Not everyone wants to paddle hard through whitewater. Sometimes the perfect river day is a gentle float in the sun with cold water under you and mountains all around. That is what tubing is for. Slow down, cool off, and drift through some of the cleanest rivers in Europe.
Book a River Tubing TripRiver tubing is exactly what it sounds like. You sit in a big, round, inflatable tube — the kind that looks like a pool floatie crossed with a truck tyre inner tube — and you let the river do the work. No paddles, no steering, no fighting currents. The water carries you downstream at its own pace while you sit back, trail your fingers in the cold, and watch the valley slide past. It is the most relaxing thing you can do on a river, full stop.
We have been offering tubing trips in Albania since 2019, originally because rafting guests kept asking if there was a slower alternative for one of the days in their trip. The answer turned out to be yes — absolutely yes — and our tubing runs have quietly become one of the most popular things we do, especially with families and couples who want a proper river experience without the intensity of whitewater. On a hot Albanian summer afternoon, when the inland temperatures climb into the mid thirties, there is genuinely nothing better than drifting down a clean mountain-fed river in a tube with a cold drink balanced on your stomach.
The tubes themselves are heavy-duty commercial-grade, not the flimsy pool toys you might be picturing. They have proper seat holes, reinforced bottoms that handle rocks without puncturing, and handles on the sides so you can link tubes together in little flotillas of friends. We usually run the trip as a group with a guide in a kayak leading the way and another at the back, so you are always in sight and never have to worry about missing a turn or ending up somewhere you are not supposed to be.
Not every river is suited to tubing. You need water that is clean enough to swim in, calm enough to be safe without a raft, deep enough that you are not constantly scraping the bottom, and warm enough that you can spend two or three hours in it without turning blue. Albania has a handful of rivers that tick all those boxes in summer, and we run tubing trips on the two best ones.
The Vjosa is the crown jewel of Albanian rivers and it also happens to be our favourite tubing spot. The stretch we use is a wide, shallow section below Permet where the river slows into long gentle pools interspersed with very mild riffles. The water is cold enough to feel fantastic on a hot day, the banks are lined with wild willow and tamarisk, and the valley is framed by the mountains of the Nemercke range. For more on the river, see our Vjosa rafting page.
By late July and August the Osum near Berat settles into a slow summer flow that is perfect for tubing. We pick a section downstream of the main rafting route, well outside the canyon, where the water runs clear and warm over gravel beds and there are plenty of natural swimming holes. It pairs beautifully with a morning walking around Berat's old town before heading to the water in the afternoon. Full details on our Berat rafting page.
We get asked about tubing inside the Osumi Canyon itself and the honest answer is no. The canyon has class II and III rapids that require a real raft and an experienced guide. Trying to tube through that section would be unsafe for guests and unprofessional on our part. If you want to see the canyon, book a rafting trip — we cover that experience in detail on our Osumi Canyon page.
Both of our tubing routes are day trips, though the time on the water is shorter than a rafting trip — usually two to three hours of actual floating, plus time for swimming stops, sunbathing on gravel beaches, and a picnic lunch somewhere scenic. The whole experience is slower by design, and most guests tell us afterwards that the slow pace was the best part. You notice things you miss on a faster trip — kingfishers hunting in the shallows, the smell of wild herbs on the bank, the way the light changes on the canyon walls as the afternoon wears on.
This is the question every guest asks us, and there is no single right answer — it depends on what you are looking for. If you want adrenaline, splash, teamwork, and a physical challenge, rafting is your activity. You paddle together, you hit rapids, you get wet, and you feel properly worked at the end of the day. It is exciting and it is an absolute blast. You can read more about it on our best rafting in Albania guide.
Tubing is different in almost every way. It is passive rather than active. You float rather than paddle. The pace is slow, the water is calm, and the vibe is more picnic than expedition. It is the activity you choose when you want to spend a day on a beautiful river without committing to any hard work. It is also the activity that works for people who are a bit nervous about rapids, who have small children, who are not strong swimmers, or who just want to properly unwind. Many of our guests do both — a rafting day early in their trip for the thrill, then a tubing afternoon later in the week to recover and savour the river at a different speed.
If you are travelling as a family with mixed energy levels, tubing is the great equaliser. We have had grandparents, parents, teenagers, and small kids all on the same float, all genuinely enjoying themselves, all chatting and laughing as they drifted. That almost never happens on a whitewater trip because the physical demands are too different. Tubing levels the playing field completely.
