AdvenChair in the Press

Fortitude, ingenuity, optimism, perseverance, and generosity are only a few of the traits that describe Bend resident Geoff Babb, founder, co-inventor, and inspiration behind the AdvenChair, an all-terrain human-powered wheelchair that thinks it’s a mountain bike, made completely in Central Oregon. 

For disabled travelers in search of adventure, there are a growing number of adrenaline-fueled options. In Oregon, one wheelchair user went tree-climbing. That climber was Geoff Babb, in his AdvenChair off-road wheelchair.

While in Oregon, I had the opportunity to participate in a group adventure at Smith Rock, a jaw-droppingly beautiful state park. Our group consisted of three wheelchair users including Geoff (AdvenChair), Kelcie (The Chronic Explorer) Kristy (Kristy Durso) and Phoenyx (Phoenyx Travels) and a team of volunteers that provided the human-power behind the AdvenChairs.

AdvenChair, a local trailblazer in all-terrain wheelchairs, and Wanderlust Tours, Central Oregon’s long-time leader in guided adventures, have just announced the schedule for their third series of accessible outings known as “AdvenTours.” On the heels of a virtually non-existent Central Oregon winter, the two partners are virtually chomping at the bit to get started.

The Onward Project will double its fleet of rugged, all-terrain “AdvenChair” wheelchairs, allowing families and friends to hike together regardless of mobility challenges, thanks to the Bend Sustainability Fund! From replacing hundreds of thousands of single-use containers at food cart pods to building one of the only adaptive cycling centers on the West Coast, 11 local projects will receive funding through the 2026 Bend Sustainability Fund (BSF), a key grant program in Visit Bend’s broader destination-stewardship strategy that ensures tourism continues to support the long-term health of our community. 

In the northwest, we’re known for our beautiful vistas and challenging hikes. But for people with mobility issues, many of those sights remain out of reach. In this Fox 12 Oregon episode of Andy’s Adventures, Andy Carson introduces you to a device that promises to change that. He went to Smith Rock State Park and met the inventor of the AdvenChair.

The Oregon Tourism Commission, dba Travel Oregon, has worked with Wheel the World (WTW) to earn the state of Oregon a landmark designation: the first state to become “Accessibility Verified.” The designation elevates transparency and promotes inclusivity in travel experiences for people with visible and non-visible disabilities. AdvenChair with WanderLust Tours, through their partnership in AdvenTours, is featured in Wheel the World’s experience in Central Oregon.

Central Oregon has a way of pulling people outside. Framed by the Cascades to the west and high desert to the east, this region blends rugged landscapes with small-town charm. Bend is the hub — full of breweries, trails, and culture — but nearby towns like Sisters, Redmond, and Prineville add their own flavors. In this Guide to Epic Accessible Adventures in Bend & Central Oregon, Wheel the World covers the best accessible adventures, where to stay, places to eat, and practical tips to make the most of your trip.

Bend Magazine writer Daniel O’Neil features the AdvenChair wheelchair that thinks its a mountain bike in his Sept/Oct 2025 article “Built to Ride—Custom bikes are a growing industry.” Downhill, cross-country, touring, road, gravel—the high desert offers every option a cyclist could ask for. It follows, then, that the area is also home to a core group of custom bike builders who are pushing bicycle engineering and production past any preconceived boundaries, while also maintaining the spirit of elation and freedom that cycling can provide. 

Condé Nast writer Sophie Morgan visits Central Oregon and is impressed by the accessibility to its natural environment, thanks to the AdvenChair hiking wheelchair. “Surrounded by a grinning team of able-bodied volunteers, all strapped onto the Advenchair with ropes, they prepared to lower me into what felt like the set of an epic Western. Smith Rock, a jagged, rust-red marvel shaped by ancient lava and sculpted by wind and water, rises from the Oregon desert like a sandstone cathedral. Ahead of me lay a trail that clung to the cliffside. Behind me: the rope team affectionately known as the “mules.” By all logic, this terrain should have been off-limits to someone like me. But this environment was nothing to the Advenchair, Geoff had taken it to the depths of the Grand Canyon previously.”

A collaboration between two outdoor industry pioneers that launched in 2024 yielded a prestigious award last week, even as they were building on the foundation of their teamwork this year.At the 2025 Oregon Governor’s Conference on Tourism held at the Portland Convention Center last week, AdvenChair and Wanderlust Tours were honored with the Partnership Award, which recognizes that leveraging traditional and non-traditional partnerships enables organizations and businesses to maximize their budgets, employee capacity, and skill sets to create an increase in efficiencies and a higher-level of aligned outcome.

On Monday night, many of Oregon’s leading members of the travel and tourism industry were honored during the Achievement Awards at the 2025 Oregon Governor’s Conference on Tourism at the Oregon Convention Center. More than 600 professionals gathered for the event to share ideas, while also discussing how to improve the quality of life, culture, diversity, ecosystem, and economy of communities across the state through these partnerships hosted by Travel Oregon and Portland.

It’s not every day that someone from one of the world’s most renowned travel publications puts you on one of their Top 25 lists. So it’s easy to understand why Geoff Babb, founder and co-inventor of AdvenChair, a Bend-based all-terrain wheelchair, was somewhat taken aback when he learned that a writer from Conde’ Nast Traveller spotlighted him last week.

All-terrain wheelchairs aren’t anything new, but a former forest firefighter has designed a chair that allows even more adults and children with spinal cord injury and disease (SCI/D) to go off-road, while promoting time with family and friends. The AdvenChair is a patented and convertible hiking wheelchair designed for people with higher levels of SCI/D or limited upper arm mobility, such as from a stroke.

