The Ozark National Scenic Riverways is serious about cracking down on rowdy, reckless behavior on the Current and Jacks Fork Rivers. Floaters, campers and visitors acting out in dangerous ways can compromise the enjoyment and safety of other visitors and will not be tolerated. The crackdown is being done to ensure everyone visiting the Ozark Riverways can have an enjoyable and positive experience while at the park and visiting the riverways. Public misbehavior will not be tolerated anywhere, and the Ozark Riverways is no different.
While consuming alcohol is strongly associated with unacceptable conduct in the park and while authorities are not banning it, there are new measures in place to deal with rowdy people. The new regulations place a ban on “beer bongs,” and similar devices. Those individuals in possession of beer bongs and similar equipment will receive a citation. Jello shots and/or other gelatin based alcoholic beverages will also be banned and the individual bringing it into the park will be cited.
It is a matter of using common sense and exercising caution and limiting oneself to a responsible amount of alcohol. Adult visitors are being asked to only bring in one six-pack of beer or similar quantities of alcohol beverages per day. People floating in canoes and rafts should bring in a cooler the size of 48-quarts or smaller, unless camping along the river. When people are intoxicated and floating, it can be as deadly as drunken driving and it is important for everyone to be safe on the river.
People gathering and making an exorbitant amount of noise will be discouraged and park rangers will be strictly enforcing sound level laws. There will be no noisy blasting of stereo systems, air horns or dangerous “dry ice” bombs. There will also be no jumping from rocks or cliffs and rope swings within the park will also be banned to reduce injuries, cut down on parties and make sure everyone is safe.
The use of polystyrene or Styrofoam food and beverage coolers is also prohibited because they frequently wind up as trash in the river and pose a danger to wildlife and are a source of pollution. When canoes flip over in the river, coolers can lose their lids or break, which results in the spilling of contents, however foam bait containers will still be allowed for fishermen. It is not about stopping people from having a good time, but it is about protecting everyone and making sure the parks and rivers stay clean and safe at all times.
All drugs and underage drinking are strictly prohibited and the laws will be vehemently enforced, as well as laws which outlaw glass containers, disorderly conduct, public nudity, profanity and littering. Distributing or accepting Mardi Gras beads is also prohibited and people caught doing it will be cited and fined. The National Park Rangers and various Missouri law enforcement agencies will be working together to crack down on violators and will cite or arrest troublemakers and kick people out of the parks. Observant visitors will notice a vast influx of uniformed and plainclothes officers on the river and throughout the park; because there is a great need to enforce public safety.
If you have not visited the Ozark Riverways recently, now is the time to come back and have some summer fun. The presence of rangers and law enforcement officers has been making a real difference in the past few years and by cracking down on unacceptable and deviant behavior, now more than ever the parks and riverways are family friendlier. If you are wondering what to do with your family this summer, visiting the Ozark Riverways is a great way to have some fun and make some memories.
I used to go floating with friends on Current River. On the last trip I was “pulled over” by a guy fishing. He was a plain clothes Ranger. He informed me I was getting a citation for littering. I assured him that he was mistaken. He agreed that he had not observed me littering. He then said that they were cracking down on littering and citing someone out of every group on the river that day. He said I was the lucky one in my group. That was 1978. I never went back. Corrupt system.
It’s the National Park Service, not Missouri Parks Service. The Ozark National Scenic Riverways is a national park like Yellowstone only better and closer!
i understand that many consume alcohol in large quantities, but that doesn’t mean everyone does. I don’t understand the banning of beer bongs and any Jell-O shots. I prefer to drink my beer from a beer bong, just as some prefer drinking from cups and some prefer drinking from a can. I consume the same amount as the average person, I just don’t like to hold a beer as it continues to get warm. It’s better than someone drinking straight liquor all down stream, Which is not banned. Just don’t understand how they can say it’s okay to consume alcohol but turn around and tell you how you are supposed to consume it. I understand some don’t prefer this method, and some abuse it but it doesn’t mean it should be banned. The argument of Jell-O shots is the littering of the little plastic cups along the river. Well, if they are in your trash bag and not sloshing around your raft or canoe, then there isn’t any issues there. I’m most certain this can be fought in court. Just so I’m not misunderstood, yes!, give anyone a citation for acting an idiot. But if a few people are being respectful and keeping to theirselves and doing a Jell-O shot or beer bong and being responsible, there isn’t any harm. I’m know that they probably hired on more Rangers this year and that they probably need to make some more money to compensate the increase in payroll so FIND THE REAL CRIME!
