Gazarian paddles through sea caves on her circumnavigation of Ireland. | Image courtesy Ariel Gazarian.
On day 107 of her circumnavigation of Ireland by sea kayak, Ariel Gazarian capsized off the Irish Coast. Then, she stood back up, shook it off and finished her journey completing her circumnavigation on November 10, 2024.
“You are so vulnerable when the whole Atlantic Ocean is there next to you. You are this tiny little thing, and the whole sea is next to you, these massive cliffs, there’s nowhere to land… it’s both really humbling and really empowering,” Gazarian shared.
Circumnavigating the island of Ireland by sea kayak
A circumnavigation of Ireland can be anywhere from 900-1,300 miles depending on how many bays and coves a paddler tucks into, a marine distance phenomenon known as the coastline paradox.
Jon Hynes completed the circumnavigation 2015 and created a film about the journey that went on to win Reel Paddling Film Festival Best Sea Kayaking Film of 2017. The same film became the inspiration point for Gazarian’s own circumnavigation and Hynes himself became a mentor.
“I just didn’t stop thinking about it for so long,” shared Gazarian.
Off water, Gazarian studies with and learns from local paddlers and mentors. | Image courtesy Ariel Gazarian
Gazarian came to the Irish coast armed with several years of experience as a sea kayaking guide in the San Juan Islands, Washington. Before heading out, she spent countless hours playing in tidal rips practicing a variety of self-rescues, or ways to get back into her kayak in rough conditions in the event of capsize.
She borrowed a Rockpool Taran 18 from Steve Smith in Ireland, another mentor pivotal to Gazarian’s trip.
“We say a circumnav here is a little like a game of chess sometimes, because you have to look at the forecast, look at what window you have,” explained Gazarian.
On June 17, Gazarian began her journey leaving from Bullock Harbour, Dublin.
Camping on a beach along the Irish Coast. | Image courtesy Ariel Gazarian
I had a wonderful rest this morning with the crashing waves and beautiful heat of the sun to wake me. I zipped open my tent and saw the most beautiful white sand and morning light glimmering within the blue crest of crashing waves. In this lighting of the sea, you can also see the silhouettes of seals swimming close to shore.Day 44, Ariel Gazarian’s expedition blog
Gazarian went on to paddle remote Irish caves and camp on sandy beaches. On July 8, she met up with Jon Hynes to paddle Old Head of Kinsale. Gazarian paddled under the Cliffs of Moher on a sunny day with dynamic seas, joined by paddlers from County Clare. Crossing Donegal Bay, she was joined by a pod of nearly 30 dolphins.
Gazarian paddles through massive sea caves off the Irish Coast. | Image courtesy Ariel Gazarian
There were two big arches to go through and the sunset glow was shining bright through them, beaming towards me. What an incredible sight. The bigger one had a sea stack behind it, so it just made for a stunning view all together. Today was totally a day of – this is why I wanted to paddle around Ireland! Ah just amazing. Once I had floated and taken a happy selfie, I started my flat calm sunset crossing to Inishkeel Island. It was just wonderful. Day 99, Ariel Gazarian’s expedition blog.
As locals consistently joked with Gazarian, summer of 2024 turned out to be the windiest summer on record since 1982 on the Irish Coast. Still, Gazarian punched through surf and swell, through sea caves and around headlands with a smile on her face.
Beyond sunshine and sea caves, Gazarian worked through sciatica, shoulder pain, tick bites, and a cyst rupture. Her journey totaled 123 days with 68 days on the water due to weather, particularly near the end of the trip, and wear and tear on her body.
On day 107, September 26, after three full months of successful paddling, Gazarian began to round Dowpatrick Head.
Past Ballycastle and well offshore, Gazarian initially planned to paddle eight more miles that day, but something shifted.
“Sometimes I get this sixth sense when I’m out there, like I should not be out here, and I need to find an exit plan,” Gazarian said.
A map of Gazarian’s circumnavigation of Ireland as told by challenges along the way. | Image courtesy of Ariel Gazarian
So Gazarian turned back to head for the bay rather than continue on, sensing that the sea was going to build. She did her best to maintain a distance of about a quarter mile off shore, but where before the wind was at her back, it was now at her face and from offshore, pushing her towards the cliffs.
Gazarian noted that waves were breaking a little farther offshore than usual, but not necessarily alarmingly so. Everything seemed normal; that’s when she saw the first wave. Gazarian realized she was “caught in between the boomers on shore and a massive set of off shore ‘freak wave’ boomers on a different reef with nowhere to go,” she wrote in a blog post about the event.
“I see this image in my head of these waves sucking me down and coming up, that feeling of the height of this wave is impossible… this is not supposed to happen. I couldn’t do anything about it, it was too late.”
In all of her years of experience and practice, Gazarian had never truly capsized outside of a controlled practice environment before. She had spent months with local paddlers marking down the areas with boomer waves and trouble spots; this hadn’t been one of them.
On day 107 of her Ireland circumnavigation, Gazarian was pulled under and ripped out of her boat by the force of a wave.
“The whole barrel of the wave, trough to crest, rose to about 15 feet before hitting me,” Gazarian explained. “I was pushed fast in the circulation of the wave, tumbled under in the surf like a washing machine and was ripped out of my boat, no chance to roll.”
From here, Gazarian did her best to hold her boat while a set of large boomer waves tumbled her further in towards a reef and breaking surf—a reef that had only barely been noted on her chart.
Later, Gazarian would find from locals that the nearby reef has a name in reputation— the name in Irish translates to “the rising serpent.”
What happens after a bad capsize on the open coast
By the time Gazarian was out of the pounding boomers and in a position to try and reenter her boat between sets, she’d already been exhausted from holding on to her boat and being worked by the Rising Serpent for several minutes.
She was on her sixth or seventh self-rescue attempt when another large wave came and ripped her boat from her.
“I briefly thought I was going to drown because I had so much water in my system after the first couple. I was watching my boat get surfed toward the rocks,” Gazarian said.
Thankfully, soon after that Gazarian was out of the cliff section and had drifted toward somewhat friendlier rock features. Eventually, she made her way back to her boat and slowly made her way toward some flat rocks nearby.
“You know in the movies where there’s a plane crash, and they get washed up on a beach? And they’re like, flat on the sand? I know what that’s like,” Gazarian said.
Her spray deck had been turned completely backwards, but there was no serious damage to either her or the boat.
Despite fears and self-doubt, Gazarian continues and completes her circumnavigation.
And so Gazarian got up off the sand. She paced around on the rocks and collected herself. She texted her friend Donal for help, and Gazarian took the next day off to regroup.
Just one day though— Gazarian got back on the water the day following despite fears and doubts.
Gazarian paddles through sea caves on her circumnavigation of Ireland. | Image courtesy Ariel Gazarian
“The days after that were really hard. I just felt so different. I felt like I was just a different paddler,” Gazarian said.
Looking back, one thing Gazarian has considered extensively was whether or not she should’ve clipped on her short tow, tethering herself to the boat. She weighed whether being tethered to her boat was safer, or if adding an extra rope in conditions like that was just something for her to get tangled in, ultimately adding more risk.
“I think about it all over and over and it just feels like a miracle that I had no wrist injuries, no holes in the boat, coughed up all the water, made it to a flat place on shore near a road, got all my stuff back, and that Donal was there,” Gazarian wrote in a blog post about the event. “It turned out as the best-case scenario, really.”
After the incident, Gazarian went back to tackle the section of the capsize west of Downpatrick Head to close the loop.
“Finally, after weeks of high wind and swell storms, and waves of 20+ feet, a high pressure has come through, and I was able to finish that section of North Mayo that felt so important to do,” Gazarian wrote on Instagram on November 7. “I paddled out and around the reef that I capsized over and just felt so much relief and accomplishment to do it confidently and after the 25 miles of gorgeous cliffs, sea stacks, and the Stags of Broadhaven.”
“Going around it, I was on edge, but I think of risk management a little bit differently now,” Gazarian explained. “I separate things into ‘this is a normal amount of swell, this is not that surge that I saw coming towards me. This one freak thing that I saw… that was abnormal.’ I feel a lot better after doing it now.”
The wave was outside of her control: Gazarian decided to focus on what was within her control.
Overall, Gazarian paddled with dolphins and camped on beaches, made friends and experienced some of the wildest coast the Atlantic has to offer. She had sun blisters and shoulder pain, had a cyst rupture, and capsized and kept going anyway, even when she doubted herself, even when she was scared.
On November 10, Gazarian paddled into Bullock Harbor in Dublin, the same place she had left months before, greeted with a bouquet of flowers, a pint of Guinness, and a crowd of her friends and mentors who helped her along the way, all there to cheer her back home.
