Hey Dave ,there was a guy planning the California run but never produced.His site is www.pacifickayaker.com you should give his gear list a once over, he's a paddling machine according to his bio ,Good Luck

Missed a piece of code www.pacifickayaker.com/animals.htm go to kayak and it will promt you to gear

Mike,

Thanks for the link. I checked it out and it compares to mine
with a couple of exceptions.

Finalizing the lists and testing the setup for the last time. New line
goes on the rods tonight.

Dave

Damn Good Info in this Thread!
 

Good Luck!

Are you bringing wasabi and soy sauce? I'd love to see a school of YFT under my yak! I'm sure you will see them many times!

Looking forward to the reports.
BTW my spot (original product) works for 1 week plus in tracking mode with Energizer Lithium Batteries never shutting down. Great product!

James

I'm Driving down to East Cape for the first two weeks in October and if you are still down that way in search of a way back I could give you a ride........I think you're trip ends sometime in September but if there are any delays, the offer stands..

Safe travels and I hope you get into some epic fishing

Tom

Wow...good luck! I know your desire for adventure....I could only wish I could do something like that before getting too old (come on lottery!)

paratroops are always told: PPPPPP and KISS - Proper Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance and Keep it Simple Stupid. so that is my best advice, and again...good luck and I wish you a safe and fun journey!!!

Launching on Saturday
 

OK. Now's when it all comes together or all falls apart...

Launching from Shelter Island on Saturday around 5:00-5:30am.

I was hoping to leave today, but I had electrical problems to
work out. Got those solved, thanks to David at West Marine.

See you all in September.

Feel free to follow my progress at http://wavster.blogspot.com. There's
a link to my SPOT map, so people can see where I am.

Good Luck!!!

I can't imagine the anticipation you're experiencing right now....

Any pics of the what the yak looks like fully rigged??

Someone should show up and take pics of the big shove off, or better yet call the news and get some airtime for your sponsers.

:you_rock:

Dave your freaking crazy
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:you_rock::cheers1:

Good luck on your adventure
hope all goes well and you have an epic time

Via con Dios

Go Dave GO!:you_rock:

good luck and enjoy!!

good luck, dude. would join you in a ny min. if it was five years ago! you'll do good cause i know what u r capable of. you know if you need assist i'll help ya. saludos....

Anyone else tracking him? (I'm stuck at work....) According to spot, he is still sitting in Encinitas.

edit: I think he is only doing daily updates.

Have a safe voyage!

Vaya con dios!

Epic
 

Epic Adventure

Looking forward to reading your blog!

Did anyone get up early and see him off? Get any pics of his set up?

Here is a link to his most updated position. Looks like he is almost to ensenada already.

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/f...8KYilBfjU2OCcb

lol i wanna see a before and after shot of your arms. i bet they are gonna be huge when you get back

Looks like Salsipuedes for the evening....then Campo La Jolla.....then PST very cool leg and it just gets better!

Adventurous, indeed!
Take care, and good luck on your trip.

I just checked Daves GPS plot, he is inland and heading towards San Felipe?

Anyone know if his trip has changed to a Sea of Cortez paddle?

sure looks like.

Come to think of it, I don't recall he really specified he was going to paddle down the Pacific side of Baja, or maybe I just missed it?

Oh-Oh. This does not sound good. My first thoughts are stolen gear. Unless, of course, he decided to navigate the new Encinada to San Felipe Canal.

With all the planning he put into this, what are the chances that he would make such a huge detour. Does he check in by phone with someone from time to time? I sure hope so.

I was not one of the majority that thought this trip was a good idea. Hopefully there is a reasonable explanation and all is well.


Bob

Was thinking the same thing. I don't believe that he would change his plans last min.

Too much goes into trip planning, to do this.

Anyone have an update?

It can get pretty ugly fast down in that direction, not to mention some safety concerns.

If he is in trouble or needs something brought down Im southbound as soon as I can next week. He has my number but somebody PM me if he has lost it and needs something.

Frank
The Beach Cam lurker :cheers1:

As far as I knew the plan was down the Pacific side..

Dont have one myself but....
I'm pretty sure you have to push the OK button to get the OK message(its not automatic) and there is an SOS button on the SPOT messenger also.....
Not 100%....but he should be ok. Hopefully rerouted for a good reason

there has been a lot of south swell and hopefully he is heading to the Cortez side for a easier route:rolleyes: Anyone know if he was carrying a satellite phone? I would imagine his family and close friends are aware of his change in plans.

wow looks like he is about 50 miles south of san felipe checking in at 10 p.m. does not sound right to me! But i hope everything is ok...

