Sipping a well-brewed cup of java while the sun rises over the canyon on a river trip is a singular pleasure. That experience requires that you don’t run out of coffee and you have the right equipment to make a good cup. The best camping coffee maker for a river trip is a thermal coffee press that will accommodate large groups and keep the coffee hot for hours. (Note: This post contains affiliate links, which means we might earn a small commission if you buy something.)
Although making coffee on a river trip is a bit like making it on a car camping trip—in that you don’t need to worry about the size or extra weight of your coffee gear—a few other considerations make river camp coffee unique. Here’s a guide to the best french presses for river trips, why I now prefer coffee presses over a percolator (but still love our giant coffee pot and use it for heating water), and why you should also have an AeroPress Go in your arsenal of coffee makers for specific situations.
Criteria for river camping coffee presses
Most of this discussion about coffee presses will focus on the best choices for multi-day river trips with groups of 16 or more people. With this scenario in mind, we can assume that you’ll have a few rafts hauling gear, which means you don’t need to scrimp on the size or weight of your kitchen gear. Plus, you’ll likely have many coffee drinkers (and maybe some coffee snobs) in your group, so you’ll want a coffee solution that cranks out high volumes of excellent java in a short amount of time.
Here’s what to look for:
1. Large size
For river trip camping, get the biggest coffee press you can find: Our favorite picks have a 48-ounce capacity. River trips are typically large-group affairs, especially for permitted rivers. If you win a coveted river permit (say, for the Middle Fork of the Salmon or the Smith River in Montana), it’s good karma to fill every one of your allotted slots, for typically at least 16 people. That’s a lot of coffee. And it’s excruciating to have to wait for a hot cup of coffee. (I’m obviously addicted and don’t like waiting.) So make it easy on everyone and get the biggest press you can find.
2. Dripless pouring
Dealing with an unfamiliar coffee pot is exponentially more stressful when you haven’t yet had a sip that morning and you’re already trying to get familiar with the river kitchen set-up. The situation is made worse if hot coffee dribbles out of the coffee pot and down your arm. You need a coffee pot that pours smoothly and reliably.
3. Heat retention
After testing different strategies, we’re fans of coffee presses that have exceptional thermal properties so you can keep the coffee hot without transferring it to a separate container. (Fresh coffee made in a press is about 180 degrees. All of the models we recommend here maintain a temperature of 160 degrees or more after an hour.) However, that approach requires having at least two presses in continuous action.
Another option is to have one thermal carafe to store the brewed coffee and a press to make the next pot. That approach would be cheaper than having two presses. Again, go for the biggest carafe you can find. Although you likely already have a thermos on hand that will work fine, if you’re in the market, I highly recommend the Oggi 6566 carafe: It keeps coffee hot for an astonishing length of time—overnight, in my experience. The only downside is its one-liter (32-ounce) capacity. If I had it to do over again, I would buy the 68-ounce Oggi Catalina.
4. Sturdy build
Coffee presses meant for river trips need the ability to withstand being knocked off the camp table into the sand, thrown unceremoniously into a dry box, and other indignities. Stainless steel construction is a good choice, but also look for presses with plungers that feel sturdy and have a stainless steel mesh filter. Also look for a big, comfortable handle that is well anchored to the pot.
5. Effective screen
To keep coffee grounds from ruining your brew, the plunger should have an effective stainless steel mesh screen that makes a good seal. It’s hard to assess this property without trying the press. But you can slide the plunger up and down in the store and note the extent to which the screen apparatus hugs the circumference of the pot. If it slides very easily, and there’s a visible gap between the edge of the screen and the pot, keep looking.
Top coffee presses for river camping
We rounded up the most promising french press coffee makers we could find and ran through some (kind of) rigorous river-side test recently. The objective was to see which presses kept the coffee hot, poured smoothly, made delicious coffee, and had a large capacity of at least 32 ounces. The three we recommend here all do the job well and get good marks for ease of use, meaning they don’t drip and they have comfortable handles.
To test the heat retention capability, we used a candy thermometer to measure the temperature of the freshly poured coffee from each press immediately after steeping for 2 minutes, after 30 minutes, and again at 60 minutes. In case you’re wondering, coffee made with boiling water and steeped for about 2 minutes is about 180 degrees F. As someone who often says she likes her coffee “piping hot,” I’m happy to finally know exactly what that means. (Although once accused of serving coffee that was close to 190 degrees, apparently McDonald’s now serves coffee at a slightly more sane 180 degrees.)
