>Suspect you're right, Jerry. On the other end of the spectrum >is a place like Monterey Bay Kayaks --- the best instruction >available, great boats, great people, but you have to be able >to convince them that you really know what you're doing before >they'll let you take out demo or rental boats if you haven't >first taken one of their very comprehensive courses in >technique and self rescue. Once they've accepted you and >believe that you know what you're doing, what a great time >you can have there! Incredibly beautiful paddling! I haven't rented there but I was at their shop this morning. Believe it or not, on weekdays they will allow you to park in their lot and use their piece of gorgeous beach for launching and exit. Then after your finished paddling you can use their wash down racks and changing rooms. It's simple good business, as they aren't busy on weekdays, and the odds are good they'll sell you something sooner or later, but how many places are so friendly and supportive. Every 4th Saturday they have Demo day where they say you can test any boat they have in stock. I haven't tried this yet, but I'm looking forward to testing it. Today the bay was smooth as glass, literally, everything was reflected. Temperature was about 75 deg. at 10:30AM and 80 at 2PM. No breeze until after I left at 2:30. It was comfortable while you were paddling but when I stopped I started to steam and my glasses fogged up. Really terrible paddling weather, I had to jump out of the boat a couple of times to cool off. :-) I counted a half dozen sea otter, an equal number of dolphins, tho' I didn't get very close to the latter, loads of sea lions, harbor seals, pelicans, loons, the ubiquitous sea gulls, and other birds. I also counted about a dozen kayaks scattered over the area between MBK and the Monterrey Bay Aquarium area. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Dave Flory, San Jose, CA. dflory_at_earthlink.net -------------------------------------------------------------------- Speak softly and study Aikido, then you won't need a big stick. -------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Thu Oct 14 1999 - 18:09:58 PDT
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