End of the line - a hot but comfortable five miles out...
... a bit of effort with reward...
... big sky water summit of the ridge - a photogenic spot
All down river from there...
... all a few days back - lots of wildlife - flocks of merganser and wood ducks, deer, osprey, squirrel, crows, swifts, water snakes, hawks, turkey vultures, two beaver kits that sat along the river bank barkin' at Zman while photographing them - and somethin' black and unidentified that ran across ahead of the trail on the hike in...
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First became aware of Stand Up Paddleboarding (SUP) during a 2010 trip out to California's Huntington and Malibu beaches...
... watchin' this guy right here from the deck of Huntington Beach pier - he was rippin' on that thing, too. Thought that was pretty interesting - he was the only guy in the surf riding one...
Next day we were up the coast at Malibu's Surfrider Beach - saw a few more boards. Many of the folks were out beyond the breaks paddlin' around in the open ocean - most long distance. Forward thinking as usual - immediately the light bulb went on - "Boy, those things look like they'd be a lot of fun on long flatwater stretches of river or lakes back in PA - and a good workout ta' boot!"
A week later got back to PA and immediately looked in to where ya' purchase and what would be a good board for the river. No inflatable boards back then. The few we found were all soft top/ hard foam boards for paddling ocean waves. A bit sketchy for our intent ("Bet those hard foam boards ding pretty easy") - no big rocks or shallow rocky bottoms (usually) at the coastline shore breaks . One company, Surftech, made a 12'-1" soft top/hard foam board advertised as designed by big wave surfer and at the time the sports premiere practitioner, Laird Hamilton (would like to know what he got paid per board for havin' his name on 'em) and shaped by master craftsman Ron House. Can't beat that duo, we guessed. On top of that, REI peddled the brand and would ship 'em direct to store for pickup. Conveniently, they'd recently opened a store in SWPA. We called the store direct to place an order and spent probably twenty minutes on the phone with a sales person trying to explain what we were talking about. Luckily they had an item number on their website so was eventually able to communicate with the guy. Can't fault him, though. Not one person to whom we had tried to describe the activity had a clue as to what we were talking about ("What the f*k are you doin' now?... a surfboard ya' paddle on the river??!). Got some unusual looks.
As suspected, the foam boards (eventually picked up a second) did ding (dent) a bit easily so we took it easy on 'em, limiting their use to forgiving stretches of river. After a few seasons, and as the activity became more popular, inflatable boards - synthetic elastomer coated tight stitched polyester fabric similar to a rubber raft - more suitable for river "running" and distance touring became available. That's all we use on the river nowadays - they take a pretty good beating. The foam boards are still the preference for the lake - they're pretty fast.
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Again back in 2010 - we visited a usual paddling spot to shoot a bit of photography and video footage to test out a then recent GoPro camera and several camera mounts. The footage wasn't bad so we edited together a short for fun:
SUP (2010)
Run time 7min (approx.)
A couple DSLR images we probably posted previously herein:
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