Read Ariel Gazarian’s blog posts from the trip here.
The Klepper Aerius 545 is speedy and stable, and it won’t lose its composure in high seas. | Feature photo: Colin Field
With the possible exceptionof orchestral instruments, few products have changed as little as the Klepper kayak since the design was first produced by master tailor Johann Klepper in 1907. The Klepper Faltbootwerft GmbH company, established in 1919, was synonymous with kayaking until composite and plastic kayaks took over after the Second World War. Kleppers swept the folding kayak events at the 1936 Olympics, won every whitewater slalom world championship until 1961, and have floated a large share of the all-time great sea kayak expeditions, including the first two Atlantic crossings by kayak—Franz Romer’s in 1928 and Hannes Lindemann’s in 1956.
Klepper’s expedition capability is incontestable. But I wondered about its relevance to the modern kayaker, such as a suburban dad with a vastly expanded array of kayak models to choose from. The Klepper Aerius is still being produced essentially unchanged since its introduction in 1954—a cotton canvas hull and wooden frame constructed with American white ash and Finnish birch—at a cost that makes it one of the dearest kayaks on the market. How does it measure up?
Enthralled by Klepper’s venerable reputation and its comparisons to being the Mercedes-Benz of folding kayaks, I leapt at the chance to test the Aerius 545 and find out.
Klepper’s legendary expedition model still goes the distance
The Aerius is the company’s longest model and can be rigged for either solo or tandem paddling. Mine arrived in three green canvas bags that maxed out the cargo space of my midsized SUV. The longest and heaviest bag contained the frame pieces and can also hold the optional two-piece paddles. A second bag held the folded skin of rubberized canvas. An assortment of seats and backrests loosely filled the third, smallest bag. In total, 29 separate components fill the bags.
I arrived at a beachside parking lot at the appointed time to meet the photographer for this review and began by dumping the frame bag to unleash a clatter of clear-varnished plywood frame parts. I’d prepared by watching the video of a man named Geord Binder assembling a Klepper in under four minutes. To the chagrin of my photographer, my first attempt took about 20 times longer, punctuated with repeated consultations with the Klepper instructional video and several conversations with curious passersby. Klepper construction is one part craftsmanship and one part public relations exercise, as you will inevitably be pressed to acknowledge various obtuse statements such as, “So, you’re going to put that thing together and paddle it?” Or, if my wife happens to be in the vicinity, the more existential question, “What’s the point?”
The Klepper frame consists of longitudinal pieces connected by hinges that open to form either the bow or stern sections, color-coded and labeled in German, English and French (heck – stern – arriere). Numbered cross-sectional pieces snap onto the long pieces, shaping them into something resembling two halves of a biplane or the museum skeleton of a prehistoric fish. You jam these into the boat skin unfurled from the second bag and lever them together in the center to tension the whole frame into the skin.
And you may ask yourself, “How do I assemble this?” / And you may ask yourself, “Where is that instruction manual?” / And you may tell yourself, “This is not my relaxing vacation.” / And you may tell yourself, “This is not Tim’s wife’s idea of fun.” | Photo: Colin Field
The Klepper’s frame is constructed of two halves. These are assembled individually and then inserted into the bow and stern of the hull, levering together to create tension in the kayak’s skin. | Photo: Colin Field
Convert between solo and tandem configurations by adding or removing an adjustable molded foam seat and backrest. Klepper sells spraydecks separately to suit both configurations, as well as a range of other accessories, including sails, rudders, rod holders, folding trolleys and more. | Photo: Colin Field
Finishing touches include crafting the cockpit coaming, a wishbone-shaped piece of wood connected by a hinge at the bow end; inflating the air sponsons in the sides of the hull; and diving into the third bag for backrests and seats, which clip into metal rails on the plywood floor to slide fore and aft, and can be repositioned for paddling either tandem or solo.
I was on the water in 90 minutes. After some practice, assembling the 545 can be done in 20 to 30 minutes—about half the time if you have help—or double if you’re adding a sailing rig.
With its open cockpit, the Aerius felt like a hybrid of a kayak and a canoe. The high coaming makes for a very secure, cocooned feel and a dry ride, even without the spraydeck, which like rudders, sails, carrying bags, paddles and all other accessories, is sold separately. Reaching over the coaming can be a bit awkward, but optional plastic risers can be added to raise the seats by up to three and a half inches.
Klepper Aerius 545 on the water
I have heard folding kayaks are superior in heavy seas because they flex to absorb the force of the waves. On this day, there was a low swell. The frame did flex a bit; it was hard to tell if this was a boon, but the craft seemed to say, “I have crossed the Atlantic; this is nothing.” Kleppers have descended the Colorado River and the Amazon, the Upper Nile and the Danube, tackled the North Pole and rounded Cape Horn no fewer than three times. I wouldn’t dare question their rough-water chops.
I can comment on agility, however. At just under 18 feet long and 34 inches wide, the 545 is a Westfalia Vanagon of the Seas, more tuned to compact, long-haul versatility than raw performance. There is more than ample space for gear in the hollow bow and stern, and along the hull’s sides. It’s incredibly stable and unresponsive to tilting. It felt stereotypically German: stolid and determined. I could see spending some weeks paddling in a straight line. Or sailing all day in an eight-knot breeze to an island where I would produce a picnic with whole place settings out of a wicker basket, while my heart’s true love read a novel in the bow and I languorously dragged my fingers in the warm water and time stood still.
The Klepper Aerius 545 is speedy and stable, and it won’t lose its composure in high seas. | Feature photo: Colin Field
Back home, I spread the disassembled Klepper in my basement to vacuum the sand out of the skin and dry it out for long-term storage. It lay there like the broken pieces of some da Vinci flying contraption or a mythic free-ranging animal I would soon have to set free.
I decided Kleppering may be its own sport, existing in its own distinct dimension—not quite kayaking, not quite canoeing, not quite sailing, but some combination of all three, suited for people in unique possession of time and resources. There are certain inarguable advantages. Key among them are portability, longevity and versatility. The Klepper is, of course, ideal for any destination to which you need to fly, if you don’t mind checking three bags.
It’s also infinitely more repairable and long-lasting than almost any other type of watercraft. Klepper supplies replacement parts for every component, even for its discontinued models. Skins are said to last 30 years or more and can be fully replaced for about half the cost of a new kayak for just about every Klepper edition dating back to 1926.
Perhaps the greatest selling point of the Klepper is its ability to convert into a sailboat fully capable of upwind sailing in light to moderate winds. I was sad not to have been able to test the S2 sail kit, which includes a mainsail and a foresail totaling 54 square feet, for an extra $1,647.
Someday, I may take up Kleppering. For now, when most of my paddling trips are shorter than the time it would take to assemble one of these floating works of virtuosity and pack it up again, I’m sorry the Klepper and I must part ways. I take solace in the fact that, if the last 100 years are any indication, when I’m ready to mount an expedition to the South Seas or retire and take up kayak sailing, there will still be a Klepper waiting for me.
This article was first published in Issue 72 of Paddling Magazine. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions, or browse the archives.
The Klepper Aerius 545 is speedy and stable, and it won’t lose its composure in high seas. | Feature photo: Colin Field
On August 12, 2024, 45-year old Ryan Borgwardt left home with his kayak to go fishing; he never returned home. Search teams found his capsized kayak and a life jacket floating in Green Lake, a large lake in Wisconsin with a maximum depth over 200 ft.
Borgwardt’s van and trailer were also found parked by a nearby boat launch. A few days later his fishing rod, tackle box, keys, and wallet were also recovered.
The search for a missing kayaker in Green Lake, Wisconsin
Search and recovery efforts began as the case of the missing Wisconsin kayaker was immediately considered a likely drowning. Meanwhile, Borgwardt’s wife and three children mourned the loss of their husband and father.
The search included the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, The Green Lake County Sheriffs Department, and Bruce’s Legacy, a nonprofit dedicated to the search and recovery of drowning victims able to lend valuable expertise and sonar equipment to help locate victims.
They soured the lake every day for several weeks until August 24, at which point they brought in three cadaver dogs and an experienced dive time according to a statement by Sheriff Mark Podoll.
The search continued through the summer but by the end of September there was still no trace of Borgwardt.
Keith Cormican, founder of Bruce’s Legacy, went to Green Lake County Sheriff Mark Podoll on October 4.
“Sir, I’ve done a lot of searches and I can’t find him,” Cormican explained. Cormican wasn’t ready to give up; he requested additional sonar technology to continue in his search of the lake for Borgwardt.
