Helen Lee, a West Australian trained in anthropology, botany and teaching, began guiding tours in Pemberton in 1988 and moved her operation onto the Margaret River in 1990, guiding every tour herself, 360 days a year, for the following six years. Guests paddle two-to-five-seater eco canoes downstream from Prevelly Park Beach, passing cliffs, pioneer and Aboriginal sites and forested kangaroo habitat before finishing near Surfers Point, where the river meets the ocean, with the 1828-built Wallcliffe House visible from the water. The roughly four-hour tour runs daily, departing around 9:30am and returning by 2pm. Lee developed close to 25 bush-food dishes from native plants identified along the river, drawing on her background in native flora and medicinal plants. The business earned excellence-in-heritage-and-cultural-tourism awards in 1996, 1999 and 2002, and in 1999 Lee received the F.A.C.E.T. Golden Guide pin, which the company describes as Australia's only award of its kind for tour guides. The river itself, per the operator, took shape over 60,000 years. The tour has operated continuously on the Margaret River since 1990.