AN EXPLORATION OF RIVERS AND LANDSCAPES
Source to Sea Project
The Source to Sea Project seeks to travel North America’s four largest Pacific rivers—Yukon, Columbia, Fraser, Colorado— from source to sea. The quest began with the Fraser River in 2006. Since then, the quest has expanded to include other, smaller Western rivers. Often the voyage ends at salt water. Sometimes reaching the river mouth—whether reservoir or canal—is journey enough. In any case, traveling from mountain headwaters to river’s end provides a unique perspective on the geography of our world.
Source to Sea Map
SOURCE TO SEA
The Big 4 Pacific Rivers of North America
Yukon River
- Length: 1,980 miles
- Basin Size: 321,000 square miles
- Discharge: 227,000 cubic feet per second
Although the Yukon River begins just 30 air miles from ocean water, it flows for nearly 2,000 miles before emptying into the Bering Sea. The river opened the North to gold seekers in the late 1800’s. Today, it is a liquid highway flowing through deep wilderness. In 2024, I began my journey at the Willison Glacier, crossed Atlin Lake, and descended the river by oar and motor in 43 days.
Fraser River
- Length: 800 miles
- Basin Size: 85,000 square miles
- Discharge: 125,000 cubic feet per second
The Fraser River is undammed along its entire main stem, and rapids punctuate its course. Simon Fraser first canoed the river in 1806. Two centuries passed before I paddled all 800 miles of the Fraser, in 2006.
Columbia River
- Length: 1,243 miles
- Basin Size: 258,000 square miles
- Discharge: 265,000 cubic feet per second
The Columbia River is the most hydroelectrically developed river in the world. Having guided for several years on its longest undammed tributary, the Salmon, I chose this as my launch point before continuing through 8 dams on the Snake and Columbia Rivers. The journey ended by crossing the Columbia River Bar—”Graveyard of the Pacific.”
Colorado River
- Length: 1,450 miles
- Basin Size: 243,000 square miles
- Discharge: 22,000 cubic feet per second
The Colorado River is the last scheduled descent of the Source to Sea Project. Cutting a spectacular course through desert canyons, including Grand Canyon, the Colorado is diverted so thoroughly in its lower reaches that it no longer flows to salt water in the Sea of Cortez.
SOURCE TO SEA
Smaller Rivers
Bogachiel – Quilayute River
- Length: 52 miles
- Basin Size: 154 square miles
- Discharge: 1,059 cubic feet per second
The Bogachiel River drains the western slope of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula. It’s upper reaches are very rarely visited by humans. The valley of the Bogachiel holds the world’s biggest Pacific silver firs (Abies amabilis). I traveled the length of the Bogachiel in 2011, and got to measure the 2 largest silver firs in the world!
Hoh River
- Length: 58 miles
- Basin Size: 299 square miles
- Discharge: 2,538 cubic feet per second
The Hoh River Valley hosts one of the world’s most well-traveled big-tree trails. Bigleaf maples, Sitka spruces, Douglas firs, and Western red cedars grow to massive proportions here, where annual rainfall is over 130 inches. Bret Simmons, Vance Hunt, and I used the Hoh trail to complete a summit-to-sea, climbing Mt Olympus before returning to the river valley and paddling to the ocean.
Queets River
- Length: 53 miles
- Basin Size: 204 square miles
- Discharge: 4,350 cubic feet per second
The Queets River drains the south side of Mt. Olympus, tumbling over mythical Service Falls before making a run through wild rainforest valleys en route to the Pacific. Bret Simmons and I launched on the remote upper Queets just below the Service Falls gorge on this almost-source-to-sea descent on the Olympic Peninsula.
Elwha River
- Length: 45 miles
- Basin Size: 321 square miles
- Discharge: 1,500 cubic feet per second
Looking at the Olympic Peninsula from space, the Elwha River basin cuts a narrow wedge straight into the Peninsula’s heart. Some might say that heart was taken when salmon-stopping dams were built on the Elwha in the early 1900s. A century later, those dams were removed, allowing salmon to return. In 2026, Bret Simmons and I traveled the Elwha from its snow finger source to the ocean, passing the former dam sites on this restored river.
Ipewik River
- Length: 85 miles
- Basin Size: 922 square miles
- Discharge: 600 cubic feet per second (estimated)
The Ipewik is the northwestern-most river in North America. The river is frozen between late October and mid-May. In 2013, I descended the river with John Govi soon after ice break-up, paddling the upper Kukpowruk River and hiking cross country to reach the Ipewik. The traverse ended at the village of Tikigaq (aka Pt. Hope) on the shores of the Chukchi Sea.
Klamath River
- Length: 257 miles
- Basin Size: 15,689 square miles
- Discharge: 16,780 cubic feet per second
The Klamath begins as a series of crystalline springs emanating from the east side of the Cascade Range. It is heavily dammed and used for irrigation in its upper reaches, before running south and west through the Klamath River Mountains, improving in water quality along the way. In 2007, I chose to launch at Spring Creek, a huge and pure spring located above Klamath Lake. Six dams had to be portaged on that descent. In 2025, I paddled the river a second time, passing the sites of four dismantled dams where salmon now swim again.
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