9 Food Packing Tips for Camping on River Trips

Packing food for camping on river trips poses some unique challenges: It’s a little like packing food for car camping, but you need to think about what will happen if your food is in a boat that flips at some point. Also, if you’re on a multi-day river trip—for three weeks if you’re on Grand Canyon—you have additional concerns. You need to ensure your perishable food doesn’t spoil, you have enough food to last the trip, and you have a backup plan if any meals get ruined by poor cooler management, water immersion, or other disasters. 

Here’s our complete guide to packing food for river camping, developed over many years of running multi-day trips in every kind of weather. For a detailed rundown of how to pack food for a Grand Canyon trip, see our friend David Harwood’s post on this topic: He orchestrated all the food for our 2021 Grand trip, including buying food, packing food, and organizing instructions and cook crews. (Note that this post contains some affiliate links, which means we might earn a small commission if you buy something.)

Our mission here is to share the best way we’ve found to pack food to save as much space as possible, minimize waste by avoiding fragile food and preparing it properly, making food accessible so no one goes hungry or thirsty, and serving up delicious meals that will be all the more memorable because they’re served riverside.  

1. Start with a camping food list 

Regardless of whether you’re doing a quick overnighter or a multi-day, you need a good food packing list. For this post, we’ll assume you’re responsible for at least one dinner, and maybe breakfast and lunch the next day. (See our post on organizing food for river trips for some ideas on how to divvy up food responsibilities among your crew.) 

Unlike typical car camping or backpacking trips, on a river trip you’re likely responsible for an entire meal (or three) for a large group of people. On our trips, we have an average of 10 to 16 river runners: Cooking dinner for that many people requires some preparation. Having a solid packing list helps avoid disasters like forgetting one of your bags of frozen chili back in the freezer at home (that happened to us once). You don’t want the 10th person in line to be scraping the last of the chili out of the pot when there are six more people waiting with empty plates in hand. Other food items commonly left behind are ones that you already had on hand in your home pantry but forgot to grab, such as condiments, spices, and dry goods.

2. Don’t overpack

Although you certainly don’t want to run out of food, resist the urge to start throwing in random backup food at the last minute, especially perishables. That approach will increase waste and cause problems in getting everything packed neatly into your dry boxes and coolers. To estimate quantities for your size of party, my rule of thumb is to multiply typical serving sizes by 1.5-2 times to satisfy hungry rafters and kayakers—especially if you have younger kids and teenagers on the trip. 

To conserve as much space as possible and extend the length of time your food remains edible on the river, I strongly recommend pre-cooking and freezing main dishes. For long trips in hot weather, vacuum sealing food before you freeze it extends its life even further and was a primary tactic used in our successful Grand Canyon food packing scheme. Three reasons to pre-cook camping meals for river trips:

1. Bringing raw meat on a camping trip is an invitation to food poisoning
2. Pre-cooking saves space in the cooler
3. With heat-and-serve dinners, you can spend more time hiking or fishing

3. Bring one easy-keeper meal as a backup

One piece of advice I have that seems antithetical to the “don’t overpack” rule is to stash one basic meal that comes in jars or cans (waterproof and spoil-proof) and appeals to kids for situations where an entire cooler takes a swim or the cookpot gets knocked into the sand (think twice before bringing your dogs).

A good example of an easy-keeper meal is a few boxes of mac and cheese and a couple of cans of tuna: That isn’t gourmet fare, but cooks up fast and will deliver calories in a pinch. Plus, tuna mac tastes delicious on the river.

4. Choose the right containers for frozen, perishable, and dry foods

Investing in airtight containers for your food will save time, money, and frustration in the long run. Top-of-the-line containers specifically built for river trip camping are expensive, but in my experience, they last for years. For example, you won’t wear out a high-quality dry box in a lifetime of recreational rafting. The benefit is that your food will stay secure on your trip.

