As a last minute decision, my daughter and I decided to route our road trip trough Cotopaxi, CO. By surprise, my wife called ahead and planned a rafting trip for us with ART-Arkansas River Tours on June 9th 2018. When we arrived, the staff was very nice and made us feel at home right away. Their facility was nice as well with lots of great souvenirs in the shop. After settling in, we went out back to meet our guide, Ethan, by their boat gear warehouse. Ethan did an amazing job of fitting my daughter and I with PFDs and helmets for our trip followed by a thorough safety meeting which was very informative. We were joined on our trip by Maggie who was just getting ready to be a guide/captain...herself. They were both very personable and friendly. Ethan even offered us his sunscreen as we had forgotten ours in our vehicle. We were driven to our drop-in area by Mike, also very friendly, and within minutes we had bypassed all of the other rafters, had a short instruction on how to place our feet and how to paddle according to Ethan's commands, and then we were off, down the Arkansas River! My daughter was very nervous at first because she didn't know what to expect, but after some gentle encouragement and coaching, she was on her was in just a couple of minutes. The trip was just amazing. Along with the intensely beautiful scenery and a constance stream of interesting facts about the river from Ethan, we spent the next hour and a half alternating between calm peaceful waters and refreshing, bumpy rapids! It was so much fun my daughter and I were smiling from ear to ear through the entire trip. After every round of rapids, Ethan called for paddle high-fives which added to the excitement of our trip. Just before we pulled up to our destination on the bank, Ethan asked if we wanted to get in the water, hanging on to the raft. I told him that I would spare them the effort of pulling me back in the boat as I am a heavy-set 250 pound man, however, Ethan assured me that our young, female guide Maggie, would have no problem pulling us back in the raft using the methods discussed in our safety meeting. To my astonishment, when it was time to pull us in, Maggie grabbed the straps on my PFD and with a little effort, pulled me right up out of the water and into the boat...Amazing! We really enjoyed this trip!! We enjoyed all of the friendly staff and our guides Ethan and Maggie...immensely!! We will absolutely do this again the next time we come through Cotopaxi and we will absolutely be using ART for our journey!!