Yellowstone River Expedition
500 Miles on Montana's Yellowstone River
Approximate Dates: August 1 - September 7, 2025

      What would it be like to paddle the Yellowstone River by dugout canoe with traditional Fur Trade Era gear?

      Expedition leader Thomas J. Elpel enjoyed the privilege of carving his first dugout canoe in 2018 under the tutelage of Churchill Clark, the great-great-great-great grandson of Captain William Clark of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Tom then led an expedition down the 2,341-mile Missouri River in 2019 from Three Forks, Montana to St. Louis, Missouri, as told in the book, Five Months on the Missouri River: Paddling a Dugout Canoe.

      The new project to paddle the Yellowstone began over the winter of 2020-2021 as students from Green University® LLC assisted in carving a second dugout canoe. The group paddled modern canoes from Green University's wilderness survival River Camp field site down the Jefferson River to Shoshone Landing on the Jefferson River Canoe Trail. There they camped for two weeks while trimming a 10,000-lb. plains cottonwood down to a moveable 4,000-lb. log, which was then trailered back to River Camp. Through the winter months, students learned braintanning and many other wilderness skills covered in Tom's book Participating in Nature: Wilderness Survival and Primitive Living Skills. As time allowed, Tom and students whittled away at the canoe, finishing it by the end of April 2021:

      The original intent was to craft all Stone Age gear in preparation for a 540-mile, six-week expedition by dugout canoe down the Yellowstone River starting in August of 2021. It evolved into a Fur Trade Era theme after a few of the participants were hired as extras in the filming of a documentary series for television. We ultimately bought some antique trunks for our gear and assembled a wardrobe of mostly old-style linen clothes.

      We put a bed of tules in the bottom of each canoe to help keep gear out of the water that normally accumulates in the bottom of the boats. Small dry bags were used to safeguard our electronics and other sensitive gear, but otherwise our food, bedding, and clothing were packed in the canoes and trunks without waterproof protection. We had more people than dugout canoes, so we included a modern Old Town canoe in the fleet.

      Below the whitewater in Yankee Jim Canyon, the Yellowstone is considered a Class I river, "suitable for practiced paddlers at low flows" according to the Paddling Montana guidebook. However, the first 180 miles or so consists of numerous "wave trains" of big waves that are fairly advanced. The upper river was stimulating paddling to say the least, and we typically had to stop after each string of wave trains to bail out one or more canoes.

      Unfortunately, the expedition had to be aborted upon reaching Livingston, only 40 miles into the trip, due to severe back pains Tom was struggling with, which started as a mild problem in April and progressively worsened throughout his frenetic summer teaching schedule. Tom spent most of August recuperating through physical therapy, chiropractic work, acupuncture and laying around watching television.

      We intended to return to the river in 2022, but plans changed when friends Kris and Bartle and Luke launched their own expedition from River Camp down the Jefferson and Missouri rivers. We met them three weeks later in Great Falls, Montana and provided portage service around the town and dam, then paddled the Upper Missouri National Wild and Scenic River together before all parties exited the river together. In 2023, we had way too much on the schedule, and the time alloted for the Yellostone River shrank and shrank, until we didn't go at all. In 2024, we needed a catch-up year, and once again postponed the trip. It is hard to say exactly when we will return to paddle the Yellowstone, but we'll keep kicking the can down the road until it happens!

      The Yellowstone still awaits, and Tom is eager to lead a new attempt to finish the river. We will likely forgo the fur-trade era theme and use modern gear and dry bags in the dugout canoes to facilitate the journey. .

      In 2024 we hope to pick up where we left off, launching downstream from Livingston, with approximately 500 miles remaining to reach the river's confluence with the Missouri River just over the border with North Dakota. We will still have +/- 150 miles of wave trains to deal with before the Yellowstone settles out into a prairie river.

      August was chosen as the ideal time for the expedition in part due to the ripening chokecherries and other fruits along the river. Fire restrictions previously necessitated the use a propane stove for cooking, and that could easily happen again this year. In addition, there is the real possibility that the river may lack sufficient depth in eastern Montana to paddle it's entire length in August (even in a good year), but we will go as far as we reasonably can. Dugout canoes draft about 8 inches and thus require a minimum sustained river depth of about 10 inches.

      Along the way we will camp, hike, and explore the surrounding countryside, while hunting rabbits and other small non-game animals. We'll forage our way down the river to supplement our previously prepared venison jerky, dried fruits, and pemmican. Anyone interested in fishing can bring handmade fishing line and hooks. Although the expedition will be Fur Trade themed, it will be a good opportunity to immerse in and practice all ancestral skills.

      We will launch approximately August 1st and paddle at the optimal time to harvest chokecherries and other wild edibles along the way, including wild grapes and probably wild plums downstream from the city of Billings, Montana. We'll harvest many wild edibles detailed in Tom's book Foraging the Mountain West.

      Would you like to join us for this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity? Click over to the contact page and send us a note about your interest and qualifications to join us. This isn't a class, and there is no charge to join the experience. However, donations would be appreciated to help offset expenses, especially the cost of transporting canoes home afterwards.

Filming
      Tom documented his previous dugout canoe adventure in a series of articles that were expanded and complimented by more than 700 photos for the award-winning travelogue, Five Months on the Missouri River: Paddling a Dugout Canoe. For the Yellowstone Expedition, Tom plans to shoot video for his YouTube Channel, so expect to be on camera a lot.

      Space is limited, and priority goes to Tom's friends and former students. But if you have significant skills to contribute to the expedition, then please click on over to our Contact Page and send us an e-mail to tell us about yourself, what your background is, and why you would like to join us for the Yellowstone Expedition. Thank you!