It was around this time that Sheriff Podoll began to suspect something was amiss. On October 7, he gathered his crew, suggesting it was time they considered other possibilities. Shortly thereafter, they found records showing his passport was checked by Canadian authorities the day after his disappearance.
From search to investigation
From here, investigators analyzed Borgwardt’s laptop and found questions about moving funds to foreign banks, a life insurance policy for $370,00 purchased in January 2024, and a history of messages with a woman from Uzbekistan.
Ryan Borgwardt with his family. TODAY | YouTube
The mission to recover Borgwardt quickly turned into an investigation. The FBI is now involved and goals are to identify any crimes committed, pursue for expenses in searches funded by taxpayers.
In total, 54 days were put into the search for Borgwardt, with 28 days put in by Cormican alone.
“Twenty-eight of them days on that lake searching for Ryan. When he wasn’t searching, he was looking over data. Looking over data, trying to figure out if he missed something,” shared Sheriff Podoll of the Green Lake County Sheriff’s Office in a press conference.
Sheriff Podoll asks that anyone with information contact the Green Lake County Sheriff’s Office.
“Balance is key. Balance good, everything good. Balance bad, better pack up, go home.” —Mr. Miyagi, The Karate Kid | Feature photo: Cory Leis
Whether you want to paddle fast, paddle far or just paddle with your dog on board, it all starts with good balance. Spending time on your board is the best way to enhance your stability. The more you paddle, the more comfortable you’ll get and the sooner you’ll be able to safely venture off mirror-flat water into gradually more challenging conditions. The five simple tips, skills and strategies below will make you feel more confident and stable on your board.
Your paddle is vital not only for propelling you forward but for balance as well. First off, you brace with your paddle blade to find support and stability whenever you feel like you’re losing your balance. Secondly, holding a long pole-like object in your hands helps enhance balance—think of the poles tightrope walkers use. However, the most important way a paddle enhances stability is by supporting some of your body weight during the pull phase of the stroke. If you’re reluctant to put any weight on your paddle blade, all your weight stays on the board. If you can learn to trust your paddle enough to take some of your body weight, you’ll paddle more efficiently, go faster and feel more stable.
“Balance is key. Balance good, everything good. Balance bad, better pack up, go home.” —Mr. Miyagi, The Karate Kid | Feature photo: Cory Leis
2 Get a little lower
If you bend your legs, both at the ankles and the knees, you’ll get a little lower and lower your center of mass in the process. This enhances stability. It also helps you absorb some of the wobbles and twitches your board will inevitably make without losing your balance. Try to relax your legs as you bend them. If you’re standing up stiff-legged, you’re like the mast on a sailboat and every time the board leans, you’ll lean with it. When you lean too far, your center of mass will be outside your base of support, and then you’ll be swimming. Practice loose, relaxed and bent legs.
3 Move your body more when you’re feeling unbalanced
It’s human nature to get cautious and move less when encountering ripples and chop. However, if you’re overly cautious, reluctant to move and stiffen up, you’ll feel less balanced. Instead, the best thing you can do is engage more of your body in the forward stroke, get more weight on your blade and focus on the rhythm of your paddling. This rhythm and body motion will become the dominant movement rather than the side-to-side wobbling of your board. Again, it may seem counterintuitive, but the more you focus on your paddling rhythm and getting your body into your stroke, the more relaxed you’ll be and the less you’ll notice any feeling of instability.
4 Get to know your board
Every board has its stability characteristics. Primary stability is basically how twitchy the board feels underneath you. If your board has good primary stability, it will feel solid and be easier to learn to trust your paddle and focus on your paddling rhythm. If your board feels twitchy, you should experiment with its secondary stability. Every board will reach a point where it leans and then stops. If you can determine where your board will stop leaning and stabilize, it won’t bother you as much when it twitches. You can just let it wobble underneath you and absorb that wobble with your relaxed legs, comfortable in the knowledge that it will stop, stabilize and allow you to bring it back to level. Spend time near the dock or shore on a sunny day when the water is warm and play with your board’s stability. Try to make it lean to the point where it won’t lean any farther. Trusting in the board’s secondary stability will be an ace up your sleeve and give you confidence whenever you feel your board is starting to wobble underneath you.
Being able to comfortably move around on your board is important. If you’ve invested some time in learning the secondary stability of your board, you can then experiment with first lifting one foot, then the other, and eventually taking cross-steps backward and forward up and down the middle line of your board. This helps give you even more confidence on your board and learn to relax when paddling, and it allows you to move up and down your board to keep it trimmed correctly when paddling into or with waves. To get comfortable with the cross-step motion, a good drill you can do on land is cross-step up and down an eight-foot-long two-by-four you can get for $10 at any building supply store. This drill not only helps you develop the coordination the cross-stepping motion requires, but also helps heighten the proprioception in muscles in your feet and lower legs, which will help you better identify and react to the board wobbling and twitching underneath you on the water.
Larry Cain is an Olympic champion in canoe sprint, a SUP athlete, and a coach of both canoe and SUP athletes. He is cofounder of Paddle Monster, which provides online coaching and education for paddlesports athletes around the world.
This article was first published in Issue 72 of Paddling Magazine. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions, or browse the archives.
“Balance is key. Balance good, everything good. Balance bad, better pack up, go home.” —Mr. Miyagi, The Karate Kid | Feature photo: Cory Leis
Built for solo paddlers looking for something extremely lightweight, minimalist, and maneuverable, Josh Thrombley of Hornbeck Boats introduced the Paddling Mag team to the Ten Classic, a popular pack boat, at Canoecopia 2024.
Origins of the pack boat
Pack boats, sometimes called an Adirondack boat, function as a cross between a canoe and kayak in order to capitalize on the features of both best suited for solo, minimalist travel. In appearance a pack boat is most similar to a canoe, but it’s padded like a kayak with a long, double-bladed paddle and from a seat at the bottom of the boat.
“Pack boats have been around for hundreds of years but they really became popular in the late 1800s by a boat builder named John Henry Rushton,” Thrombley shared. “Rushton built boats for a gentleman named George Washington Sears, his pen name was Nessmuk.”
Nessmuk was an outdoor writer and conservationist who wanted to travel the Adirondacks, then known as the Northeast Wilderness, with just a small canvas pack and a small, maneuverable boat. Rushton, drawing from his experience building sailing canoes, designed a canoe specifically for Nessmuk and his goals.
“They were made out of Cedar strips and you sit on a little cedar plank, and you typically paddle with a double-bladed paddle,” said Thrombley. “He [Rushton] was about to do these boats at 13, 14,15 pounds.”
Fifty years ago Thrombley’s father-in-law, Peter Hornbeck, was in the Adirondack museum and saw one of Rushton’s designs. Hornbeck had been a kayaker and wondered how it would work to take one of Rushton’s designs and build something similar out of fiberglass.
He took inspiration from Rushton’s designs and arrived at the Long Pond Boat, or Hornbeck Boat’s Ten Classic. In the 1970s, Hornbeck boats swapped out fiberglass for kevlar and never looked back.
Today, the pack boat is a minimalist’s boat, lightweight and packable, designed for barebones solo wilderness travel. There are few features on the pack boat beyond the essentials.
“Anytime you’re adding features you’re adding weight,” explained Thrombley.
Ultimately in modern times the biggest pro of the pack boat might boil down to one, game-changing factor for solo paddlers: at 15 pounds, it’s easy to get on and off your car.
The Klamath River stretches 400 miles from its source in Oregon to the sea in California, and on October 21, 2024, for the first time in over 100 years, wildlife officials from both the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and Yurok Tribe Fisheries department recorded Chinook salmon in Oregon’s Klamath Basin.
In September 2024, the Iron Gate dam on the Klamath River, the final of four hydroelectric dams on the Klamath, came down in what constituted the largest dam removal project in the United States. The fight for dam removal was driven by a number of players, including the Klamath River Renewal Corporation, the State Governments of California and Oregon, and most pivotally, local tribes including the Yurok, Karuk, Hoopa, Shasta, and Klamath.
The project restores nearly 400 miles of vital habitat for salmon with the goal of reviving an ecosystem that once not only supported salmon but Indigenous communities along the entirety of its banks including the Yurok, Karuk, Hoopa, Shasta, and Klamath — communities that suffered during the century the dams were in place.
Historically, the Klamath River was the third largest salmon-producing river in the continental United States. In addition to chinook and coho salmon, the Klamath also supports steelhead, coasts cutthroat trout, green and white sturgeon, and Pacific lamprey.
The Upper Klamath had a reputation as one of the best summer whitewater rivers in the west, with water flow around 1,000-3,000 cubic feet per second thanks to the John C. Boyle dam just upriver, now undamed.
