Au Sable, Mainstream (Grayling) - Not bad, but you pass by too many houses. Some campgrounds on the way, might be good for a multi-day trip. Can get too crowded on weekends.

A fall paddle on the Au Sable (Mainstream)

Au Sable, South Branch (Roscommon) - Better than the mainstream - travels through the Mason Tract, a preserve where no building is allowed. Great for a late season paddle - in October we saw nobody but deer and a couple fisherman.

Huron River (All over the Northwest Metro Detroit area) - The part by Wixom  (Proud Lake) is terrible, greenish-grayish-brownish water, and if you don't think that having one of those straps around your neck that hold a beer can is the coolest thing in the world, you don't fit in. Nothing like choking on second-hand smoke in the wilderness. In all fairness to the rest of the river, I've been told the section from Kensington Dam in Island Lake Recreation area to to Ann Arbor is quite beautiful. In addition, some parts northwest of Ann Arbor (near Dehli Metropark) are supposed to border on decent whitewater for a couple weeks in spring.

Rifle River (Sterling) - A faster moving river than most in the east side of the state, it has a couple stretches of rapids to make things fun.

Platte River (Honor, near Sleeping Bear Dunes) - A fun paddle, especially when the water level is higher, though it can get crowded on weekends. There are four good group campgrounds at Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore, right at the foot of the dunes.

Pine River (near Cadillac) - While not exactly whitewater, the Pine is one of the fastest rivers in the Lower Peninsula. Better yet, it offers beautiful scenery - high banks, forest, and its path through National Forest land means there are practically no cottages on the banks. (The downside of this is that forest service restricts paddling to the hours of 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.) We didn't feel like scraping up our sea kayaks, so we rented whitewater boats at the Pine River Paddlesports Center, which we highly recommend. (They also have a well-manicured, 24-hour quiet campground). The little kayaks were a blast, though we had to dodge hordes of rental canoes later in the day, many of whose operators seemed to have picked a bad river to learn to paddle on. Late in the day we did come across a group paddling 17' sea kayaks down the river, though I'd still be hesistant to try it in my own boat.

Old Ausable Channel (Ontario) - Lying within the Pinery Provincial Park, this river is wide and slow-moving yet remarkably clear. Even on a cloudy, rainy day we were able to numerous fish and several turtles. For a convenient launch site, cross the river by the bridge near the park store, and proceed a few hundred yards until you see a sign for a hand-carry launch site, take the dirt access road on the right and you'll end up right by the river. You can paddle northwest unobstructed for about two miles before you meet up again with the park road. While the channel parallels a road much of the way, we saw very few people and heard few cars, despite it being a summer weekend.