain tarp, like the NRS River Wing. Corridor weather swings hard between hot sun and cold rain, and there’s little natural shade at most camps.
- Trash containment. Ammo cans with liners work well and double as a dry place to store trash between camps.
- Water containers for your group’s full supply, split across boats. The Scepter 20-liter water jug is the standard for a reason: it’s rugged and stacks well on a frame.
- Pin kit and rescue gear, such as the NRS Z-Drag Kit: static line, carabiners, prussiks, pulleys, webbing.
- A basic first aid kit, with at least one full kit like the NRS Comprehensive Medical Kit somewhere in the group.
Other gear considerations
- Extra propane and a backup camp stove in case your primary setup fails.
- A dedicated coffee setup for the group, since running low on coffee morale on day 4 is its own kind of crisis.
- Camp chairs, a Bluetooth speaker, and anything else that makes the evenings better without adding real weight or risk.
Water
BLM and Recreation.gov guidance for desert river corridors in this region consistently lands on the same baseline: a minimum of one gallon per person per day, for drinking and basic cooking. That's the figure BLM publishes for both the Westwater and San Juan permits, and it's the standard planning number private groups use on the Snake and the Lower Salmon as well. Kids typically need less, so a half gallon per kid per day is a reasonable adjustment if your group skews younger.
Snake River water quality in Hells Canyon is notoriously poor, so plan to bring your full drinking supply rather than relying on filtering river water there. On the Lower Salmon, potable water is available at Hammer Creek and again at Pine Bar, but nothing downstream of Pine Bar, so top off there if you’re running low partway through. Lower Salmon water is otherwise clean enough that most groups filter or treat it for Giardia rather than hauling every gallon, but that’s a call for your group to make, not a permit requirement.
Wash dishes with river water on both rivers to conserve your drinking supply, but hold enough in reserve that you can switch to drinking water if a side drainage kicks up mud or ash after a storm.
Groovers
The math here is simpler than it sounds. The NRS Eco-Safe tank, the most common groover setup on private trips, holds 5.5 gallons and is rated for about 50 uses before it needs a pump-out. River runners planning group trips use a similar formula: multiply your total person-days (people times days on the river) and divide by 40 to 50 uses per tank to get the number of units you need.
That math tracks with what a linked Hells Canyon and Lower Salmon trip actually requires. A 3-day Hells Canyon run with 24 people works out to 72 person-days, which is why two units, cleaned and reused, is the common setup for that leg. A 5-day Lower Salmon run with a similar-sized group runs past 100 person-days, which is where a third unit earns its keep.
Where to rent, and where you can’t
If you don't own enough groover units, rental availability is spottier on the Idaho side of this trip than you'd expect. We had trouble finding a groover rental outfit based in or near Riggins for this specific trip, despite Riggins being the obvious hub for both the Hells Canyon and Lower Salmon corridors. What worked for us was renting from Rimrock Adventures in Fruita, Colorado, since Fruita sits right on the I-70 corridor most groups driving from Colorado or Utah pass through on the way to Idaho anyway. Their groovers range from 3 to 11 gallons with day-based pricing, so it's worth booking ahead and picking up on your way through rather than scrambling for a rental once you're already in Riggins or White Bird.
Where to dump
Human waste disposal points sit at convenient spots along this exact route. Riggins, Idaho has a SCAT machine at the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area office on Highway 95, built for self-contained river toilets rather than RV-style units. Asotin, Washington has a second SCAT machine at Chief Looking Glass Park. And Hammer Creek itself has an RV dump station with a 3-inch hose fitting, which makes it a natural place to service your units during the transition day between the two rivers rather than hauling everything all the way to Heller Bar.
If you’re planning more trips this season, RiverTrip tracks Recreation.gov cancellations across the rivers you’re already watching, so a permit that opens up somewhere else doesn’t slip past while you’re still packing out from this one.