The Paddle Tribal Waters Program aims for first descent of the new Klamath in Spring 2025
The removal of the four hydroelectric dams, first the Copco 2 dam in October 2023, followed by Copco 1 dam, the JC Boyle dam, and finally the Iron Gate Dam in September 2024 exposes a new, or rather rewilded, Klamath River.
Indigenous youth from the Yurok, Hoopa, Karuk and other local tribes have been reconnecting with sections of the Klamath river that have not flowed freely for over a hundred years by way of whitewater kayak. The Paddle Tribal Waters Program, organized by nonprofit Rios to Rivers, has Indigenous youth learning whitewater skills in preparation for a 400-mile source to sea journey in Spring 2025.
This will be the first whitewater descent of the new Klamath since its undamming.
Danielle Frank, director of development and community engagement for Rios to Rivers and member of the Hoopa and Yurok tribes, grew up deeply connected to the Klamath River.
“We’ve really grappled with this [the term first descent] a lot, recognizing that our river’s been a highway for water transit since time immemorial, canoes have existed from the top of the headwaters down to the mouth at Requa,” Frank shared. “We may not be the first people to run these places and we recognize that but we will be the first ultimate source to sea whitewater kayaking descent.”
While a first descent of the undammed Klamath and an accompanying documentary is the short-term goal of the Paddle Tribal Waters program, the scope of the project goes well beyond spring 2025. The long-term goal is to support Indigenous youth along the Klamath in becoming leaders in the paddling community, to promote peer mentorship, and strengthen the relationship between Indigenous youth and their ancestral waterways. These goals will span generations rather than a season.
“That’s what reconnecting our river is for us; it’s not just a new playground. It’s the ability to reconnect our people,” Frank said.
As a direct result of the damming of the Klamath over a century ago, salmon populations had almost died out in the region, unable to return to their spawning headwaters. For the first time in over 100 years, in Spring 2025, the first generation of newly spawned salmon will make the journey from the Klamath to the sea alongside the Indigenous youth kayakers.
The Indigenous-led battle to free the Klamath
In 1918 Copco 1 Dam, the first dam in the Klamath Hydroelectric Project was built, preventing the salmon run from reaching the Upper Klamath Basin. In 1925, Copco 2 Dam became operational, followed by J.C. Boyle Dam in 1958 and Iron Gate Dam in 1962.
Amy Bowers Cordalis of the Yurok Tribe was working on the Klamath as a fish technician when she witnessed the largest fish kill in the history of the Klamath. In September 2002, an estimated 34,000 Chinook salmon died in a severe epizootic outbreak. According to a report by the Yurok Tribal Fisheries Program, “low flow from Iron Gate Dam was a substantial causative factor in the fish kill of 2002.”
As a result, Bowers Cordalis was inspired to go to law school to prevent ecological collapse like that from happening in her home again. “Nothing like that in Yurok’s history has ever happened,” Bowers Cordalis said in Undammed, a Patagonia film documenting her journey.
The removal of the dams was not the first time the Yurok had to fight for the Klamath and their way of life. In 1969, Bowers Cordalis’ great uncle Raymond Mattz was fishing when a game warden confiscated his gill nets and gave him a citation.
The State argued that the Klamath River Reservation “for all practical purposes, almost immediately lost its identity,” and was not Indian country and therefore was subject to United States fishing regulations, while Mattz maintained that the Klamath River Reservation remained sovereign and retained the right to fish and practice Yurok culture in the manner they had since time immemorial.
Mattz pushed the issue all the way to the Supreme Court in what became the 1973 case Mattz v. Arnett which reaffirmed that the Yurok Reservation was still Indian Country and the Yurok people had federally-reserved fishing rights. This landmark case laid the groundwork for the Yurok Nation to express its sovereignty.
Despite reaffirming the sovereignty of the Yurok, in 1978 the federal government put a complete moratorium on Yurok fishing on the Klamath River. “They sent in federal Marshalls with full riot gear, raiding houses in the middle of the night without warrants, abuse and beatings down on the water,” Bowers Cordalis said in Undammed. “The Yurok people kept fishing.”
The fight for the restoration of the Klamath River has been ongoing and largely Indigenous-led. Bowers Cordalis was instrumental in the legal battle to remove the four dams from the Klamath River, serving as a tribal lawyer on behalf of the Yurok and other tribes.
“It’s really an exciting time to be a tribal lawyer because all of those fishing and water rights are the supreme law of the land,” said Bowers Cordalis in Undammed. “The people in my generation realize our fight is for the preservation of the fish and the river. And a lot of us have dedicated our adult lives to continuing that historical fight.”
During the century that the Klamath was dammed, water temperatures rose and toxic algae bloomed. Salmon were blocked from reaching the upper river to spawn, and their populations dropped below 10% of what they once were.
The first of the dam’s reservoirs was drained in January 2024, uncovering 2,800 acres of land in California that the state has promised to return to the Shasta Indian Nation. As part of the rehabilitation effort, teams made up of largely tribal members have been planting native seeds in former lakebeds and restoring river habitat for returning fish.
“When the dams come down, that’s when the work is able to start,” Danielle Frank of Paddle Tribal Waters shared. “The dams were in the way of the salmon returning, of revegetating the reservoirs and all the restoration that is to come… There’s 50 years of work to be done to bring this river to a state of restoration.”
Work that, Frank states, people couldn’t be more excited to have the opportunity to begin.
Restoration of the river’s health is intrinsically tied to the restoration of the health of the Indigenous communities along its banks. Along the Klamath, Indigenous communities are living in one of the biggest food deserts along the west coast without access to their traditional healthy food sources; food sources that were cut off by the Klamath River dams, Frank explained.
Paddling the Klamath River with Paddle Tribal Waters. | Paul Robert Wolf Wilson
“We really hope that all the folks looking to recreate on these new reopened spaces of river that they can also know there are years of work to come,” said Frank.
While a fully restored Klamath still may be many years away, this autumn, wildlife officials recorded Chinook salmon in Oregon’s Klamath Basin for the first time in over a hundred years.
A look at the new Gorilla with Chris Gragtmans. Feature Photo courtesy of Chris Gragtmans.
November 2, 2024 would’ve been the 29th annual Green Race, an event that draws thousands from all over the world to watch whitewater kayakers race a stretch of Class V rapids on Western North Carolina’s Green River Narrows.
Instead, paddlers rallied for a river clean-up day and memorial for the Green River as they knew it after floodwaters from Hurricane Helene altered the river beyond recognition.
Green River altered significantly by impacts from Hurricane Helene
“As whitewater paddlers we’re used to change…but rarely do we see the proverbial bedrock shaken and distorted in a way like it has,” shared Chris Gragtmans, lifelong paddler of the Green and whitewater professional.
“The Green River witnessed just an unbelievable, earth-shaking event here with this storm. There were a few watersheds in Western North Carolina and Eastern Tennessee that bore the brunt, the pinnacle of fury, of Hurricane Helene. The Green River watershed was one of them.”
Overall, Hurricane Helene caused an estimated 1,400 landslides in Western North Carolina, damaged over 160 sewer and water systems, damaged at least 6,000 miles (9,650 kilometers) of roads, and washed out more than 1,000 bridges and culverts according to the Associated Press.
“There’s obviously a lot of human pain involved. People lost their lives, their homes, people will go bankrupt over this.” Gragtmans shared. “For myself and for our community, where we deal with the hard things in life are these sacred rivers.”
“This is what rivers do, rivers change, but we’re not used to seeing geological time play out before our eyes,” Gragtmans added. “We make the assumption that these things occur more gradually, that the water wears the rock away over millions of years.”
In place of the 29th annual Green River Race, paddlers rally to clean up and honor the Green River
According to a statement from the Green Race, the road that allowed vehicle access to the lower Green River has been washed out from both above and below; the powerhouse that controlled water release through the Green River Narrows was partially destroyed by a landslide, rendering the Narrows fully dependent on rainfall for runnable water levels. Beyond that, the Green River Narrows itself has changed.
With the Green River Race an impossibility at this time, paddlers from throughout the region and world gathered on November 2, 2024 for the river clean up, fundraiser, and to honor the river itself.
Eric Deguil, a former Green River Race champion from France, competed in the Russell Fork “Lord of the Fork” Race, coming in first, and made the trip over to the Green River for the clean up and memorial, race or no race.
“Deguil, Corey Volt and countless others utilized their trade skill sets to help the community. He was in the river, climbing all over with borrowed chainsaws doing work that the rest of us aren’t qualified to do,” shared Gragtmans. “It’s just so beautiful to see people doing that, to see Eric still flying in from abroad, I really gotta give him props.”
A look at the new Green River
So what remains of the Green River as we knew it?
