About
Outdoor Education Programs at Mother Lode River Center include white water rafting, packrafting, ziplining, and team building with a challenge ropes course. Programs also include outdoor education with guide instruction and can be offered as half-day programs or multiple-days programs. Riverside camping is part of the experience, alongside access to a large Pacific Yurt used as a meeting, sleeping, and performance space, and “glamping” canvas cabin tents on wooden platforms with cots and sleeping pads.
• Ages: 5–18 years old
• Schedule: Half-day and multiple-days program options
Since its founding in 1974, Mother Lode has 50 years of experience and has safely guided over 300,000 guests down 3 million river miles. Guides receive extensive training as river guides, ropes course facilitators, and outdoor educators, and the company was the first to incorporate Rescue 3’s Swiftwater Rescue Training into its Guide School, which has since become an international standard for excellence. Mother Lode’s safety record is described as one of the best in the industry, and the organization states that its mission is to share a love of California’s rivers with guests and to help protect these places for future generations.
Mother Lode helped Rescue 3’s founder, Jim Segerstrom, adapt Swiftwater Rescue Training, originally intended for first responders, for river guides. Scott and Greg are mentioned as part of “Scott, Greg and the MaLode Crew,” and Marc Dubois, Scott, Emily, and Adrienne Underwood were chosen as “River Heroes” by Friends of the River. Over 30,000 guests have volunteered through Mother Lode to write letters in defense of 15 California rivers, and this work has helped keep many California rivers running.
Outdoor Education Programs take place at a scenic twenty-acre river oasis that includes an ancient Native American camp with dozens of grinding holes bored into granite bedrock overlooking the river, panoramic river views along half a mile of riverfront property, full-service bathrooms with showers and changing rooms, a camp store with swag and river necessities, and a large Pacific Yurt used as a meeting, sleeping, and performance space. One testimonial describes the place as “amazing,” and another says that very few things in life can beat a day white water rafting on the American River and calls it “an experience that will stay with you for a lifetime.”
Last updated April 7, 2026.
• Ages: 5–18 years old
• Schedule: Half-day and multiple-days program options
Since its founding in 1974, Mother Lode has 50 years of experience and has safely guided over 300,000 guests down 3 million river miles. Guides receive extensive training as river guides, ropes course facilitators, and outdoor educators, and the company was the first to incorporate Rescue 3’s Swiftwater Rescue Training into its Guide School, which has since become an international standard for excellence. Mother Lode’s safety record is described as one of the best in the industry, and the organization states that its mission is to share a love of California’s rivers with guests and to help protect these places for future generations.
Mother Lode helped Rescue 3’s founder, Jim Segerstrom, adapt Swiftwater Rescue Training, originally intended for first responders, for river guides. Scott and Greg are mentioned as part of “Scott, Greg and the MaLode Crew,” and Marc Dubois, Scott, Emily, and Adrienne Underwood were chosen as “River Heroes” by Friends of the River. Over 30,000 guests have volunteered through Mother Lode to write letters in defense of 15 California rivers, and this work has helped keep many California rivers running.
Outdoor Education Programs take place at a scenic twenty-acre river oasis that includes an ancient Native American camp with dozens of grinding holes bored into granite bedrock overlooking the river, panoramic river views along half a mile of riverfront property, full-service bathrooms with showers and changing rooms, a camp store with swag and river necessities, and a large Pacific Yurt used as a meeting, sleeping, and performance space. One testimonial describes the place as “amazing,” and another says that very few things in life can beat a day white water rafting on the American River and calls it “an experience that will stay with you for a lifetime.”
Last updated April 7, 2026.
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