Reply To: Meramec from the park to Scott’s Ford

You can’t go wrong with the Catchercraft Freestone.

I looked at several other solo fly-fishing rafts.  Particularly the Water Master Kodiak and the Outcast Clearwater.  I spoke with Rich at Water Master and Dave at Catchercraft.  I didn’t really talk to anyone at Outcast.

I had read on sone forums about the oar lock delaminating on the Water Master as it’s just welded to the raft.  Rich admitted that he’d heard about that happening as well, but blamed it on improper storage (excessive heat can lead to delaminating).  To be fair, I thoroughly believe that he believes that, and he may very well be correct.  From my perspective as an inexperienced oarsmen though, I wanted to minimize any potential problems.

The Catchercraft is similar to the Water Master and the Clearwater, but it includes a lightweight frame that breaks down to a manageable size.  You could fit it in any vehicle.  The oar locks are part of the frame offering some peace of mind that I won’t lose an oar in the middle of floating the Yellowstone (this is one of the stories that I had read online.  Guy lost his oar lock on his water master, but was skilled enough to row to safety with a single oar.  Am I good enough to do that?  Probably not.  I don’t want to find out)

The only downside is that raft + frame is about 50 pounds so it’s not exactly backpackable.  This is where talking to Dave at Catchercraft really helped.  I wanted a single raft to fulfill two purposes – 1.) Navigate western rivers safely and 2.) Small enough that I could pack it in to alpine lakes.  As I learned, this is a pipe dream.  Dave recommended buying an outcast float tube for packing in to remote lakes, and I think his suggestion is spot on.  Especially now seeing that Outcast has the Summit (7 pounds!) coming out this November.

At the end of the day though – I think that each of these rafts are high quality and Catchercraft, Water Master, and Outcast are solid companies.  I’d be happy with any of them.

Just wanted to share my thought process behind buying the Freestone.

Can not wait to get back to Montana.  🙂

-Jeff