Ya, I won’t be going, or setting up any future trips to such a oppressive place.
Use to go to Sam baker park to swim and camp, now they cut down all the rope swings.
Looks like missouri park system just sucking the fun out of enjoying the parks more every year! I guess they don’t need tourist money anymore, looks like we’ll being going to other states To swim, boat and camp
We quit floating several years ago because of a group of unknowns who were drunk and wanted to “party” with us….we weren’t partying. It apparently ticked off one of the very verbal, angry, and nasty young men that we weren’t and they came after us screaming obscenities and threats. There was nobody else around or within the length of our continued float and we attempted to paddle as fast as we could to get away from them. We dumped our canoe in the rush and my husband actually got caught in a log that almost pulled him under…last time we ever went and will never go again!! When I said something to the pick up driver later that day all I got was, “yeah, we have a lot of that…can’t do much about it”…sealed the deal for us right there.
Wondering, of my own curiosity, “When people are intoxicated and floating, it can be as deadly as drunken driving”… how many people a year die on the rivers in Missouri due to alcohol related incidents? I grew up spending every weekend of my summer at Jacks Fork often floating and I know how crowded the rivers can be but never witnessed any death. I still float on the rivers, in fact this year I will be on the Meramec river in just a couple weeks, I have saved a few people from drowning from swift currents and overturned canoes but none of them drunk, just river accidents and inexperienced operators.
LOL This is ABSOLUTELY ridiculas. They pretty much banned everything exept floating! Why dont you ban swiming or even tanning while your at it. Might as well. Pretty easy to break laws when they are this ridiculas. Maybe you should change the name to “childrens river”. Just another sign of the facist police state we are becoming. Where the police are concerned about the size of your lunch cooler. I guess possesion of beads is also a crime now also. Gimme a break…… Just another facist police dept trying to steal as much revenue from the public as possible. Ill take my money elsewhere this year. I hope many others do too
Hey police! This is why people HATE YOU! Take notes!
We were lining up a trip for July. Not after reading this article. If I wanted to be oppressed I would stay right here in the corrupt state of Illinois. 6 pack my ass ! Hell the last time we were at Currant River I got nervous when we got down to a 18 beers.
I don’t agree with this. I do agree that the “drunk and disorderly” need to be cited or thrown off the river AND cited because clearly it’s taking the fun of the people who drink responsibly! We take beer bongs and Jell-O shots and take care of our trash!! On top of that we are responsible adults who know our limits and are being punished as a whole for the few that can’t be responsible!!! Guess it’s time to head to Nebraska!!!
Welcome to nazi controlled waterways!
They think they can cite for profanity??? I think the supreme court has ruled on this. Belive all this would be unconstitutional?
At least you can get yourself into some nature to escape the corrupt system. Oh wait. No you can’t.
I went to current last year and had a blast and we had our cooler and radio on top of it and no one was obligerent or loud. . if anything ppl were floating beside us because we had music . . it makes the trip so much better . . and jello shots?! Wtf is wrong with jello shots? . . we keep a trash bag for our plastic cups and anything else we have with us . . we are setting up a trip soon and if we have problems like other mentioned before then we will NEVER be back and we usually have 10-15 people
Well they just lost my money and time being spent their… These parks are getting to strict and it seems like no one wants anyone to have fun anymore… Like someone else said just give a citation to the ones acting like idiots… Thanks for ruining the fun!!!
lol, this is great. How can one be cited and fined for things that are perfectly legal to do in public anywhere else? Exchanging of beads? What type of alchohol can be consumed? I like how the quantity was merely suggested… Looks as if they are trying to fill the coffers through fines. Maybe we’re “creating” more park ranger jobs here!
There’s no such thing as a “plain clothes ranger” on the Current River. To all of those who find it better to stay home than abide by these rules– I wouldn’t expect to change anything by throwing a fit. I believe you are just the sort of folks they are trying to keep away in order to maintain some level of sanity on the rivers. You’re not trying to “get out to nature.” You just want another venue in which to get trashed. Can’t you do that just as easily sitting in your homes where it won’t bother anybody else? The Current River is a NATIONAL PARK! Would you rally to take beer bongs, beads, and jell-o shots into Yellowstone? Would you go stand on the rim of The Grand Canyon or at the base of Mount Rushmore and get nude and be profane in front of a bunch of families? Then why are you so determined that it’s your “right” to do it on the river?
