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How It All Began
The Sobek Signature Series




1973 - The Year it All Began

In 1973, as a last fling before joining the routine working world, boyhood friends Richard Bangs and John Yost and a scrappy team of Grand Canyon river guides decided to tackle the Awash, a little-known unrun river in Ethiopia filled with crocodiles and hippos. The experience was so thrilling, they decided to try to interest others in similar trips.

That successful endeavor gave birth to Sobek, named after the ancient Egyptian crocodile-headed water god who seemed to have honored them with safe passage. Later that same year, they offered the first commercial river trip on the Omo River, also in Ethiopia, an excursion that expanded into a thriving operation. Along the way they met indigenous people who had never seen sunglasses or cameras - not to mention rubber rafts!.

Richard Bangs

In the intervening years, Sobek Expedition (combined since 1991 with Mountain Travel) has rafted more than 100 rivers, pioneering over 70 for the first time. And the adventure continues with new rivers explored and revisited, and first descents every year.

John Yost


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The Sobek Signature Series

Since 1973, Sobek has pioneered more than 70 rivers with first descents. Since 2004, we’ve featured the revival of a classic Sobek trip each year, led by Sobek co-founder John Yost. Sobek Signature Series trips are hand-picked by John for river enthusiasts and avid rafters alike, who want to explore resurrections of the classic Sobek trips of yore.

Past Sobek Signature Series Trips

  • The Series began in 2004 with the Watut in Papua New Guinea, a river offering a combination of challenging whitewater and beautiful rainforest and cultural interactions. This made it a favorite of Sobek guides, and a natural choice to be the first in the Signature Series!
  • In 2005, we took on Siberia’s Katun, descended first by Sobek in 1987, which carves an impressive course through Siberia’s Altai Mountains, near the Mongolian border.
  • In 2006, we featured the Rio Tambopata in the Peruvian Amazon, one of the most biologically diverse areas in the world.
  • And 2007, we ran the Zanskar in Ladakh, with its Grand Canyon-like gorge and amazing vistas of 19,000-foot peaks! We had so much fun revisiting this 1976 Sobek first descent, we’re offering it again in 2009!


Upcoming Sobek Signature Series Trip

  • The Chatkal River, which crosses from Uzbekistan into Kyrgyzstan, first run by Sobek in 1989, is being offered in September 2008 to celebrate 35 years of Sobek rafting history.
  • For 2009, we celebrate the 40th anniversary of the founding of Mountain Travel (and the 1991 union with Sobek to become today’s Mountain Travel Sobek) with trips down Tanzania’s Rufiji River and Tasmania’s Franklin River, as well as our 6-Continent International Whitewater Rafting Adventure which tackles 6 Continents and 9 Rivers in 25 Days.
  • Upcoming Signature Series trips include the Sala Sadang/Lariang (Sulawesi, Indonesia) in 2010, the Brahmaputra (India) in 2011, the Tuichi (Bolivia) in 2011, and the Yarkand (Xinjiang, China) in 2012!


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For more information and reservations, please contact:

Mountain Travel Sobek
1266 66th Street, Suite 4
Emeryville, CA 94608
1-510-594-6000 or
Toll Free 1-888-831-7526 (USA & Canada)
Additional International Toll Free Numbers
Fax: 1-510-594-6001
Email: info@mtsobek.com