Here are our picks for the best coffee makers for multi-day river trips:
BruTrek BaseCamp Coffee Press
The BruTrek BaseCamp 48-ounce coffee press, made by a Montana-based company, is my top pick for a camping coffee press because it has sturdy construction, an innovative lid that snaps down to close off the spout when not in use, and a tight seal on the plunger. Plus it has a rubberized bottom so it doesn’t slide around on the camp table. The spout produces a smooth pour, and the handle feels sturdy.
The BruTrek got high marks for heat retention: After an hour, the temp of the freshly poured coffee was still about 170 degrees, and 160 degrees after an hour.
One note about the plunger: Although I didn’t find it hard to press down, I saw that some online reviewers struggled to push it down. My hot tip is make sure you flip up the spout lid to allow some air flow before you plunge. When it’s closed, the lid is doing its job by creating a vacuum seal to keep air out so the coffee doesn’t get cold. Give it a little air, then try again.
All in all, the BruTrek is the best option for river trips because of its huge capacity, good design, ingenuous heat-retaining lid, and solid plunger mechanism.
Stanley Classic Vacuum French Press
The highly rated Stanley Classic 48-ounce french coffee press looks great and makes a lot of good coffee. It’s unfussy and has a sturdy build. The plunger doesn’t feel as tight against the walls of the press as the BruTrek BaseCamp, but as long as you’re using coffee that is ground to the right coarseness, the Stanley will make smooth, ground-free coffee. The pouring action is good—no drips. It also has a lid that rotates to close off the spout, which helps keep the coffee hot. The biggest downside of the Stanley Classic is it’s significantly more expensive than our other picks.
Thermos Stainless Steel Gourmet Coffee Press
We have had the Thermos Stainless Steel Gourmet Coffee Press for many years, and it still works like a champ. It holds only 32 ounces, so it’s our backup for the other presses. No problems pouring this one. The big plus is it’s about half the cost of the Stanley Classic. The only downside of the Thermos was that it kept coffee slightly less hot than our other choices. But unless you’re enjoying a layover day with a long, lazy breakfast, you’ll likely be on the river before the coffee in the Thermos gets lukewarm.
Recommended coffee percolator for river trips
If you’re going to make coffee with a press, you’ll also need a pot to heat the water. We are big fans of the GSI Outdoors Glacier Stainless Steel 14-cup percolator, which makes a whopping 112 ounces of coffee and is built like a tank. I love the hinged lid and the construction of the basket and stem inside: Unlike the enamelware GSI coffee pot (which we also use for heating water), the innards of the GSI Outdoors Glacier are much sturdier. The cheaper enamelware version has a slim stem on the basket that feels like it’s going to snap off.
So why not just use a percolator on a river trip and leave the coffee presses behind? We do often use just the percolator on river trips, and it works great. But in my opinion, a press is even better for a few reasons:
- With a percolator, someone needs to keep an eye on the coffee pot once it starts perking so it doesn’t sit on the camp stove boiling for too long. This is rarely a real problem since someone is usually in camp keeping a watchful eye on the pot. But when it happens it’s sad, because then the coffee is strong and bitter and it’s hard to recover.
- Some people don’t drink coffee, so if you use presses, you’ll always have hot water on hand for tea, cocoa, and matcha drinkers
- A thermal press keeps the coffee hotter longer than the percolator. So if you’re making a lot of coffee, it’s better to have a couple of presses going.
- Arguably, coffee tastes better when made with a press. This is a risky proclamation because so many factors go into making a great cup of coffee. But in general, my experience is that a coffee press or a pour-over situation makes better-tasting coffee than a percolator. Part of that is likely vigilance in timing the perk cycle that a percolator requires. But especially on a river trip, that level of scrutiny is hard to maintain.
Best coffee maker for single or duo paddlers: AeroPress Go
If you’re doing a trip with just a couple of people and small boats, the AeroPress Go Travel is the best choice for making coffee. This ingenious little kit makes wonderful-tasting coffee with minimal fuss and packs down into a convenient container. If I had more than two people on my trip, I would level up to a bigger press, but for just two paddlers (or three, max), the AeroPress is the perfect solution.
Although the AeroPress comes with paper filters, you can order a reusable AeroPress metal filter or other manufacturers (we have this Altura metal filter that fits the AeroPress Go, too, and it works great). Although the paper filters are tiny and compostable, it makes sense to buy a reusable metal filter to cut down on waste. Although some people claim the paper filters making a cleaner-tasting brew, I can’t taste much difference.