This is pathetic they don’t realize that not only are they going to be loosing money from this to better our camps and rivers in the more important ways but also the people that rely on the people that come to this beautiful place to make there living
In no way can the ranger enforce these ridiculous “laws” it’s simply not doable. My family and I went on a float trip on the Niangua. At the time my kids were 13&12. For 12 miles we saw nothing but women flashing, people smoking pot, guys throwing crap at passing kayaks at strangers just to be jerks. The result was we have never been back again to that area due to our experience. If your reading this and thinking, “whatever, if you can’t have a bit of fun go F$*& off and quit whining” then you’re the reason these laws have cracked down the waterways and campgrounds. You want to get hammered fine, you want to smoke pot it’s your right to buy when you hinder me and my families experience and act like D-bags then yes the new “law” is because of your unthoughtful behavior. I would prefer they reopen “Party Cove” and let the outrageous behavior go there and let the rivers be for people wanting to enjoy them peacefully.
Great! Now I can actually take my family to the River without seeing a mess of drunk idiots! We can actually enjoy the river and see other people that are there to enjoy it also, not to get wasted. This is a good move for the Park service in my book!
you cant blame the police, they do not make the laws they have a job to enforce them, that is their job.
Another money grab by the corrupt law enforcement assholes and politicians in Doutjern MO. Another chance to shakedown young people having fun. Don’t go here. Spend your vacation dollar elsewhere.
This is a great idea and maybe it will keep the drunk idiots from making an appearance. If you have to drink to have a good time to hen obviously you are not having a good time. Maybe now families can actually enjoy the outdoors.
I’m in the middle on this one. If youre drunk and drown that’s a you problem. If you want to do some beer bongs and jello shots clean up your trash. If you’re drunk and being an a-hole ruining someone else’s time you deserve a ticket and/or escorted away. Respect the ozarks. If you wanna be hammered keep it to yourself. Any state park will probably have plain clothed a-holes trying to catch you doing something wrong… just don’t do it. Have fun but don’t be an a-hole.
Why would you bring music to enjoy NATURE? what about hearing birds and other animals? Why do you have to have a big loud obnoxious drunken party? Oh that’s right.. because you’re away from home and whoopin’ it up. Please do us a favor and take yourselves elsewhere. Out of state would be great.
This is fucking stupid, yeah, jello shots are such a problem causer. Fuck these so called laws. I’ll keep float like i have been for the past 12 years
In the 1990’s and early 2000’s I floated the Current River with a group of friends every year. I play music in a band. We made instrument amplifiers out of coolers. We would connect keyboard, guitar and bass along with headset mics. I had a small modified kid’s drum set I bungie’d into my canoe to play drums. We would float and have sing-a-longs with people down the river. It was the most fun I ever had. We made a lot of noise. But it was happy noise. And now that is illegal. I think the National Park Service are basically Nazis. They stole away my summer happiness.
To bad the only way some can have fun is to get bombed out of there heads and blame everyone else… We drink with the best of them but stupid is stupid
If you even want to give up your god-given right to cuss, go here. ONSR is going to kill the tourist industry there, for sure.
I am amazed at the level of self-involvement and entitlement in posts here. This is a commons: it is meant to serve lots of people with lots of different goals, but who jointly come here to do something in a natural river and woods setting. There is an ecosystem in place here as well that is not compatible with styrofoam and concrete and urinating in rivers (or 100 feet near them–do you know the rules for keeping e coli out of river water?) or loud music (birdsong, anyone?). State parks offer some of the only places where people can connect with nature and teach their children something about living in concordance with it. Why is it your right to redefine–in urban, city terms–this space for your own fun? You can drink, play loud music, and get rowdy ANYWHERE, but where do the rest of us go to get away from you doing that? Go to a Six Flags park, for heavens sake. And let us try to learn something about other ways of being in the world.
Totally agree, “you do not own the commons” and thank you. Many comments here are appalling, as is lax enforcement on too many streams. Like state parks, Missouri rivers and streams belong to all citizens, and it is the state’s obligation to keep them clean, safe and enjoyable for everyone. Some people can’t take time off on weekdays for a float trip, and people shouldn’t have to stay off rivers on weekends because of loud, drunk, obnoxious jerks. If your float trip was ruined by such people, please write to the Mo Water Patrol and demand enforcement. Rivers are Missouri’s most precious natural resource and should be treated with respect, as should fellow floaters.