A look at the new Gorilla with Chris Gragtmans. Feature photo courtesy of Chris Gragtmans.
“Probably 97% of the rapids on the Green changed, and three percent are intact,” Gragtmans estimates. “Maybe less. It’s basically become a very young geological river bed. Sediment is going to fill in and rocks are going to roll.”
Overall, Gragtmans estimates that the river has likely become more difficult and more consequential.
“I believe we need to treat it like a remote class V river. I also think that rescue from the heart of that gorge is going to be really challenging,” said Gragtmans.
“I choose to believe that we can hold both the grief and sorrow of losing the place as we knew it and also wonder at the power of nature, and hope for the future stories that will be written in that gorge. I think it’s got a lot more to teach us,” added Gragtmans.
According to a post on Facebook on Thursday, November 7, Chris Gragtmans put that philosophy into action with friend and paddler Patrick Keller and opened up the Gorilla, one of the most recognizable rapids on the Green.
Gragtmans wrote on Facebook that while the river has changed not all hope is lost:
“She’s different, but still so beautiful and badass. And she’s got at least two more lines to share with us all when the flows and the energy align. It was a very special day.”
The author teamed up in a tandem on the Orange River, South Africa. | Feature photo: Regina Nicolardi
In all my years paddling, I’ve spent many days in kayaks and in rafts, but some of the most enjoyable times on the water I’ve ever had have been the trips partnered in a tandem inflatable kayak. There is just something fun about bobbing your way down the river, trying to synchronize as you bounce off rocks and bash through wave trains. Or, in those calm stretches, being able to swing your legs over the side and drift your way through long flat pools with a charcuterie lunch spread out on the deck. Yes, kayaking is always good time, but sharing a boat with a friend, relative or your significant other gives the whole experience a big boost of lighthearted adventure. Of course, going tandem will also test the foundation of any relationship, but let’s gloss over that for now.
Throw in the fact the best two-person inflatable kayaks available today roll up to fit in a closet, are made of lighter, durable material, and provide an accessible gateway to paddling that requires far less experience than a hardshell kayak, and the only question left is why wouldn’t you want to have one? The key element though in today’s flood of inflatables floating around online is finding one that you will actually enjoy paddling once you have it. To set you on the right course, I’ve put together a list of what I feel are the best tandem inflatable kayaks out there today. The goal of this article is not only to provide direct boat options but to share some insights that I hope will be helpful when considering the kayaks that are available for you.
Everyone, even strong swimmers, needs to wear a life jacket at all times when on the water. It is extremely difficult to put a life jacket on once you fall into the water. Even a light wind can blow any paddlecraft away from you, faster than you can swim.
Always wear a USCG-approved Level 70 or Type III life jacket designed for paddling.
Best tandem inflatable kayaks for whitewater
Nyce Haul
The Nyce Haul fuels those river running grins. | Photo: Joe Potoczak
I didn’t know I could be as smitten with an inflatable kayak as I am with the Nyce Haul. The Colorado-based brand has incorporated thoughtful, unencumbered design elements to this tandem inflatable kayak which have made it an outstanding design in my mind.
The Haul takes on an elongated raft-like oval shape with 12-inch outer tubes and kicked-up bow and stern rocker that smashes rapids and feels plenty stable on the river.
There are 12 internal D-rings within the Haul for both securing the outfitting and strapping in gear. Speaking of outfitting, the Haul uses tubular backrests that provide good support and are secured with nothing more than a cam strap. This allows you to move the backrest position with next to no effort. This also means that while the 11-foot boat is a two-person kayak, you can easily switch the seating to a solo setup that is perfect for loading down with gear for a desert river trip. It all rolls up well in their travel bag, along with their included air pump, with some room left for a bit more gear like breakdown paddles.
Photo: Joe Potoczak
Photo: Joe Potoczak
My absolute favorite part of the Nyce Haul though is the drop-stitch constructed floor. What a drop-stitch floor provides is a more rigid structure because you can inflate it to a higher air pressure per square inch. Think of the solid feel of an inflatable paddleboard compared to a squishy pool floatie. Inflatable kayaks and rafts tend to fall somewhere between these two, however, because of the drop stitch floor, the Haul leans toward the firmness of a SUP. This means it has less squish as it punches through a drop, and it provides a sturdy platform to stand up and scout ahead or cast your fly rod across those long pools between rapids.
The floor of the Nyce Haul is also self-bailing, meaning any whitewater that splashes into the kayak drains out through ports running along the edge of the floor. And a bonus, the floor bladder slides out, which means it can be used as a makeshift camp pad, or, if damaged, conveniently replaced from Nyce.
Reasons to buy
Fun and comfortable hitting rapids or floating a lazy river
Drop-stitched high-pressure floor
Functional and thoughtful outfitting
Ready to load up for river trips tandem or solo
Consider another if
You need a boat that does most of the work to track in a straight line
You want more elaborate backrests and outfitting
You only plan to float slow rivers and paddle flatwater and would prefer a smaller tube diameter for paddle strokes and self-rescue
Bottom line
The streamlined and well-constructed design elements of the Nyce Haul have made it my new favorite tandem inflatable kayak, and whether I’m taking a summer float down the Willamette or convincing someone to try whitewater for the first time, it’ll be loaded in the car. See the Nyce Haul again on Paddling Mag’s list of best kayaks.
AIRE Tributary Tomcat Tandem
The AIRE Tributary Tomcat is a classic torpedo through rapids. | Photo: Joe Potoczak
The AIRE Tributary Tomcat Tandem is a classic design in the world of inflatable kayaks, built for running rivers 20 years running. The torpedo shape with a rockered nose and plows over rapids and remains stable. The Tomcat II has a comfortable backrest to lean against, and the floor has a slight ridge to let water drain away from your butt and out through the self-bailing mesh ports. It also rolls up to a more reasonable size than I would have expected and easily fits in the back of my Subaru with more than enough room for gear.
AIRE also uses a unique construction element for river runners, an innertube-like bladder inside the outer PVC shell that can be easily replaced. The outer shell is tough, as tough as any other inflatable kayak out there, but no matter how tough a tube is, when you’re running whitewater a pop can happen and old seams wear out. If and when it happens, you can simply unzip any of the Tomcat’s three tubes and remove the vinyl chamber. Then simply throw on a patch or buy a replacement and the boat is back to work.
Photo: Joe Potoczak
The Tomcat’s 500-pound capacity and interior area provide plenty of space as a tandem kayak, along with room in the stern for a gear bag.
AIRE has a collection of respected tandem designs, including the bigger Outfitter II and sleek sporty Lynx II. The Tomcat II isn’t too dissimilar from either of these designs. The Tomcat, though, is half the price. Sure, there are slight differences in tube diameter and bow rise, but the biggest difference is in the innertube construction. The Tomcat uses a lower-cost vinyl bladder, whereas the other two use urethane. This doesn’t hold the Tomcat back and still withstand years of regular use—so you can put those savings toward the rest of your whitewater gear.
Reasons to buy
Proven, stable inflatable, capable of tackling rapids or drifting down your local river
Replaceable air bladders
Tough PVC outer construction with innertube-like air bladders
Value price within the reputation of an AIRE design
Consider another if
You plan to mostly paddle flatwater like lakes and bays
You’d prefer an inflatable kayak without an internal bladder system
You paddle class I–II whitewater and prefer a smaller outer tube diameter for your paddle strokes and for self-rescue
Bottom line
The AIRE Tributary Tomcat Tandem has been a long-tested and trusted river-running inflatable for two decades now. It is stable, punches through waves and holes, and has space to load up gear.
Best tandem inflatable kayak for lakes, bays and slow rivers
Advanced Elements AdvancedFrame Convertible Elite
The AdvancedFrame Convertible Elite in open cockpit mode. | Photo: Courtesy Advanced Elements
Advanced Elements AdvancedFrame Convertible Elite Specs
The words two-person inflatable kayak and flatwater paddling tend to mix like oil and water. Because of their ballooned shape and their bouncy, less-than-rigid structure, taking most inflatable kayaks across a lake or bay is a laborious slog. Not so for the Advanced Elements AdvancedFrame Convertible Elite. When our editors wrote a full review of the Convertible Elite, we applauded “its long waterline and chines, which help enhance speed, tracking and edging ability. These features make the AdvancedFrame Convertible Elite efficient and ideally suited for day trips and touring in friendly conditions.”
What makes the Convertible Elite a touring-capable inflatable is the fact its construction goes beyond rubber air bladders. A pair of aluminum ribs are inserted at the bow and stern to provide a stiff, peaked shape like you would find on a fiberglass or plastic kayak. This helps the bow to efficiently cut through the water instead of just slapping at it. Additional plastic plates are inserted on the deck ends as well to further strengthen the area and shed water.