Best coffee mugs for camping trips
In my opinion, the Contigo West Loop Stainless Steel Vacuum-Insulated travel mug is the uncontested champion of coffee vessels, whether you’re camping or not. In fact, I drink out of a Contigo at home, when I’m in the car, when I’m grocery shopping, and sometimes when I’m hiking (not kidding). It never, ever leaks (no more coffee stains on the upholstery or rugs at home!). It keeps the coffee piping hot. It’s indestructible as far as I can tell. I have a few that have fallen off the roof of the car and sustained a few dents, but performance was not affected in any way.
However, I see other river trippers with other types of coffee mugs on our trips, and apparently they’re happy. I just wouldn’t recommend anything but the Contigo myself. (And it has to have the auto-seal lid. Don’t be fooled by the inferior ones with the flip-top lid.)
When packing for river trips, we always throw in a few travel mugs that we’ve picked up at gas stations or received as promo items, just in case someone forgets their coffee cup. So if you have sub-par cups on hand, don’t throw them out. They serve well as back-up cups.
How to make coffee on a river camping trip
So how exactly do you make coffee on a river camping trip? Here are my guidelines for making a great cup of coffee with a french press on the river.
- Pack all your coffee equipment and coffee itself in one container: I use a drawstring bag to hold the coffee pot and presses, plus the coffee, and pack this bag in the dry box in our dish pails. That way, the coffee apparatus comes out of the boat the night before and is on hand the next morning when the first-light people are ready to start the morning coffee.
- Bring ground coffee! (And tell all the coffee lovers in your crew to bring coffee, too. You don’t want to run out.) You’ll be sad if you forget this part and end up on the river with whole coffee beans. (Unless, of course, you have one of these nifty hand-powered OXO coffee grinders: Great gift idea for a river runner.) If possible, buy whole beans and grind them coarsely at home. I find that store-bought ground coffee is too finely ground to work well in camping coffee presses and you might end up with grounds in your brew.
- When it’s time to make coffee, fill the coffee pot with water, light the camping stove, turn it to the highest setting, and bring it to a boil.
- In the meantime, measure out the ground coffee into the first press: For a 48-ounce press, I use ½-cup of ground coffee.
- If your press has a lid that allows you to close the spout, do that.
- When the water boils, pour it into the press to the max line (or the level that seems reasonable if there is no marked line).
- Give the water and coffee a few stirs with a long spoon.
- Place the plunger on top, pressing down slightly (about a quarter-inch).
- Let the coffee steep for about 2 minutes.
- Adjust the lid to allow air into the spout.
- Press the plunger down very slowly and evenly.
- Pour into the waiting mugs. If coffee is left after you’ve served everyone a first round, pour the remainder into a carafe.
- Important: Before you start the next pot, give the plunger apparatus a quick rinse and scrub in some clean water to remove coffee grounds and residue from the filter. If you skip this step, each successive pot will be harder to plunge, and grounds will start to seep into the coffee.
Troubleshooting problems with coffee presses on camping trips
Although making coffee in river camp is fairly easy, some trouble can arise. The best prevention for most problems is knowing exactly how your coffee equipment works and ensuring you have enough coffee. Here are the most frequent questions that come up.
Yes, using a coffee press for river trips or for car camping produces great-tasting. A thermal coffee press can keep the coffee hot for hours.
Percolators work well for river camping when you have raft support and can carry a lot of gear, such as a big camp stove. But overall, coffee presses are better for river camping because they usually produce better-tasting coffee, they keep the coffee hot longer (if you use a thermal press), and they require hot water, which can also be used for tea, cocoa, and other drinks for those who don’t like coffee.
If your press makes coffee that leaves grounds in your cup, it’s usually because 1) the coffee is not ground coarsely, so the grounds are slipping through the mesh strainer, 2) the mesh strainer is damaged or not well-made, 3) you plunged the coffee too fast, forcing grounds up past the strainer into the coffee. Try grinding whole-bean coffee yourself using a setting on the grinder that is specifically for presses. Store-bought ground coffee is often too fine for a press and grounds will end up in the cup. Make sure the press plunger remains in good shape and replace it if it gets bent or the mesh starts to degrade. When plunging the coffee, take it slow and press down steadily and evenly to prevent the coffee from spurting. 
Any kind of coffee will work as long as it is ground coarsely so that the coffee particles don’t slip through the mesh strainer. Avoid using store-bought ground coffee if you’re using a press. Grind whole beans yourself using a setting for a press.
When you’re making coffee with a press, steep it for about two minutes before pouring for the best-tasting coffee.
For a large-capacity, 48-ounce thermal coffee press, use about 1/2 cup of coarsely ground coffee.
- Best Coffee Presses for River Camping
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