Sea kayaking research page

As I pedal, and the SUVs and deisel trucks rumble by, I can't help but think there must be a better way... I mean to look into travel by small boat more. For now, here's an article to help us start thinking in the water-nomadism direction. Please let me know if you find other useful information.

 

There is a book on long-distance kayak travel I should get ahold of.

The library is closing, so: be sure to check out :

http://www.caske2000.org/caske.htm

http://www.seekayak.com/Publications/

http://www.seekayak.com/Reference_Resources/Trips/

Sea Kayaking: A Manual for Long-Distance Touring by john dowd

and more- will revise later

 

 

Ed Gillet kayaked from Monterey, CA (where I kept going to live) to Maui, Hawaii in 63 days.

 

 

"I was immediate-ly captivated by the simplicity of my new sport. Sitting in that silent, slender hunting craft with 5,000 years of history behind it, moving forward was as natural as breathing. After a few days travel in my kayak, I was so closely attuned to the sea's rhythms and my own paddling cadence that I felt as though I could go on paddling forever. Wrenched out of the 20th century, I found myself in a simpler world. A world where hungry hunters with a single purpose moved along a dark coast searching for food, and prehistoric explorers endured months of hardship to satisfy their curiosity. I might have been part of an ancient migration. I didn't know how or where my journey would end and I didn't care. As long as I kept moving forward, I was satisfied. "

 

"Kayaks can travel long distances with little effort. In that respect, paddling is like cycling. But on the ocean you are free to go wherever you want. There are no trails or roads, and in most places you might care to paddle, there is no traffic. "

 

"Instead of spending about $100,000 on a boat, slip and mainte-nance to visit a few new harbors, I realized that I could take my relatively inexpensive kayak anywhere you can drive, fly, sail or paddle, and explore places most yachtspeople see only through their binoculars."

 

"Competent paddlers "wear" their boats, they do not "ride" them."

 

"Contemporary kayakers, I believe, are merely following in the wake of early paddlers who understood more than we do about the harmony of self-propelled travel. Sea kayaks can take us to some of the best parts of this watery earth. And they can take us along avenues to freedom, self-sufficiency, and accom-plishment. I don't sail much anymore, but I plan on paddling kayaks for a long time."

 

 

and a yearlong, 4,500-mile paddle up the west coast of South America in 1984.

 

"This might sound crazy, but I understand that every place on the planet has its own spirit. On the ocean the markers are subtler but they are there nonetheless."

 

"I used a sextant and a navigation calculator to work the trig solutions to my sun sights. I took sights in the morning and afternoons to fix my longitude, a sight around noon to get latitude."

 

I'm currently (2003-09-16-1258 Tuesday Sewanee, TN) imagining a migratory route: start in New Orleans, paddle around FL up the atlantic coast, to the roanoake river source- portage 30 mi to the New River, float to the Ohio, and back down the Mississippi.