This excursion marks the launch of wheelchair accessible tours—called AdvenTours -- the AdvenChair in association with Wanderlust Tours of Bend to places previously thought unreachable.

"I think it went really well," said Jared Garfield, Wanderlust Tours co-owner. "Our mission is to get people outside in whatever capacity they are ready for. We want to meet people where they are at."

What do you get when you combine AdvenChair, developer of the world’s most durable all-terrain wheelchair, with Wanderlust Tours, Central Oregon’s leader in naturalist-guided adventures? You get AdvenTours, a variety of accessible outings that allow people with mobility challenges to explore Central Oregon’s most iconic wild places with expert guidance. 

After a stroke in 2005 left Babb paralyzed with limited use of one hand, he became determined to return to his active lifestyle.

“Being outside was really important to me,” Babb said. “But I found out right away that the standard wheelchair wasn’t going to allow me to be outside the way I would like to be. So I started experimenting and modifying a standard chair.” With the help of his friend, a helicopter mechanic, he developed the AdvenChair 1.0. The prototype featured large tires, a detachable front wheel, handbrakes, and a harness designed to navigate steep terrain.In May 2022, Babb, and his team finally set out on the Bright Angel Trail, located at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. He and his AdvenChair made it the entire four-day, 20-mile trek – accessing nature previously out of reach.

"DREAM BOLDLY The Grand AdvenChair" is a documentary film by Outback Film that's making its debut Friday, March 22, 2024, evening at Central Oregon Community College in Bend, Oregon. The 48-minute documentary features the story of Bend adventurer, entrepreneur, and disability advocate Geoff Babb and the effort that led to the creation of the AdvenChair. KTVZ interviews Babb and Outback Film Director Marcia Volk a few days prior to the event.

This year once again, the resort and Sunriver Nature Center are hosting the 2023 Christmas Bird Count, a nationwide Audubon Society tradition dating back 124 years. The birding event is a citizen science activity where participants count as many of the birds as they can find in a local 15-mile diameter circle. The AdvenChair joined in the count.

Thank you Visit Central Oregon for including AdvenChair in the Central Oregon Makers series. We are proud to help make the beauty of the region accessible to those with mobility challenges

Growing up in White Salmon, Geoff Babb had always been a huge lover of nature and spending time outside. Between his work as a fire ecologist and his love for outdoor activities like skiing and backpacking, his active lifestyle had always been really important to him. Then, in November 2005, he had a stroke that changed everything. It could’ve killed him, and it almost did. It left him in a wheelchair, with only limited use of one of his hands. However, Babb wasn’t ready to give up the outdoors and all of the things he loved, despite the limitations of his chair.

In 1869, when John Wesley Powell led the first crew of explorers down the Colorado River into what is now known as the Grand Canyon, he had no idea what kind of destructive forces lay ahead. In fact, shortly after beginning the journey, one of their wooden boats overturned in a rock-filled cataract and almost instantly split apart into kindling, destroying a full third of the group’s provisions. It only got worse from there.

Similarly, when Geoff Babb took a team of adventurers down the Bright Angel Trail in 2016, attempting to reach the Colorado River in a modified human-powered wheelchair, he was not prepared for the destructive forces lay ahead either.

NewsChannel 21 has followed the progress of Bend inventor Geoff Babb's AdvenChair, an all-terrain wheelchair, over the years. Recently, on a second journey to Grand Canyon National Park, a new milestone was reached.

Bend stroke survivor Geoff Babb, inventor of the all-terrain wheelchair called the AdvenChair, recently was the first person to reach the summit of Smith Rock's Burma Road Trail by wheelchair. He soon plans a trip to reach the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

“Boldly going where no chair has gone before” is the mantra for AdvenChair, the all-terrain wheelchair designed to allow everyone to visit wild places not necessarily on graded trails. Geoff Babb, the local inventor of the AdvenChair, and his team use Smith Rock State Park as a proving ground for that premise, each time pushing the envelope to make the chair more resilient to hiking trail challenges. This time the goal was the Burma Road summit, with a total elevation gain of 1156 feet. They did the roughly 6-mile round trip in just over 3 hours, over gravelly steep hillsides, around boulders, and at times, very narrow trails.

On an unseasonably cold December afternoon in Southern California, most Angelenos have retreated to their homes. But at Miramar Park, a narrow strip of green space overlooking Torrance County Beach, Robert Kapen and his wife Nelly are out for an adventure.

Patrik Nabelek lives with muscular dystrophy, but he loves to get outside.

“There's one thing to look at kind of nature stuff from afar, but it's another to kind of get really get in there," Nabelek said. "And so, I hope a lot of other people will get the same opportunity I have had.”

Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) Producer Jule Gilfillan and videographer Kristen Henderson had their work cut out for them filming at Smith Rock State Park during the hottest July on record. For 24 days, the temperature exceeded 90 degrees. The filming for this part of the “Adventure Wheelchair” story on AdvenChair for the OPB show, Oregon Field Guide, had already been postponed once. Both the film crew and the AdvenChair team decided to go for it by getting an early start.

A year that started off with great hope and promise for AdvenChair, the all-terrain wheelchair, has done nothing but roll onward and upward to new heights. Or downward, as the trails may dictate.

VIDEO: It’s a wheelchair that resembles more of a mountain bike than a traditional wheelchair, and its purpose is to get people to beautiful outdoor areas that otherwise might prove impossible. The all-terrain AdvenChair is the brainchild of Bend local Geoff Babb.