The floor of the kayak uses a drop-stitch construction similar to a paddleboard. This provides rigidity to the kayak hull for efficient gliding across the water. The floor on the Convertible Elite also creates a chined hull, meaning you actually have some edge transition—a rarity on an inflatable paddle craft. The foam seat is comfortable enough to spend the day on and combined with the stiffness of the drop stitch floor, raises you to a nice high paddling position.
Factor all of this with the boat’s namesake—a convertible deck that can either be an open cockpit or closed up with the option of a zip-on spray deck—and you have an inflatable kayak that can be rolled up and stored in the back of your van, and unfurled to make a crossing against a wind chopped bay with an ability outranking most inflatable kayaks.
Reasons to buy
Capable touring inflatable with ribbed bow and stern, plastic end caps, and drop-stitched floor
Tracks well for its class and even has some edging ability
Convertible from open to closed deck depending on comfort and conditions
Consider another if
You plan to run rapids often
You prefer less components to keep track of
Are looking for weight savings on your inflatable
You don’t need a drop stitch floor—then consider the lower-cost non-elite Advanced Elements Convertible
Bottom line
The Advanced Elements AdvancedFrame Convertible Elite is one of few tandem inflatable kayaks you’ll find enjoyable on a flatwater tour.
Dress For Immersion, Not Air Temperature
Your body loses heat much faster when immersed in cold water than it does when dry.
Avoid cotton clothing like t-shirts and jeans; they retain water and accelerate cooling when wet. Synthetic fabrics, or wool, are generally a better choice. If the water is very cold (60° fahrenheit or less), you should wear a wetsuit or drysuit.
Best tandem packrafts
Alpacka Tango
The Alpacka Tango pops with color and is one of the lightest, most compact inflatables you’ll find. | Photo: Joe Potoczak
I know, it’s technically a packraft, but a packraft is really just an inflatable kayak. Or, wait, maybe an inflatable kayak is just a raft? Either way, you blow them up with air, sit in them and use a kayak paddle to propel them. Packrafts are a fantastic tandem kayak option, especially for two types of people. First, those who are really tight on space, whether at home or in their liveaboard vehicle. The other type is those who live the motto: it’s not just about the journey on the water but the journey to the water—people whose idea of fun is a hike to a mountain lake or bikepack to remote streams.
Alpacka is one of the most well-regarded brands when it comes to packrafts, and we found their Tango tandem a creative option in the realm of inflatables. The Tango is extremely lightweight at just 13 pounds. You can easily carry it with one hand and toss it around in the air like pizza dough. But the Tango is by no means a fragile tandem inflatable. Alpacka uses 210-denier nylon on the tubes, and a 840-denier ballistic nylon floor to maximize durability.
Photo: Joe Potoczak
The distinct, bulbous shape of the packraft rides over minor waves with ease. You could paddle the Tango across a small lake or down some mild rapids. The floor is not self-bailing however, and so I wouldn’t recommend it on anything over class II. Because of its flat hull design and short length, it doesn’t have the best tracking ability either, and so wouldn’t be my first choice to cross an open waterway.
The interior cockpit feels a little cramped, which is to be expected on such a lightweight 12-foot boat, but what I did appreciate about the Alpack Tango when it came to utilizing space was the Cargo Fly zipper built into the stern. This means if you and your partner want to head out and camp the night on an island, you can stow drybags and gear inside the packraft—a useful feature you won’t find on traditional types of inflatable kayaks.
Reasons to buy
Rolls up to the size of a packed camping tent
The most lightweight type of inflatable kayak you’ll find
Cargo Fly provides storage within the packraft
Consider another if
You prefer some room to spread out
Have the space in your vehicle or home for a traditional inflatable kayak
Favor comfort and performance over storage and portability
Bottom line
Packrafts are about as convenient as an inflatable kayak can get in terms of storage and transport. If you are traveling with limited space and just want to be able to get out on the water, or enjoy hiking or biking to remote paddling locales, the Alpacka Tango is your tandem packraft.
Kokopelli Twain
The Kokopelli Twain is ready for adventure with your favorite paddling partner. | Photo: Kaydi Pyette
Kokopelli Twain Specs
Length: 10’2”
Width: 37”
Weight: 11.2 lbs
Construction: 210d TPU and Nylon tubes | 840d TPU and DuPont Kevlar Aramid-Nylon Blend Floor
Our editor-in-chief Kaydi Pyette spent time with Kokopelli’s tandem packraft, the Twain. Kaydi found the Twain fun to paddle on local Ontario adventures with her mom. And, it was super stable—in her words, “approaching the stability of a small barge/pontoon.”
Kaydi also found the Twain maneuverable. If you were to flip the Twain over, you’d see it has a very flat hull, which, combined with its short waterline, lets it spin easily to change direction. This is great for moving water like rivers, but can be counterproductive on flatwater because it leads to corrections with each stroke. What the Twain provides that is unique for a tandem packraft, and alleviates constant corrections, is a removable center fin under the stern. Say you’re on a tandem paddle across the lake, that fin provides better tracking to help you draw straighter lines in your course of travel. In the packraft realm, this gives the Twain a big benefit over others on open waterways. Then if your next mission is down a shallow river, you simply remove the fin and you have that deft little boat for maneuvering back.
The Twain doesn’t have a self-bailing floor however, which limits the size of the rapids it would be suited for. And, with the short interior cockpit, Kaydi felt the inside space was snug for two paddlers and wouldn’t accommodate much camping gear. She recommends opting for the TiZIP upgrade that provides storage within the packraft.
It took less than 10 minutes for our editor to set up the Kokopelli Twain for the first time, and that was while figuring out the outfitting. To deflate and roll up, it was just five minutes to pack away the packraft. A tandem packraft like the Twain provides a nice option for after-work afternoons on the lake, meandering floats down the river and urban adventures.
Reasons to buy
Extremely lightweight
Easy to set up and pack away
A convenient choice for solo camping, tandem urban adventures, and the classic hike and paddle
Consider another if
You have the space to store a traditional inflatable kayak
Your regular access points are well-developed for larger craft
You prefer a roomy boat and beefy outfitting
Your adventures include whitewater bigger than class II or open water crossings
Bottom line
If a packraft provides the storability and portability you need for flatwater and slower rivers, the Kokopelli Twain provides a quick-setup, easy-to-paddle option and the bonus of a removable center fin for flatwater.
Best tandem inflatable fishing kayaks
BOTE Zeppelin Aero 12’6”
The elevated seat, drop stitched floor, and minimalist but well thought-out rigging make the BOTE Zeppelin Aero an angler’s tandem. Photo: Courtesy BOTE
Fishing kayaks have gone to such a rigging extreme that there is an endless debate over when they are still kayaks and just another boat. The BOTE Zeppelin Aero takes the fishing kayak discussion back to simpler times, with just a touch of outfitting to make this a tandem inflatable kayak great for fishing.
First off, the obvious advantage of a two-person-inflatable fishing kayak is that the BOTE Zeppelin Aero doesn’t require a trailer to get to the water. When rolled up, the Zeppelin is just three feet long and two feet wide. The combination of a keeled bow and removable fin on the stern help the Zeppelin Aero travel straight lines across the open types of waterways favored for fishing. And since it’s a tandem, you can have your paddling partner back you away from overhanging mangroves or hold you steady near the mouth of that irresistible channel.
What I really enjoy about BOTE’s design though are the outfitting subtleties that turn this into an angler’s inflatable kayak. The high-rise inflated seats provide an elevated casting position, and if that’s not enough, the drop-stitch floor can be blown up to 15 PSI, providing a solid platform to stand and sight cast. I also love their MAGNEPOD magnetic base plates on the deck and find them a fantastic place to put a fly or forceps while getting prepped.
The Zeppelin Aero also includes accessory points to attach your GoPro or other gadgetry and the ability to integrate BOTE’s Bucket-Rac system, which creates the option for rod storage and a secured five-gallon bucket.
Reasons to buy
Cuts through the noise of elaborate kayak rigging
Thoughtful outfitting including MAGNEPOD and Bucket-Rac systems
Elevated seats and high-pressure floor provide a good casting platform whether sitting or standing
Consider another if
You are looking for pedals or a motor
A wider boat with a larger tube diameter provides you peace of mind for stability on moving water
Bottom line
The BOTE Zeppelin Aero has everything an angler needs on a two-person inflatable fishing kayak and nothing you don’t.
