YAKIMA -- As the office manager and a lead guide for the state's largest whitewater rafting service, Brad Coleman has a simple routine when it comes to helping customers plan their adventure.

"I tend to try to find out when people are going on vacation," says Coleman, who works for Seattle-based Blue Sky Outfitters, "and then tell them where the best water is."

This year, that advice may be harder -- or easier, if you're a glass-half-full person. Because that good water is going to be everywhere.

A way-above-average snowpack and a cool spring have set the stage for what outfitters around the state expect to be a long, big-water rafting season.

"It's going to be one of the better seasons we've had in probably
10 years," said D.J. Tuttle, who operates Action Rafting in Cashmere. "With all the snow staying up high in the mountains over the early spring, we haven't had much runoff. I'd say the last year we had like this was '99, with this kind of snowpack and late runoff."

Coleman is also expecting a big year -- especially on the Wenatchee River, the state's top rafting destination because of its central location, its big-water thrills and the fact that it can handle the traffic. As many as 100 rafts might run the Wenatchee on a busy Saturday in June.

"The Wenatchee's going to be awesome," says Coleman, whose Blue Sky Outfitters provided raft trips for about 10,000 customers last year on the Wenatchee, Methow, White Salmon, Tieton and Skagit rivers. "We have so much snowpack up there and it's such a late spring, the behavior we're seeing with the rivers right now is what we're used to seeing a month ago."

And that, for rafters, means big business. A lot of customers hesitate to shell out $75 or more on an April raft trip out of fear of frigid water -- but doing the same thing in May, June or July simply sounds like a kinder, warmer experience.

"I'd much rather have good water in July than in April," Tuttle says. "Any time."

Many rivers aren't quite at good water yet, but some are. The White Salmon River is a personal favorite for many rafters, and it's raftable nearly all year long because of steady flows from Mount Adams' White Salmon Glacier. The river runs through a particularly scenic channel, the narrowness of which means rafters can achieve the same kind of whitewater thrills at a much lower rate of cubic feet per second (cfs) as many of the bigger rivers.

All Adventures Rafting, whose headquarters overlooks the river at BZ Corner, north of the town of White Salmon, has been running trips on the White Salmon since January. Until last weekend, All Adventures was still able to take passengers over Husum Falls -- which, with a 14-foot drop, is believed to be the country's largest waterfall commercially run in paddle rafts.

Now, though, All Adventures is backing off doing the falls -- possibly until mid-July -- because the steadily increasing flows make running it a safety risk.

"Conditions are wonderful on the river right now," says All Adventures owner Karen Driver, whose guides know every rock, twist and hole on the White Salmon. "The falls is iffy, though; that's why we're not running it. There's a 50-50 chance you'd flip."

Another river that, like the White Salmon, is too often overlooked by the masses is the Methow River in north-central Washington, which is just now moving into the best part of its season.

"That's the best rafting in the state -- on the Methow, when the water's up," says Jerry Michalec, owner and head guide for Arlington-based North Cascades River Expeditions. "It's got the best stuff. It's just a very entertaining river -- it's got something like 17 miles, and every one of them is very entertaining, and yet it's relatively safe."

With the big snowpack, though, all would-be rafting customers would do well to avoid a rafting trip following a stretch of particularly hot days. While that can create bigger rapids, the sudden snowmelt can fill rivers with a surge of downed trees and other debris, creating potentially dangerous logjams.

Customers should also be wary of outfitters who are too anxious to run trips in those conditions.

"It's going to be a good year, but I think we'll probably be facing a couple of hot weekends where I don't know if we'll be wanting to run or not," Michalec said. "If we get 10 days of really hot, sunny weather, those rivers are going to get way up."

In those conditions, some areas -- like Boulder Bend, an otherwise very popular section of Wenatchee River whitewater on the outskirts of Leavenworth -- become essentially unrunnable for all but the most expert rafters.

On the plus side, though, there's enough snow in the mountains, and enough rivers fed by enough different basins and stream systems, for a long season. By trying different rivers at different times, a diehard whitewater lover could conceivably start now and raft every other weekend without ever having to raft the same river twice.

If you want to try that, here's a likely itinerary:

* Start with the Green River Gorge. It's dam-controlled and can be problematic, since the releases are not done for the benefit of the rafting community. But this figures to be a best year on the Green, because the hydro folks have massive snowpack and no choice but to do steady releases for weeks.

* Move south after that to the White Salmon (or save that until late July if you've got your heart set on doing Husum Falls).

* Save June for the Methow and the Wenatchee, which will really be rocking.

* Hit the Klickitat and Skykomish toward the end of the month and into July, when enough of the debris should have been flushed out. (But only do those tricky rivers with very experienced guides.)

* Hit the Sauk and Suiattle over a couple of July weekends and then do the Skagit in August, when the latter's S-bends will be worth running.

* Finally, in the first or second weekend of September, finish your big whitewater summer on the "flip-flop" flows of the Tieton.

If that's not enough, you could always hit the Deschutes in Oregon or do a multi-day trip on the Salmon in Idaho. But, of course, if all that Washington whitewater isn't enough for you, you probably have fins and gills and don't read newspapers anyway.