Naturebaby
Aug. 8, 2017
We go on annual family float trips consisting of at least 25 people with ages ranging from 2 to 80. Floating to us is fishing, enjoying the beauty of nature, watching wildlife and enjoying each other’s conversations and of course gravel-bar lunches.
During a float, we were startled by boom boxes and rafts tied together stretching across the water blocking our entire path across the water behind and in front of us. Drunk, rowdy, f-bombing girls and boys, dancing in the rafts half naked and some getting that way.. some making advanced crude flirtations with our young married girls was just the last straw and our first encounter to such behavior on a river or creek. I feel it was rude, very embarrassing to the women in our group(we are not nuns) and totally unacceptable for our children to hear and view. There was no respect to humanity at all. I think the worse part for me to swallow is the trash they threw out along the way into the river. I finally lost my temper, got off my kayak, picked the up the cans and put them in our trash sack and threw then back into their boat and told them I would call a conservation agent if they continued to continue.Guess you can guess what kind of harrassement I rec’d after that. Low &n behold, around the next bend as my husband and I were trying to escape into a good fishing cove and out of the way of the rude traffic that was about to run over us, I spotted two agents on the bank in various hiding places….who did they ask to pull over to inspect our fishing lisence? My 68 year old husband and I who am 65. They not once told the partiers to put their clothes back on, turn down the music OR fine them for littering! Really!??? All of our family was horrified, they could not believe what they witnessed. We live in the country and we appreciate clean water, the trees and vegetation that serves as riparian zones along the river and we appreciate quiet spaces for wildlife to live their lives in their homes. We are visitors to nature, we as humans should live with, not against our natural resources and the animals living there. As a result of the partiers, we saw one bird in a 5 mile stretch of water. Fish…ha, we didn’t have any place to throw our lines and if and when that rare moment happened, here comes the big yellow tubes floating right over our lines. These people need to stay in the city to party in their buildings, bars or their own backyards, I see very few enjoying nature or the river and NO respect for people other than their own kind! Keep in mind, we are not a group of “prudes”, we like beer and fun too, but all in moderation with respect to other floaters. The rivers need to be patrolled like the highways, things are getting out of hand.
Naturebaby
August 8, 2017
A reply to you Logan. Your disgusting choice of words is less than pleasing to you. You need to learn to spell before you keep spewing the f-bomb. It’s people like you whom we are glad to see leave the rivers because you can’t obey rules. With every one of the rude partiers who leave, decent people will be going to the riverways in your place. We pay taxes and we are happy that they will be use to put law enforcement on the riverways. To you who think this is a Nazi place, please feel free to go to Russia and actually experience your Nazi freedom. Don’t come back and tell us how it was….either love Missouri and the United States of America or leave it. Educate yourselves, oh I forgot, that’s too much of a rule too. You have no idea what you are talking about, but I sure wish you could experience it. For all you who want to leave the riverways because it is not a party place….thank goodness, go and be blessed. There are 100 more to take your place. Thanks, you just made our lives so much better! Happy Trails.
I have been a Missouri adventurer all my 64 years. Grandpa and Dad started taking me floating and fishing about as soon as I could walk, and continue to this day. I have been a member of the Missouri Stream, Cave Research Foundation, etc. When I got out of the Army in1977, after traveling to many different countries and beautiful places, the first thing I wanted to do was float, fish, and camp on a beautiful Missouri Ozark Stream. That trip was the weekend after Memorial Day, and this year I celebrated my 40th annual trip floating and camping on the Little Niangua River upstream of Bannister. Oz Hawksleys wonderful book on Missouri streams has been my “bible”. I have floated, fished, camped all but 3 streams in that book, including the Current and Jacks Fork. That was years ago and wonderful, including catch and release of several nice 17” smallies. Went last time 5 or 6 years ago, and vowed never again. The tubers, party people, and just sheer mass of humanity made it impossible to enjoy the stream. Fishing was out of the question. I had to walk my 17’ canoe nearly a mile just to safely navigate thru this melee. This same phenomena has now infected most of our beautiful Ozark streams. My full supports goes to the regulation of these streams by whatever means necessary, so that families and people like me, who go there to fish, camp, float, and enjoy the beauty and serenity of nature, can have our streams back. I still like an occasional party at my age, but the stream is not the place for this activity. There are plenty of venues where people can party, swim, etc. without being such a nuisance. I hope someday I can return to the Current and Jacks Fork, and actually fish and enjoy nature. You have taken a step in the right direction in my opinion. Thank you from an old adventurer!