Bridging the Gap: SOTAR Supports Historic Klamath River First Descent Rafting Expedition

When the road ended, the river kept going. So did the volunteers.

While 30 indigenous youth from the Yurok, Hupa, Klamath, and other tribes led the way on the first-ever source-to-sea descent of the newly undammed Klamath River, a patchwork of volunteer support teams worked behind the scenes to keep the month-long expedition moving smoothly and safely.

For a three-day stretch in early July, the SOTAR team brought in six rafts to haul food, gear, and camping supplies through a remote stretch of river to support the expedition led by Ríos to Rivers’ Paddle Tribal Waters Program. “The road from inland ends, and then the road from the coast picks up, but there’s a gap,” Jeremiah Lewman, co-owner of SOTAR, explained. 

That gap was where SOTAR stepped in to help.

Initially expecting to bring two boats, Jeremiah and Rachel, his wife and the co-owner of SOTAR, received word just days before departure that they’d need to bring six. “They did a lot of planning, but also—things change,” Rachel said with a laugh.

“With a long expedition like that, things always expand,” Jeremiah added. “You might have things dialed in to a T for the first few days, but then, you don’t know.”

The descent, led by the Ríos to Rivers’ Paddle Tribal Waters Program, covered over 250 miles of water over thirty days. Some youth participated from start to finish, while others joined for shorter stretches. With paddlers joining and leaving the descent at different points, flexibility was key—especially when the number of participants surged to around 120 kayakers on the final days of the descent.

“There are lots of indigenous groups all over the world that are fighting their local governments to get dams removed so they get their access to their native lands back,” Jeremiah said. “And this [descent] has been a really big beacon, because [the Klamath activists] actually accomplished their goals. People from Bolivia, Chile, New Zealand, and China came to see how it happened.”

In the end, joined as they were by so many eager activists and river guides, SOTAR’s six boats ended up being more than enough.

“They probably only needed half the number of rafts,” Jeremiah said with a smile, looking around at the crowd filling the Ada Waukell Charles Community Center, which hosted the Klamath First Descent Celebration on July 12. “But there were so many people who were volunteers.”

For Jeremiah and Rachel, being invited to participate during those last few days was an honor.

“It was really cool,” Rachel said. “This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.”