Here’s my checklist of essential containers for packing camping food:

1. Large, high-quality cooler for perishable foods: If you’re outfitting a raft for the first time, you must test your cooler in your frame to make sure it fits (unless you secretly want a new cooler). Aim for a 70- to 80-liter cooler. We bought this classic Yeti 75 cooler about a decade ago and it’s still going strong. A few things to look for in a cooler for river trip camping or car camping:
   • Bear-proof fastening capability: Look for lids that will accommodate padlocks on the corners
   • Ability to accommodate dry ice: For hot desert trips, dry ice will extend food life
   • Drain on the outside so you can remove water without emptying the entire cooler
2. Separate cooler for drinks: Optional, but having a second cooler for drinks or fruit that people can grab throughout the day means your core cooler will be opened less often, which will keep important items like dinner cold.
3. Large dry box: As with the cooler, you’ll want to make sure your dry box fits into your raft frame. A good-quality dry box will cost a few hundred dollars, but it’s a critical piece of equipment that you will use for decades. We use an earlier version of these Gunnison dry boxes from Down River Equipment in Denver. You can also use an ammo box for the dry goods, but it’s easier to see all the food in a shorter, wider container than it is in a tall ammo box. We primarily use our dry box for holding our kitchen gear (cookware, dishwashing gear, camp stove) and any food that won’t fit in the cooler and the small dry box.
4. Small plastic dry box for storing dry goods and keeping snacks accessible: One of the most-loved pieces of equipment we have is the Orange Box, which holds all our dry goods (coffee, pasta, spices) as well as the day’s snacks (cookies, crackers, trail mix). This box would work well for an inflatable kayak or canoe camping trip. We typically strap ours onto the raft so that we can easily dispense snacks during the day. (We have an earlier version of this NRS Boulder Canyon box.)
5. Smaller airtight silicone food containers: These Vremi containers are perfect for camping trips because they’re freezer and dishwasher safe, BPA-free, airtight so food stays fresh longer, and collapsible to reduce space.
6. Reusable silicone bags: Get big ones like these Stasher 64-ounce bags. You can use them for freezing make-ahead meals such as chili or pasta sauce (check out our white bean chili and black bean chili recipes, both delicious and easy to make and freeze ahead). Plus, these silicone bags are handy for holding leftovers and much sturdier than single-use plastic bags.
7. Dry sacks: Lightweight roll-top dry bags are perfect for corralling random food in the cooler such as fruit. 

5. Plan river camping meals and create a packing timeline

Unless you’re a professional river guide, you’re likely fitting river trips around work, family, and non-river life in general, so preparing for a multi-day trip can feel daunting. Thorough meal planning, a food packing checklist, and a general packing timeline will streamline the operation so you’re more inclined to get out on the water on a regular basis. 

Here’s a rough timeline I use for planning a river trip dinner, breakfast, and lunch for a 16-person group:

1. At least 5 days before launch, sketch out a menu for each meal and shop for ingredients that you don’t have on hand. 
2. At least 3 days before launch, cook any dishes that you intend to freeze beforehand and consider vacuuming sealing them. You’ll want items like chili to spend at least 24 hours in the freezer before packing it in the cooler. 
3. The day before launch, assemble any food that doesn’t need frozen but can be premade, such as grain salads.

6. Pack the dry goods

Most of the dry goods for one family for a multi-day trip will fit in a small plastic dry box, so you can start packing this in the days leading up to your trip.

1. To save space, avoid bringing bulky items like bags of chips: Crackers are more compact and less likely to end up in crumbs from jostling. 
2. Include dry goods for dinner meals, such as pasta, rice, quinoa and other items that you’ll cook in a second pot. 
3. Add plenty of high-calorie snacks such as trail mix, granola bars, and peanut butter.
4. Pack a few utensils such as a knife for spreading peanut butter or cutting cheese and a roll of anti-bacterial wipes to wipe off utensils before they get washed that evening after dinner. Add some hand sanitizer for lunch stops as well.
5. Place olive oil, spices, and other staples that you’ll need for cooking in this box: Take the time to dispense these items into reusable containers with good lids. 