:hmmmm: booming south swell must have been tuff on the paddle and landings. Hope he hitched a ride to the gulf side....

I imagine that when he cleared the point at Punta Banda he ran into some serious rough water with the current south swell. Position seven is in the cove where he'd of taken shelter if that was the case and there is a road out of there he could of used to head across to the Gulf side. Position eight he's on that road just East of Colonial Lazaro Cardenas, and by position nine he's at little cove about five miles south of Puertacitos.
http://www.griptwister.com/bajapics/Puertecitos.jpg

Puretocitos would be a logical place to launch if he switched sides, and the cove would be a good place to stop if he launched there and did not have full day to paddle.

I'd say he's back paddling again by the looks of things.

I hope he realizes what he's now got himself into. The weather on the Pacific side is mild like ours. Weather on the Gulf side is much hotter, with daily temperatures over 100 degrees.

Water is going to be the biggest issue. He's going to need at least twice the drinking water, roughly a minimum of a Gallon a day of clean drinking water. There are some stretches on that side where water is going to be hard to come by, and carrying multiple gallons of water is going to slow him down. I wouldn't want to paddle that trip without a water maker.

The other issue is wind. Though generally calmer he now runs the risk of getting hit by chubascos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtXs1gB2yrs

Personally I wouldn't try that trip on that side this time of year. I think he just set himself up with a much harder trip to get away from some swell.

On the bright side fishing should be fantastic. He's already in Pargo city, and once past Mulege..

http://blogs.sun.com/katysblog/resou...lighthouse.jpg

It should be wall to wall Dorado, Yellowfin, sails and even Marlin. He's going to see some of the best areas to fish in Mexico if he makes it down OK.

Jim

How does the spot track work? Do you have to push a button to report your position or is it more like an epirb that reports your position automatically? If its something that you have to do manually to report your position, you can pretty much rule out theft. I'm fairly certain that the thieves are not going to think its a good idea to report their position to the world. But if its an automatic thing, different story.

My (optimistic) guess is that things got a bit rough, he figured that he'd cross and try his luck in the gulf. If things don't work out, he's obviously planned to be off work until September, might as well drive it and fish the hell out of baja!

I'm sure Dave is doing fine ..... If he was in any danger he would of not checked in with the Spot messenger .....he would of clicked the Help button.

http://www.findmespot.com/en/index.php?cid=102

Ive personally witnessed Dave doing many, many, many things that he shouldn't and he seems to keep proving the theories of Darwin wrong!!!:sifone:

I'm surprised he made it past Ensenada Bay. Disappointed he didn't get to SQ.,good fish right now. If its the weather that changed his plan,just think what Guerrero Negro (Turtle Bay) weather is like now:eek:. I have called him and left texts many times in the past 24 hrs. but no response. He must be mad at me.:rolleyes:. At least he seems to be making progress south...whether by land or sea you can't go wrong..

He just checked in At
5:15:36 PM.
Hope he's got some fish :reel: by now :)

Well, that confirms it. He made it across Baja and re-entered sea of cortez. Good luck on the next leg, it will be lots more doable without all the huge surf and wind in your face...

I'd rather take the chop and swells, at least the water is cold...
San Felipe in July, guess it's not as bad as it is in August, hoping for him it's not too hot and he's got plenty of agua.
Treacherous tide drops...

What an adventurer though, willing to adapt and adjust to do whatever it takes to reach the destiny.

I've been thinking alot about Dave. I'll never forget
how hard he fought to figure out La Jolla. He must of
put in thousands of posts before he caught his first fish.
And all the while getting negative pm's from people who
thought he was fishing too much.

Dave will figure it all out. Hell, not only will he catch fish,
but I'm sure there will be a Mexican Bride in every bay
he stays in.

Keep going Dave, our thoughts and prayers are with you.

I have a spot and here is how it works. Depending on the subscription you have it can track automaticly every 10 minutes as well as whenever you press the ok button. It appears that he did not opt for the auto tracking or just is not activating it and each point marked he is doing manually pressing the OK button.

There are 5 buttons on the spot that will mark your GPS point, one is a tracking option that reports your position every 10 minutes, One is the OK button that is what Dave appears to be using and send your position when pressed, Another that is a custom message (Wooo Hooo fish on, Bull Elk down! Whatever you pre-program), Another that is a help button that is also a custom message button that is requesting assistance from specific pre-determined people, and the last one is the SOS button that is for serious emergiencies.

Appears to me he has just had a change of plans and all is ok so far. Crossing over land like he did he would have had access to phones and should have in my opinion had someone post here as to what has happened since he has set it up for so many people to follow his trek.