Crazy expedition trips

[Nick Pending]

There's a thread going here on a canoe trip in Yellowstone that went bad, but here's something similar where it turned out okay.

It's a long, windswept trip that happened back in 1987. Unfortunately it was paddled in one of them hated k*y*ks, but it is still a crazy trip worth mentioning. (And I don't paddle kayaks, either.)

In June of that year, Ed Gillet of San Diego put his kayak into the water in Monterey Bay California. He had 40 days of food with him, paddling solo. 63 days after launching he beached his boat on the island of Maui in Hawaii. He'd been eating toothpaste, all he had left, for the last three or four days. But he made it.

Talk about windswept?

Here's a link to a short article on the trip:

Top Expeditions 1970-2020, #5: Ed Gillet Kayaks to Hawaii » Explorersweb

We now live in an era when major expeditions set up elaborate websites, post daily on social media, and deck gear and garments with as many sponsor labels as an F1 driver. Even in the past, some adventures have always been giant productions. But not all. Once in a while, someone just went off...

explorersweb.com

Anyone interested can look for more.
Yeah, remember that the Hawaiian Islands were first discovered and populated by people in canoes. Likely not first by a solo paddler, but -- hey -- who knows?

 

[JohnSand]

Hannes Lindemann paddled across the Atlantic in the fifties in a folding Klepper I think. There was another German who went from Europe to maybe Australia in another folder. I'm not sure where the line is between a challenging dream and a dangerous stunt.

 

[Sweetfancymoses]

Hannes Lindemann paddled across the Atlantic in the fifties in a folding Klepper I think. [...]

His book Alone at sea is available for free download at the Internet Archive.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

Ed Gillet of San Diego

I rented a sea kayak from his shop in San Diego in the 90's, but he wasn't there that particular day. I talked about his trip with the woman who was working there, maybe his wife or girl friend. I had read about the trip in paddling magazines in the 80's. What a heroic venture. No electronics. No special boat. Just a commercial tandem kayak. All alone for 2500 miles (4000 km) on the ocean. Wow!

 

[Halpc]

He guided sea kayak trips also out of his San Diego shop. I took my two sons and daughter in law on a trip to Mexico with him. He was purely a guide- no cooking, setting up camp, etc., which was fine with me. He did give us lessons/tips on exploring sea caves and kayak surfing. He really loved paddling, even after his epic trip to Hawaii. In the evening when we sat exhausted on the beach at camp he would be out playing in the surf in his boat. A great unpretentious guy.