Our 2025 Whitewater rafting season Begins!
After first opening our doors to adventure-seekers and nature-lovers in 1996, Ocoee Adventure Center is proud to announce the official beginning of our 2025 Whitewater rafting season, and our 29th season on the Ocoee River! To mark the occasion, let us take you through a bit of our history and introduce you to the newest members of the OAC family.
Our story begins when our founder, Larry Mashburn, came to the Ocoee River to manage the whitewater slalom course for the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. Like many of us, he fell in love with the area and opened OAC to bring whitewater rafting to over 145 thousand guests and counting!
In our 29 seasons, we have trained and hired some of the most experienced guides on the Ocoee River. Most of our guides have over ten years of experience on the Ocoee, and many have experience on whitewater rivers around the country! Our most experienced veteran guides train our newer guides, and they benefit from veterans’ whitewater wisdom daily.
We are especially excited to welcome four new folks to the Ocoee Adventure Center family! Our newest trainees are all coming to the Ocoee with previous whitewater experience and a passion for adventure. Here is a little bit about each of them:
OAC Trainees 2025 (left to right): Mitch, Tanner, Adam, and Luke
Mitch has been involved in the whitewater community for 12 years and has been raft guiding for 7 of those years! When asked what he is most excited about for his first season at OAC, he said, “I am really excited to guide with such a talented and experienced staff, and really learn a beautiful and wonderful river.”
Tanner has been adventuring in whitewater since 2010. His first whitewater experience was rafting down Westwater Canyon in Utah, and he has since led several kayaking trips and paddled many multi-day whitewater trips out West. He says that he is most excited to gain more experience on bigger water and bring his private-boating experience to commercial guiding this season.
Adam got his first taste of whitewater while thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail. This season will be his third season as a commercial guide, with two years of previous guiding experience on the Poudre River in Colorado. He is most excited to “come full circle back to this region that holds a special place in his soul and share that with other guests,” as well as be on a new river!
This will be Luke’s second year as a commercial guide. Previously, he worked in the Royal Gorge section of the Arkansas River. He says he is most excited to meet everyone at OAC and enjoy the Ocoee. As a Tennessee native, he looks forward to exploring and guiding a river within his home state.
This 2025 season, we look forward to making new memories with you and our new guides, and reconnecting with returning customers and our rafting family. Make sure to book your trip today!