7. Pack drinks

Making sure everyone has plenty of water is the first rule of food packing for river trips. But failing to supply coffee can be a deal-breaker, too. If you need to conserve space on a trip, the order of importance for drinks is 1) water, 2) caffeine, 3) fun bubbly drinks, 4) alcohol or fixings for mocktails. The more room you have in the rafts, the more drinks you can bring from each column.

Having taken many kids of all ages on various river trips, I recommend keeping them hydrated by making it easy for them to drink liquids throughout the day.

1. Gather water bottles for your entire group (one for each person plus an extra) and put each person’s name on the bottle. My favorite water bottles are stainless steel and have some kind of loop so you can affix a carabiner to it and attach it to the raft or kayak so it’s accessible.
2. Consider bringing a powdered drink mix like Gatorade or Nuun (made for runners but perfect for river runners, too) to help keep kids hydrated on hot trips: They will more likely drink warmish flavored water than warmish plain water and they will also benefit from those electrolytes.
3. Bring plenty of drinkable water with you (don’t assume you’ll have access to potable water at the launch site) and bring water filters in case you run out. For tips on choosing and using water filters for river water and bringing containers of water, see “3 Essential Water Filters for River Trips.” 

Aside from water, you can pack canned drinks in NRS drag bags (lightweight mesh bags will fall apart) or in a secondary cooler (not the primary cooler where you have your food as the repeated opening and closing for drinks will deplete your ice). Ingredients for cocktails and mocktails that don’t need to be cooled can go in an ammo box along with coffee and tea. Make sure you bring ground coffee if you’re accustomed to grinding beans at home, and consider bringing some instant coffee as a back-up.

8. Pack the frozen food

River runners tend to have strong opinions about how to pack coolers. I pack as if I’m headed on a 6-night trip on Desolation Canyon to reduce food spoilage. If the weather is cooler than expected, then you might need to spend more time thawing your frozen food, but that’s better than contemplating a curry that’s reached room temperature on Day 3 in the cooler.

So, I’m a fan of starting the cooler packing with about 10 pounds of dry ice, which you can buy at most grocery stores. This will come in a paper bag that you can lay on the bottom of the cooler.

• On top of the dry ice, place your vacuum-sealed, frozen dinner entree (chili, curry, pasta sauce, etc.).
• Surround those with ice packs or containers (recycled juice or milk jugs), filled with water and frozen.
• Avoid using cube or block ice in the primary cooler as it melts quickly and makes a mess, potentially ruining your fresh food. You want everything in this cooler to stay as dry and cold as possible. (If you want cubed ice for cocktails, keep that in your secondary cooler.)

9. Pack the fresh foods

When packing fresh foods for camping trips, choose food that has a chance of surviving the rough-and-tumble of a river trip to cut down on waste. For example, avoid bananas, fragile forms of lettuce, and fussy baked goods that will get smashed or mold easily.

Good fresh fruits for river camping include apples and any citrus fruit. I typically skip lettuce salads completely as it’s too hard to keep the separate ingredients fresh. However, “crunchy” chopped salads made with broccoli, cabbage, and carrots work well. 

Separate food into logical groupings in silicone bags or boxes or in dry sacks: For example, I put small items like cheese, cream cheese, hummus, and chocolate bars together in one bag or box. All condiments go in a separate dry sack. These bags and sacks can be laid on top of the frozen food or placed in the cooler basket. That little basket that comes with your cooler probably won’t be big enough to hold all these items, so use that for your most precious items, such as high-dollar chocolate bars (secured in their own airtight container).

Pack the camp kitchen gear

The next step is to pack the camp kitchen gear, which is a big topic on its own. Check out “Essential River Camp Cooking Gear” for a complete checklist of kitchen gear, including specific pieces of cookware, cooking utensils, and other gear. 

Any food, no matter how simple, tastes better on the river. These time-tested guidelines for packing camping food for river trips will save time, reduce food waste, and keep everyone fueled for paddling.

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