grew up on the kettle. from laurier to just north of barstow it is a trout stream with some NICE rainbows. From just south of the Barstow bridge to the columbia river its primarily walleye and small mouth bass ( My brother still pulls a few nice bass outta there around Kamloops)

As for launches, there is a small set of rapids just north of barstow and the river is pretty low right now I imagine so that area is not nice on boats.

THere is a nice launch just north of boyds across the Napoleon bridge concrete plenty of parking.

I think there is also a launch at kamloops campground?

north of barstow is a pack in show but you can float the entire river from laurier down to barstow on a pontoon boat