Kayaking in California

[Rygate]

Hi All

Am doing a road trip from LA to San Fran up Route 1, and want to do some lake kayaking whilst en route. After scenery rather than touristy stuff. Know about Bass Lake and Big Bear, so wondered if there were any others. Will need to be able to rent the kayak etc. Also, some reasonable whitewater rafting places would be nice to know of.
Will be visiting Yosemite as well, so am trying to keep as near as I can to this route.
Thanks.

[roadie]

Along Hwy 1, there's no white water kayaking, but there is sea kayaking.

If you stop in Monterey, you could kayak Monterey Bay.

You can rent from Monterey Bay Kayaks:
http://www.montereybaykayaks.com/
They rent some very nice kayaks.

In Monterey Bay, you'll see many seals and likely see sea otters. There
are some legal limits on how close you can get to them though.

The Bay has some swells, but nothing like white water.

Another area you could sea kayak is Elkhorn Slough, just north of
Monterey. It's all calm water in the slough. Montery Bay Kayaks has
a rental shop near Elkhorn Slough.

Have fun.

[Mark Sedenquist]

Am doing a road trip from LA to San Fran up Route 1, and want to do some lake kayaking whilst en route.

Oops I missed the work "lake" when I started this thread -- but what I started to mention was the class III to Class V+ white water runs on the Kern River near Lake Isabella (of course, this isn't very close to route 1).

Mark

[Mark Sedenquist]

Another area you could sea kayak is Elkhorn Slough, just north of Monterey. It's all calm water in the slough. Montery Bay Kayaks has
a rental shop near Elkhorn Slough.

This is a very cool place -- especially in the early dawn!

[roadie]

I've never kayak'd in Morro Bay, that's another possibility. The water
should be pretty calm, it's protected by a sand spit.

[Rygate]

Thanks for the updates to date. Hadn't considered sea kayaking as not very experienced at at, so was looking for somewhere tranquil. Have to say Monterey Bay looks pretty cool though.