American Whitewater is proud to bring back the storied traditions of the annual Feather River Festival for 2024! This festival and fundraiser mark the annual celebration of American Whitewater’s stewardship work on the North Fork Feather River. At its core, it’s a celebration of AW’s successful efforts to restore ecological and recreational flows to the North Fork Feather River watershed and reconnect the community to this special place. The festival is put on through efforts of American Whitewater, Chico Paddleheads and volunteers from the paddling community.

This 3-day festival, September 27-29, 2024 brings together boaters who run every type of whitewater craft down three distinct sections of river: the fun Class III rapids of Roger’s Flat Section, the challenging Class V Tobin Section, and the exciting Class IV Lobin Section. With easy roadside access, the festival is an exciting event for aspiring boaters to paddle alongside some truly world class athletes.

Film festival, live music, silent auction, and of course all the whitewater action you can handle! Who's gonna be there this year? A very fun base flow of 450cfs will be available in advance of the whitewater releases - 900 cfs Saturday September 28th and Sunday September 29th. Additional boating opportunities, negotiated by AW, will occur in the area as well. The Poe section will have a 1,400 cfs release from 9am-3pm Saturday and Sunday. The South Feather below Little Grass Valley Reservoir will be releasing 425 cfs from September 19th to October 7th.

All current American Whitewater members will have free admission to the Film Festival on Friday and the Feather Fest Party on Saturday. Donate, renew or sign up for a new AW membership to support our stewardship work and you will be entered into our drawing for a new piece of drygear!

On Friday night, American Whitewater will kick off the weekend with the film festival and the all important Stewardship update on our work. On Saturday night, Habanero’s Taqueria food truck arrives to feed the masses and Sierra Nevada and Mulberry Station will provide the beer. Smokey the Groove returns to provide the ultimate funk rock jazz experience and will DJ our after party.

As a fundraiser for American Whitewater, the Saturday night Silent Auction will have boats and gear at awesome prices for bidding. There will also be plenty of vendor and sponsor booths to amass boater swag and merchandise!

Note: American Whitewater will not be sponsoring or holding a Tobin Downriver Race or a Rock Creek Slalom this year but we encourage boaters of all types to enjoy the recreational releases at their leisure.

IMPORTANT DETAILS:

Where: The Indian Jim Campground, located at Plumas County mile marker 8.22 on Highway 70 near Tobin, CA. Search “Indian Jim Campground” on Google Maps for location.

As a reminder to be respectful of the homelands of the Konkow Valley Band of Maidu, the Feather River Festival is a LEAVE NO TRACE event. Please, pack it in and pack it out. There are no trash cans nor is there trash pick-up available at the event.

NO DRINKING WATER is available at the Festival, please BYO water.

There is FREE camping at the Festival site. Additional free camping is available one mile up-stream at Roger’s Flat or one mile down-stream at Tobin Vista. Parking is tight, carpool!

There is no shuttle service; however, there are hundreds of cool boater folks just like you… just meet your neighbor for guaranteed fun times and great boating!

VOLUNTEERING: Feather Fest runs on volunteers! Sign up to volunteer here and get included in some great swag giveaways while knowing you've helped make this year's festival a success: volunteersignup.org/RPT8M.

NO OPEN FIRES! You are required to have a free permit from Calfire to use any camp stove. Get yours before the event HERE.