Preparation - Get certified with:

1) Wilderness First Responder
2) CPR
3) Swiftwater Rescue

Acquire a Toyota Truck with 4WD and a camper shell, 2 pair of quick dry shorts, a polar fleece sweater, a rain shell, a pair of Teva river sandals, a leatherman, a sheath knife, sunglasses, a sleeping bag, and a pad, and a pack. Make sure they don't look new. Grab a pair of jeans and a few t-shirts and a baseball cap. If you are going to Alaska include a pair of Carharts and knee high rubber boots. Put everything else in storage.

Bid farewell to your, family, security, home, and basic pleasures of domestic life. Kiss your girl (boy) friend(s) goodbye. Of course you'll promise to write.

Put $500 in your wallet. Put any remaining assets into a Mutual Fund. Keep one credit card. Get a cell phone whose charges are billed to the credit card. Get one checking account and arrange monthly auto pay to your one credit card.

Action:

Drive to the operations office of the Outfitter that you most want to work for (remember to do this in the month before their season begins - this doesn't work in the winter).

Interview with the operations manager. Offer to do any job they need doing - repair boats, empty shit cans, drive shuttles - but make it clear that your #1 goal is to guide on the river.

Be friendly, kind, and enthusiastic to everyone. Relish doing any menial work with a smile on your face and ask for more. Do every job thoroughly, but don't be too excellent at anything you don't really want to do forever. Take any opportunity to go on the river. Stay within 50 feet of the front door at all times.

Result:

Next thing you know, it will be 10 years later; you will have passports full of exotic international stamps. You will be in the best shape of your life, except for that recurring Malaria. And if your mutual fund has done well you will have some money.

Preparation:

Go to College. Major in geology, biology, or some environmental science. While getting the degree, focus studies on psychology and cooking, because that's what you will be dealing with as a guide.

Action:

Send out resumes to all the companies you really want to work for. In this age of Internet you can actually contact many companies at once, but are you really interested in guiding Yak tours in Bangladesh?

Follow up with a phone call.
Follow up with a letter and a professional looking resume on hard copy.
Follow up with a phone call.
Fix a time for a personal interview. (You travel to them.)
Follow up with a phone call.

First Result:

Perhaps you will receive an internship where you will do all the usual menial jobs, but at half the pay.

Second Preparation:

Do all of the preparation in Method one. Did you really think you would get to skip this?

Final Result:

Same as Method # 1, except now you have a degree with which to get a paying job.

Preparation:

Have your rich relatives buy or start an Adventure Travel Company. Learn marketing, web development, database development, reservations, retail operations, gear purchasing, equipment maintenance, leadership, and patience.

Action:

1) Find a river that has never been run before and needs no government permit. Run trips there under your company banner. Don't worry. Even if it is hopeless creek it will someday be an adventure travel destination.

2) Or buy an existing river permit. But ask yourself, why are these guys selling such a valuable permit?

Result:

You will be in the worst shape of your life. You will have a bad back, an ulcer, a ruined marriage, and you would have a drinking problem if you only had the time.

Except for those for those explorations on that hopeless creek you won't have been guiding in the outdoors for many years.

If, in the end, you decide that you really would rather guide, it's too late. Guides will always treat you as an outfitter. But the upside is that the government permit for that hopeless creek is now worth a million dollars if you could only find someone to buy it.

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