Ready to get back on the SUP
If you know you know. Yes, what is an SUP? If you have one or have tried one you know. For the uninitiated, and SUP is a stand-up paddle board. I first tried an SUP maybe ten years ago in Hawaii. We did it out in the Pacific Ocean off of the shores of Maui near Kihei. I rented a board at a little shop next door to the little condo we were staying at on the beach. It was a hard board (as opposed to an inflatable.) I was only mildly successful. There was a lot of falling off of the board with the swells of the water. Fast forward a few years where Jill and I were doing a lot of kayaking on lakes and bigger flat-water rivers. We started seeing a lot more people suddenly on paddle boards. It looked really fun AND a lot of them were paddling with their dogs! Now we have seen some people kayaking with their dogs, especially on flat top boats. We had touring kayaks that were not made to carry more than one person and their gear. They were also a bit of a pain to get to the water. We eventually purchased a couple of Thule Hullavator kayak racks. If you have not seen one of those bad boys, they are amazing. They come down the side of your car our in our case a Jeep. You set the kayak on the rack and then hydraulics help to push it up on top of the vehicle. It really does make it easier to get a big kayak to and from the water. Even with that, it was a pain to store them and get them out of the garage each time. We saw people pulling a large backpack out of their trunk, hooking up a pump, and blowing up their paddle boards. They were still really hard and did not seem like they had been inflated at all. So easy to store and transport! AND easy to take your dog with you. We decided to sell our kayaks and buy paddle boards. We did a lot of research and ended up purchasing a couple of Isle Paddle Boards. It was a great fit. The boards came with paddles, ankle leashes and hand pumps. Almost everything you need to get started (except a PFD). We purchased a 12v pump from Isle right off to make it a bit easier and quicker to inflate the boards from our Jeep at the water. The learning curve was very short. It was much easier to paddle the inflatable boards on the lakes around Oregon than it was to paddle the hard board in the Pacific Ocean around Maui. We eventually bought a couple more Isle boards that were a bit bigger than our originals and a Hala Atcha board for white water trips. We now have five boards. We also ended up buying some Black Project paddles that are really great and super light as well.
We moved into a house the summer of 2021 where we are a five minute drive to paddle around a local lake. The other side of the reservoir from the lake is the Clackamas river where we can put in and run the white water about an hour to our back yard or continue on for a few more hours down the river. We are hooked. We have taken our boards to so many fun places now. We have gone down the Colorado River near Moab and Arches National Park. We have been to Jackson Lake in Grand Teton National Park. We have paddled right up to Shoshone Falls in Idaho on the Snake River. That is all not to mention so many other local lakes and rivers. The SUPs are so easy to pack and take with us. They easily fit in our little RV exterior storage. All five of our paddle boards fit on one shelving unit in the shed at our house. We cannot wait to get back on our boards this spring. Keep watching back here and listening to our podcast to hear more about stand up paddle boarding. I am excited to get you hooked on this fun sport as well!
