Poor Man's Catalina
To those of you who paddle & I stay in touch with to trade
stories I am sharing with you a unique paddle experience I had the last two days.
Only a few have ever paddled to Catalina Island off the coast of California, lots
have paddled from Catalina to the CA coast ( Catalina Classic), only one I know
of (maybe more) have paddled solo with out escort across the San Pedro Channel.
On Friday my wife dropped me off at Abalone Cove in Rancho Palos Verde's at 5:30
Am (under protest), with a rare clear day I was able to paddle 5 hours and 44
minutes to Whites Beach (3 miles from Avalon) . I was 10 miles off my original
destination of The Isthmus. The compass I used was either affected by the metal
bottle holder I had or I had pursued the wrong heading of degree. I only used
my GPS for speed. I had many Great White Shark or White whales siteing below and
above water, once I even got my little pocket knife out because an above surface
fin was within about 14 yards. His fin was as big as my arm and he was swimming
aimlessly, I paddled about 50 yards wide of him, trying to figure out if I should
get my knife out or my camera, I chose knife.
At about 3 hours into my paddle I had stopped to eat some sandwiches and was laying
on my board enjoying the glass and cobalt blue water, I was amazed how far in
the water I could see, What looked like a rock bottom until I realized it was
moving and had Barnacles --- turned out to be several moving objects, I don't
know I was spooked enough to just eat on the run and not make haste.
The depth in mid channel is thousands of feet deep. I did look again to make sure
I was not imaging things and sure enough there was a lot of animals underneath
me at least 20-30 feet below . The water was crystal. Earlier in the paddle I
had two touches of animals, once my hand touched something and another something
came by and hit my fin, most likely a seal playing with me.
At any event I landed at White Beach ( 10 miles off my course) close to 6
hours after starting. I thought I paddled into Isthmus, a young lady said
this was a private cove and no food or phone was available, through her
generosity and and of her family from New Port Beach fed me and allowed me
to nap on their boat . The beach I paddled in on had no phone and no food ,
so this was a find. They boated me down to Avalon around 4 PM which is the
far side of Catalina.
To make a long story short, my plan was to sleep on the beach "OLD California"
style, the cold drove me into a local hotel lobby at about 2 AM whereby I commandeered
the couch, when the Inn Keeper asked If I was a guest I said I was fighting with
my wife and she had thrown me out of the room. He gave me a pillow and a blanket.
(Yes I do still have that Irish luck!) I spent what money I brought (42$) on a
pair of flip flops and the rest went for $2 dollar beers after preserving a paid
in advance cheeseburger for breakfast)
I hitched a ride up the coast with some fishermen the next early AM because I
had never intended for my paddle back to be 28 + miles, I was dropped somewhere
in the vicinity of Isle of Isthmus off the coast for a water start . This paddling
day (Saturday Aug 25) had relatively zero visibly because of the marine layer,
I saw no animals other than some leaping seals. I did break through after paddling
four hours off the coast of Palos Verde's around 11 AM at the light house, paddled
and maneuvered around a lot of sea kelp, (paddled very slowly ). I was worn out
from not sleeping the night before, finely I paddled past Haggerty's, R-10, Old
Mans (surf breaks) and into Torrance beach at 12:07PM, My wife was waiting. I
was an hour off my timed landing, someone on the beach asked me if was just down
at the light house (about 8-9 miles away) I said yup, they commented what a long
paddle that was, I smiled and said I had come from Avalon (not really , more like
Isthmus).
Any way, Today is the Catalina Classic, where by about 70-80 guys will sprint
32 miles in 6-7 hours to Manhattan pier from Catalina. It's a great run , but
nothing like a pleasure paddle across the channel, solo, no radio, just the bare
minimum. Thus is what I call a Poor Mans Catalina. I 'll send some pic's when
I get them developed. I have slept 16 hours straight since returning , The only
advice I can give on doing some thing like this is too plan better for sleeping
because if you miss a full nights rest you just don't feel like doing anything,
even if it is finding peace in the middle of a fog dream 10 mile off the any coast.
This was done to dig deeper into the California mystic of the sport, This is what
Gene Tarzan Smith probably would of liked, so I did it.
Michael O'Shaughnessy
Submitted on August 26, 2001