Riverboarding is believed to have originated in the late 1970s. It is claimed to have originated in France, where raft guides stuffed a burlap mail sack with life vests and went down rapids.[3] Soon, riders adapted a personal submarine shell for their molds, and the plastic version of the riverboard was born. Sometime in the late 1980s, Robert Carlson began running rivers in California using an ocean bodyboard and ended up making his own board that was bigger and thicker and had handles. In 1986, Ged Hay began taking his body board down the Kawarau River near Queenstown in New Zealand while on his days off as a rafting guide.