Clarksdale is the home base of operations for Quapaw Canoe Company, and the ideal jump- place for your guided adventure through the watery wilderness of the Lower Mississippi River. Unique accommodations, great eating, down-home Delta blues in the juke joints, and the Delta Blues Museum make for a complete nature-cultural experience for you & your family! More blues musicians come from Clarksdale & surrounding Delta region than any other single place on earth. The main channel of the Mississippi River used to flow adjacent downtown Clarksdale, and it was once the center of a thriving Native American community of 2 – 3,000 known as Quiz-Quiz. There is evidence that Hernando de Soto and his conquistadors passed through this area during their 1540-42 ravage of the Southeast (and became the first Europeans to view the Mighty Mississippi River, which they called “The Rio Grande”). Jolliette & Marquette (1673), LaSalle (1681) and John James Audubon (1820) traveled this section of river.
Clarksdale, Mississippi, has become the world wide center for custom-guided access to the Lower Mississippi River. All roads lead to the river. Clarksdale is the center of a giant wheel from which all spokes emanate outwards and intersect the big river. We package all of our guided expeditions from here, and then shuttle “upstream” for “downstream” adventures. We go with the flow. Many of our shuttles pass through Stovall Plantation where Muddy Waters lived for 25 years before migrating to Chicago. Other shuttles pass through the “Humber” site which was once the largest concentration of Native Americans outside of Cahokia (Charles Peabody, Harvard University, 1897). At journey”s end our shuttle drivers Wesley Jefferson “The Mississippi Junebug” and Ellis Coleman (Super Chikan’s younger brother) pick us up and bring us back to home base. Expeditions above Memphis are shuttled from Mud Island downtown Memphis, Dyersburg, Tennessee or New Madrid Missouri. Expeditions below Vicksburg are shuttled from Vicksburg, Port Gibson or Natchez.