Hobie Mirage iTrek 14 Duo
A lightweight pedal-drive tandem, the Mirage iTrek 14 Duo turns kayak fishing into a family trip. | Photo: Patrick Hayes
The pedal drive may just be the biggest moment of evolution in the history of kayak fishing. For those who’ve never fished a tight stream or along overhanging estuaries without a pedal drive or trolling motor, let me tell you, frustration was a large part of the experience as you had a paddle in one hand and a rod in the other. Thanks to pedal drives, the kayaking part of fishing became nearly hands-free, allowing you to focus on what you really hit the water to do, toss a line. It was the Hobie MirageDrive that led the way, and so it’s no surprise they looked at the inflatable paddleboards and kayaks floating around and realized they had something to offer—a pedal drive kayak that weighs just 45 pounds.
The 13-foot 8-inch iTrek Duo looks more paddleboard than tandem kayak, with the addition of outrigger-like rails to provide increased stability. The dual flipper-style pedal and rudder system mean you and your fishing pal can haul to your hot spot. The iTrek Duo doesn’t feature many fishing-specific features, but that keeps the weight and bulk to a minimum and is easily resolved to an extent thanks to the lash points to strap down a crate.
Our editor at Kayak Angler, Ric Burnley, has tested just about every fishing kayak in existence. After reviewing the Hobie Mirage iTrek 14 Duo, he declared it a sensible tandem solution. Ric said that the secret to the iTrek Duo’s success as a portable tandem kayak is its simple and stable design. “I always wanted a tandem kayak, but I don’t have room for another boat in my yard,” Ric shared in his full review. “The packable, inflatable pedal-powered tandem is a sensible solution. When the objective is family time with a side of fishing, the Mirage iTrek 14 Duo is the platform for focusing on what is most important—having fun with a favorite person.”
Reasons to buy
Lightweight tandem pedal drive fishing kayak
Includes Hobie MirageDrive GT
Paddleboard-like deck provides a stable casting platform
Coastal bays and flats or open lakes are your primary fishing spots
Consider another if
You are looking for a fishing-specific kayak with accessory mounts and rails
You prefer a traditional kayak design with a floor and raised side tubes
Moving rivers are your regular fishing spot
Bottom line
The Hobie Mirage iTrek 14 Duo opens the possibility of getting on the water with friends or family to do some tandem fishing with the efficiency and low-strain effort provided by the MirageDrive. The inflatable platform is a fraction of the weight of a comparable plastic kayak.
Budget-friendly two-person inflatable kayak
Sea Eagle 370
The Sea Eagle 370 is one of the most affordable inflatable tandems out there, and it’s made by a brand with a half-century of kayak-making experience. | Photo: Courtesy Sea Eagle
If you were to conduct a search for a cheap two-person inflatable kayak, two of the models that come up most often are the Intex Explorer K2 and the Sea Eagle 370. In fact, the Intex Explorer usually ranks higher in results, costs just a couple hundred dollars, and has tens of thousands of positive Amazon reviews. As someone who has sat in considerably more kayaks than I have office chairs, has had their share of rough paddling experiences, and wants you to get the best possible value for your dollar when it comes to gear, I’d like to ask you to consider spending just a little more to get an inflatable tandem you’ll be happier with for years ahead—the Sea Eagle 370.
Sea Eagle is a 50-year-running inflatable kayak company based out of Long Island, New York. The 370 represents their entry-level boat design, meaning if you are happy with what they produce, you can always upgrade to a higher-performance, heavier-duty kayak within their fleet.
Something you’ll notice in comparing the Sea Eagle 370 with the Intex Explorer are the valve styles on the floor and seats. The Sea Eagle provides screw-in one-way air valves on every chamber of the kayak, while the Explorer has small pool float style valves to blow up by mouth on the floor and seats. This means you can more easily inflate the Sea Eagle to its maximum air pressure. Why is that important? A fully inflated kayak has more rigidity which leads to better comfort and performance. A soft kayak is spongy, and feels like you are being folded in a bow to stern taco while swinging a paddle around.
The Sea Eagle 370 has a 38-millimeter PolyKrylar PVC build on its outer tubes which Sea Eagle warrants is strong enough to paddle up to class-III whitewater. This doesn’t mean you have to go anywhere near rapids with the 370, but what it does mean is the brand believes in the construction of the boat to bash against some rocks. Sea Eagle even provides a three-year manufacturer warranty on the 370, which says a lot for their trust in a boat at this price range.
Reasons to buy
One of the cheapest inflatable kayaks out there
Made by a well-established kayak brand
Includes everything you need to go kayaking except a life jacket
Every chamber on the boat includes a screw-in one-way valve for maximum inflation
Comfortable seats for the price with ability to upgrade
Stern skegs to help you go straight
Consider another if
Your maximum budget is less than the Sea Eagle 370
You want a tandem inflatable with a more premium construction and performance
You plan on making ambitious flatwater crossings
You plan to run class-III whitewater or go on remote extended trips
Bottom line
If you are looking for a two-person inflatable kayak at a low cost that will get you floating on the lake or drifting down the local river, the Sea Eagle 370 will be one of the best deals you can get for your dollar.
Know The Local Hazards
Check navigation charts before you launch.
Check with those who have local knowledge of man-made and natural hazards, e.g. low-head dams; sweepers, strainers and undercuts; tides and currents; and rocks and shoals.
What to consider when buying a tandem inflatable kayak
It’s easy to look at price tags and ask what could possibly be the difference between two inflatable kayaks. There are a few key elements you should bear in mind though before purchasing one to enjoy the water.
The construction of varying degrees of inflatable kayaks is likely one of the largest differences between boats. The best inflatable tandem kayaks are made of stronger, thicker soft plastics. A poorly constructed inflatable kayak is very often made with thin plastics that feel like they belong to an inflatable pool toy. Packrafts are an exception, having managed to use thinner material technology that is very light but durable and easy to repair.
Air valves are another major factor to reaching proper inflation, and, for the hull at least, a well-designed inflatable kayak features one-way valves that you can inflate without air escaping when you pull away your pump nozzle. This allows you to be able to put the maximum recommended air pressure into each tube. This and the construction of the tubes equates to a tandem kayak that feels more rigid for effective paddling—like you would sooner bounce off of it rather than sink into it.
Also, pay attention to how many air chambers there are. Air chambers are what keep you afloat, and while standup paddleboards have yet to regularly adopt multiple chambers, most well built kayaks will have a few, which provides a safety element should a chamber pop.
Along with the overall shape of a kayak and whether it is made more for rivers or flatwater, the outer tube diameter is something else to consider. The larger the tube diameter, the more of a pontoon each will provide to keep you riding high and stable. A larger tube diameter is especially important on whitewater, and much less so on flatwater. You do, however, also want to consider whether the size of the tube diameter inhibits your ability to self-rescue back into the boat should you capsize. With this in mind, if you have the opportunity to test out a friend’s inflatable or visit a local outfitter you’ll quickly see how comfortable and capable a model is for you to paddle.
To create this list of the best two-person inflatable kayaks we took popular boats available today out on our favorite local waterways, as well as gathered the feedback of editors and contributors and their reviews conducted over years of editorial coverage.
Paddling Magazine digital editor Joe Potoczak.
Why you should trust us
As a river guide and paddling instructor for nearly two decades, inflatable kayaks have played a key role in how I’ve introduced people to kayaking. Especially on rivers, they offer a low barrier of entry into the sport. I’ve spent many a day on the river paddling them myself to be in the same craft as students and guests, gaining a great appreciation for the benefits and limitations of inflatable kayaks.
The author teamed up in a tandem on the Orange River, South Africa. | Feature photo: Regina Nicolardi
Pile of NRS DriDuffels ready to load. | Feature Image: Dylan Silver | OARS
The heat of summer is nice and all, but there is something special about fall paddling trips. Maybe it’s the landscape painted in the palette of autumn, the feel of cozy fleece under a drysuit, or the satisfying warmth of a hot meal at the end of the shortening days. As colder temperatures creep in we are nowhere close to thinking the paddling season is coming to an end, and that’s because for our team it never does. What we’ve figured out is it’s the little things, the gear we pack for comfort, fun and luxury that makes the difference in getting the most enjoyment out of these fall days.
To help you do the same, we asked our editors what they won’t go without this fall, and this is what they had to share.
This tent is basically a backcountry castle with a super roomy vestibule to cook in when it’s rainy and windy outside. I love that this tent has extended my paddle camping season, and is easy to fit in a canoe or sea kayaks.
Bottom line
The MSR Remote 3 is a sturdy and roomy four-season tent that keeps you and your paddling partner’s gear bone dry for shoulder season camping. The central-support frame of the Remote 3 uses Easton Syclone poles, a ballistic-fiber, carbon, and resin composite that offers increased durability and significant weight saving compared to aluminum poles. The Remote 3 has a 22 square-foot vestibule, 46 square feet of floor space inside, and reaches almost four feet tall inside for space to move around on those windbound days.
