For our descent of the Jordan River from its source to the Dead Sea, we have assembled an alliance of expert river runners and a media crew, as well as in-country environmental experts to guide us through the history and issues of this legendary land.

Jim Slade is one of the world's foremost adventure travel guides, having led trips on all seven continents. He is best known as a river guide, with over 70,000 river miles to his credit. He has participated in numerous first descents, including the Zambezi, Indus, Watut, Blue Nile and Yarkand. He has guided on the Colorado through Grand Canyon, the Bio-Bio (Chile), and the Tatshenshini and Alsek (Canada/Alaska) more than 50 times each. In 2000, he was selected by Paddler Magazine as one of its "Paddlers of the Century."

Our correspondent is Richard Bangs, one of today's leading adventurers, an international river explorer, Web pioneer and award-winning author. His online travels began in 1995 for the adventure travel company he helped create, Mountain Travel Sobek, and have since taken him to many foreign companies for a variety of high-tech publishers. For more, read About Richard Bangs.

In the field, producer and photographer Didrik Johnck is a renaissance man of Internet media, who has taken photos at the summit of Everest, shot video from the slopes of Annapurna, and dived with the Moken sea gypsies, among other adventures. John Canning, our intrepid photographer, is again on hand to focus on the action with his digital camera. Rich, John and Didrik most recently worked together on Expedition Rwanda, the preceding adventure from Richard Bangs Adventures.

Back on the home front, Julia Romano is our coordinator and audio editor, drawing upon her two-plus years at National Public Radio. Jon Brick is our video producer, overseeing technical aspects of the many video elements on the site. And Christian Kallen is our creative director and lead producer, a producer of live Internet programs for over a decade and a colleague of Richard Bangs for almost 25 years.