Full tubing experience including tube, safety gear, guide, transport and photos
Our tubing trips run on the same €40 per person price as our rafting trips, which reflects the fact that the logistics — transport to the river, guide, equipment, safety cover, photos — are broadly the same. The difference is in the experience, not the cost. Most guests find it tremendous value for what ends up being a four to five hour outing end to end once you count the drive time, float, swim stops, and return journey.
We run tubing trips from June through early September when the water is warm enough to spend a long time in without a wetsuit. Outside those months we swap to rafting, where the wetsuit keeps you comfortable even in cooler shoulder-season conditions. If you want a tubing trip in late May or late September, ask us — we can sometimes make it work with a wetsuit on a warm day, but we would rather be honest about the conditions than send you out to be cold. Browse the full lineup on our packages page.
People sometimes assume that because tubing is gentle, safety does not really matter. In our experience the opposite is true — calm water lulls people into complacency, and the majority of river accidents in Albania and elsewhere happen on easy sections where someone stopped paying attention. So we take tubing safety seriously even though the risks are lower than rafting.
Every participant wears a properly fitted Type III buoyancy aid, the same life jackets we use on our whitewater trips. These keep you afloat automatically if you roll off the tube or fall into a deeper pool. We provide helmets on sections where there is any chance of bumping into overhanging branches or scraping past rocky banks, though on the calmer Vjosa stretch we sometimes run without helmets — that is a judgement call the guide makes on the day based on water levels.
Our guides are the same certified team who run our rafting trips. That means they hold international rafting and swiftwater rescue qualifications, they know the rivers intimately, and they carry full rescue kits including throw bags, whistles, and first aid supplies. You probably will not ever need any of it, but we carry it anyway. Before every float we do a short briefing covering how to sit in the tube, what to do if you flip (sit up, hold on to the tube, the guide will be with you in seconds), and the signals we use on the water.
We also pay close attention to sun exposure, which is the actual risk most tubing guests underestimate. You are floating in direct sunlight on water that reflects heat and light, often for two or three hours, and it is remarkably easy to get badly burned without realising. We recommend long-sleeve UPF shirts, a wide-brim hat that you can cinch under your chin, and plenty of waterproof sunscreen reapplied at every swim stop. We carry backup sunscreen in the guide kayak, but bring your own as well.
Rafting uses a large inflatable raft that holds six to eight people who paddle together under the direction of a guide. You work as a team, you tackle rapids, and you follow instructions to steer through the water. Tubing means floating down the river on an individual inflatable ring — one person per tube — with no paddles and no guide in the same boat with you. Rafting is active and physical and handles bigger rapids. Tubing is slow, quiet, and focused on drifting through calm sections while enjoying the scenery. Both are great, but they are very different experiences. We tell guests to pick based on what they actually want from their river day, not based on what sounds most impressive.
Yes, tubing is one of the safest water activities we offer when it is done on the right section of river with proper supervision. We only run tubing on calm stretches where the current is gentle, the water is warm, and there are no technical rapids. Every participant wears a properly fitted life jacket at all times, and our guides are on the water with the group in kayaks to monitor everyone and respond if needed. We accept kids from age eight on most tubing trips, and younger children can join if they share a parent's tube under direct supervision. We have never had a serious incident on a tubing trip and we have run hundreds of them with families.
The Vjosa River near Permet is the best tubing river in Albania, and it is also one of the best in Europe. The water is clean, the flow is gentle in summer, the scenery is stunning, and there are long quiet stretches perfect for floating. The slower sections of the Osum River near Berat also work well for tubing, especially in midsummer when the water drops to a lazy summer flow. We generally avoid the Osumi Canyon itself for tubing because the current is too fast and the rapids too technical — that stretch is for rafting. We pick the tubing section based on the actual conditions on the day, so the exact put-in and take-out might vary a little depending on water levels.
The minimum age for solo tubing in Albania on the calm sections we use is eight years old. Between five and eight, children can join if they ride on a parent's tube or share a larger double tube with a responsible adult. For adults there is no upper age limit — we have hosted guests in their seventies who thoroughly enjoyed the day. The main requirements are being comfortable in water and able to sit upright in a tube for a couple of hours. You do not need to be a strong swimmer because the life jackets do the work of keeping you afloat, but basic water confidence makes the trip more enjoyable. If you are unsure whether someone in your group is ready, just ask us and we will advise honestly.
Tubing is the easiest way to fall in love with an Albanian river. Send us a message and we will get you on the water — response times are usually under an hour, often much faster.
Book River Tubing NowPrefer a bit more action? Check our Vjosa rafting or browse all our best rafting experiences. See also our packages and pricing or visit the homepage.