Nalgene 16-ounce Storage Jar. | Photo: Maddy Marquardt
I love using a Nalgene jar for my bowl in order to never truly do camp dishes. I just screw the cap on and let my previous camp meal season the next.
Bottom line
The Nalgene Storage Jar can easily be your personal camp bowl, used for food prep, leftovers, or packing out coffee grounds and food waste. These jars are made of durable Tritan BPA/BPS-free plastic—so they won’t leave a funny taste in your meal. The lid is leakproof, and the 16-ounce is a condensed size that solves the puzzle in your drybag.
Nemo Tensor Sleeping Pad. | Photo: Maddy Marquardt
I love that the Tensor is quieter to sleep on than most other pads, packs small enough to fit behind my skeg box, and is as comfortable to sleep on as larger sleeping pads.
Bottom line
Comfortable, packable, and sturdy: the Tensor insulated sleeping pad has an 5.4 R-value, which places it toward the upper end of all-season insulation. The Tensor is 3.5 inches thick and uses an aluminized film for its insulation value. Nemo also makes the pads in four sizes including regular, regular wide, long wide and a mummy shape.
I was skeptical of the Solo Stove when the household first convinced me we should get one. It wasn’t until I had my hands on the griddle top that I saw the versatility of the Bonfire as both our backyard and basecamp low-impact firepit. The cleverness of the Solo Stove is in its cooking accessories that beat out those old grates over the fire ring and turn some serious heat up on the camp chefery.
Bottom line
The Solo Stove Bonfire can set up shop at the river festival, disperse camp down an NF road, or hold down the patio party. The 17-inch cast iron griddle top is the size of a large pizza, providing enough space to fire up breakfast for the whole crew. With the hub underneath to raise the griddle off the flames, you gain a built-on heat deflector to send some warmth out to those puffy-clad campers salivating over the sizzle of bacon.
The NRS DriDuffel had me at the zipper that slides like a hot knife through butter. My first time using it was on an overnight trip outside of Yosemite. The 35 liter had all the space needed for my personal effects. The lengthwise opening was a dream to not have to root around the bottom of a deep, dark dry bag to find my fly box once I caught a glimpse of rainbows rising on the Tuolumne.
The NRS DriDuffel seals with a TRU Zip zipper and has an IPX7 waterproof rating. That means it’s submersible at a meter deep for 30 minutes. To back up the zipper, the DriDuffel is constructed of PVC-free 84-denier heavy-duty TPU-coated nylon. The outer straps help secure and compress your gear to fit in the back of your kayak or minimize the pile on the raft. This is why we selected the DriDuffel as one of the best dry bags of the year.
What I love about The Camp Pillow is that it doesn’t try to be a minimalist, barely there, teched-out solution for one of the most neglected pieces of trip gear there is. Instead Rumpl has stuffed their camp pillow dense with shredded memory foam. While others have left me spending the night folding and configuring to finally get comfortable, Rumpl’s solution feels like a luxury as I drift off staring at the stars.
Bottom Line
The Camp Pillow from Rumpl is 22 inches by 15 inches with a two-sided outer shell—one side brushed polar fleece, the other a soft-touch polyester. The shredded memory foam fill is accessible and adjustable for your preferred loft, and The Camp Pillow includes a stuff sack to compress it for your pack.
I never have to ask myself again whether it’s practical to bring my fly rod on the river because of the Beartooth. It telescopes down to just 14 inches long and fits in my drybag for a raft trip, and I’ve put it in the back of my kayak to pull over and work the tails of pools on river runs. I was hesitant whether tenkara fishing would provide enough line on casts, but soon realized how little I actually use and that reaching most pockets could be solved with a few small steps.
Bottom line
The Beartooth is Tenkara Rod Co.’s most compact packing fishing rod. It weighs 2.3 ounces, extends to 10-feet long, is constructed of carbon fiber and has a 6:4 flex that land bigger fish than you’d expect by looking at it. You can get the rod alone or purchase the kit that includes line, tippet and even a box of flies so you are immediately ready to roll your line out.
BruTrek OVRLNDR French Press. | Photo: Joe Potoczak
What I look forward to most on every day of camping is a cup of hot coffee, okay, not just camping, every day in general. I’ve used all sorts of coffee methods and contraptions to serve my indulgence, and the OVERLNDR is hands-down my favorite for brewing camp and travel coffee. The 24-ounce insulated French press makes just the right amount of coffee and keeps it hot. The Bru-Stop plunger keeps out the sludge, and it has a removable bottom chamber that lets me shake out the grounds, call it “camp clean” and brew another round. I also love the cylindrical shape without a handle, which gives it a big advantage for packing in a dry bag or bin.
Bottom line
The BruTrek OVRLNDR was designed for the adventurous. It’s body is made of a stainless steel construction, with a double-walled vacuum seal design to keep coffee hot for hours. The Bru-Stop plunger prevents over-extraction, and the removable base lets you break down as much of the OVRLNDR as you’d like for cleaning.
For wet, mucky, cold winter days, Korkers’ Neo Flex Thermo booties are possibly the most comfortable waterproof boots I’ve ever worn. The cushy fleece-lined interior is more reminiscent of a pair of cozy slippers than rugged outdoor shoes. They were invaluable in keeping my feet warm and dry during a snowy long weekend road trip in Yellowstone National Park this October that I felt otherwise unprepared for. The cushioning kept me comfortable during hikes, while the Kling-On Grip outsoles held firm on slippery boardwalks while other geyser gazers slid past.
Bottom line
Most rubber boots are made with a hard rubber midsole that leads to foot fatigue after a long day in the snow. The Korkers Neo Flex Thermo boots use Cush-Tech EVA on the midsole to absorb the day’s impact. The outsole is then finished with the non-marking Kling-On Grip rubber. The Thermos insulation is provided by 3.5-millimeter-thick neoprene and a fleece interior lining that adds up to a -20 degree Fahrenheit comfort rating.
North Water’s Water Bomber. | Photo: Courtesy North Water
The Water Bomber from North Water takes a page from Smokey Bear’s book, making sure “Only YOU can prevent forest fires” is more than just a motto. How you ask? It’s simple. First, fill the 12-liter rolltop bag in one fell scoop from a stream or lake. Then, dump it over your campfire and enjoy the satisfying sizzle of fire safety. Beyond fire control, the Water Bomber doubles as a camp dromedary—hang it by its adjustable strap from a tree or picnic table, and use the twist valve to dispense smaller amounts of water for washing and cooking. It’s light, compact, easy to clean by flipping inside out, and rolls flat for easy packing.
Bottom line
The Water Bomber has 12 liters of volume and it’s top is designed to fill in one scoop and extinguish the flames of the campfire. The twist valve sits an inch above the bottom to not spout grit, and the hang strip is adjustable.
The NRS Ninja Pro got an upgrade in 2024 and the Paddling Mag team got a first look at the redesign of this classic PFD at Canoecopia 2024.
First Look: NRS Ninja Pro and OS and orbit fit technology
Already the bestselling PFD at NRS, the NRS Ninja has a classic design with high mobility and a thoughtfully placed clamshell pocket that has made it one of the most popular PFDs on the market according to Blake Longworth, from NRS. It’s also a favorite amongst the Paddling Mag team, and earned top marks as one of the best life jackets for paddlers.
The update for the Ninja includes an Orbit Fit technology to contour to the paddlers body right out of the box. The new Orbit Fit System differs from previous models in that rather than bending one large piece of foam for floatation, multiple pieces of precision cut ethafoam are laid to create a pre-curved shape, creating a snug and secure fit.
While the previous iterations of the Ninja have fit a range of body sizes and types, the new Ninja takes it a step further with a slightly altered form profile between sizes to allow for the most comfortable and customizable possible fit for paddlers of all sizes.
“This is a PFD designed for every… body,” Longworth shared.
A previous complaint of the NRS Ninja was the lash tabs for knife placement made it easy to get your knife snagged in your deck rigging or on the chicken lines on a raft. To remedy this, the new Ninja has moved the lash tabs to below the clamshell pocket of the PFD where it’s less likely to snag protected by the shape of the pocket itself.
Meanwhile, the new Ninja OS has been designed specifically for offshore paddlers, a rework of the classic version of the Ninja PFD.
According to NRS, the NRS Ninja OS is also made with sea kayakers in mind, where previously it had been engineered to cater more exclusively to whitewater. The NRS Ninja OS is built for sea kayakers who want a low profile PFD with more freedom of movement while retaining the classic safety features, storage, and visibility.
This article was first published in Issue 72 of Paddling Magazine. 
