A Bridge Too Far

A BRIDGE TOO FAR

A paddling trip on the SF Bay   

A Carolina Paddler Article                           

Photography and Text by Alton Chewning

This article was written in 2010. It was my first paddling-related story.

∞ Our family usually waits until mid-June to determine our July vacation plans.  This year we decided on San Francisco and once our location was determined I started thinking about kayaking opportunities.  I’d been to SF before, always briefly, but enough to be aware of the significance of water in the city’s life.  Water and … bridges, of which there are five in San Francisco Bay.  The most heralded is the Golden Gate, often called “the most beautiful bridge in the world.” Even though the distinctive TransAmerica Building heralds the city’s financial prowess, the gloriously orange Golden Gate remains the steadfast symbol of San Francisco’s quirky, romantic heart.

 Would it be possible to paddle in, under or around this formidable beauty?  I began researching the bay and its bridges and learned many interesting facts. Water from 40% of California empties into the SF Bay and ultimately flows through the mile-wide straight spanned by the GG.  As you would expect this amount of water pressing through such a narrow space, even with its depth of 300 feet, creates dynamic hydraulics. Partnered with the tidal actions of the Pacific Ocean directly outside the GG, the brisk and persistent winds, and the steady stream of shipping in and out of one of the West’s busiest ports and this confluence of conditions gave me pause.

Oh, and the water temperature?  SF Bay surrounds Alcatraz Island, once home to the most feared prison in America. The story goes, a warden, when apprised of a potential mass escape of desperate inmates, uttered simply, “Let ‘em swim.”  Those prisoners thoughtfully declined. In other attempts at making the mile-long swim to freedom, convicts successful in reaching the water were drowned or disappeared. The only known swimming survivor was found at the base of the GG, clinging to a rock, too tired and chilled to pull himself out of the water. So, how cold is it?  During August, the water temperature may climb to 58 degrees or so.  Most of the time it’s much colder.

I dismayed.  I can swim a little and do a pretty decent warm water cowboy self-rescue but I don’t yet have a dependable roll, certainly not what you would call a San Francisco Bay Bombproof Roll. So, even though I have a neophyte’s enthusiasm for testing my abilities, paddling under and around the GG seemed beyond any sane evaluation of my skills as a solo paddler. What about with a companion or a guide?  I’m the only kayaker in my family so no help there. I’m less than two years into kayaking and haven’t met folks from the West Coast.

I went on the internet and started looking for guide services.  Entering “paddling Golden Gate Bridge” turned up a few hits but not as many as you might think. The first sight described the conditions, including a tidal race towards the north end of the bridge. Surfing YouTube revealed a few short clips of GG kayaking.  A couple of boats on a City Kayak guided tour. A paddler doing a roll under the bridge, aided by a generous swell. Another paddler wet exiting and then doing a self rescue scramble (and probably a quick dash back to shore for an Irish coffee). The longest video, a group of SF Symposium advanced kayakers testing the tidal race underneath the GG for what Nigel Dennis calls the Fun Or Fear Factor.  The look of the conditions spelled FEAR for me but the experienced folks seemed to be managing well enough.  I wondered…

If I were to paddle the GG I would need planning, a guide, and the proper equipment. City Kayak was the name of a SF kayak shop that kept appearing on the web. In preparation for talking with them, I used their website’s handy links to currents and tidal charts to gauge the best time during our family vacations to step away from drier pursuits and go for a paddle. The currents in SF Bay, particularly in the entrance under GG, are not to be taken lightly. Considering currents reach as high as eight knots and coupled with the frigid waters, you can see why the Alcatraz warden nonchalantly challenged the would-be escapees to “take a swim.”

So far, I’m only a warm water paddler. This gear intensive sport of kayaking has already diverted much of my discretionary funds, and I haven’t bought cold weather gear: dry suit or wet suit, neoprene gloves or pogies and so on. Cold weather gear is not cheap. A dry coat can cost $250-500, a full dry suit up to $1000. Wet suits are cheaper but they can be toasty and inflexible in our not-so- cold weather. I needed a guide who could also supply the necessary equipment and… kayak.

That’s one more pipe dream I had to overcome. I’m a folding kayak owner. I paddle a wonderfully supple and moderately priced Folbot Cooper and for those not familiar with it, this sea kayak is 16’6”long with a 24”beam and is durable, fast and buoyant. The main reason for having a collapsible kayak is to be able to pack it up in a bag or two and put it in your trunk or on a plane and go someplace to paddle where you can’t easily take your hard-shelled boat. The SF Bay would be a wonderful excuse to take my Folbot. However, applying just a few moments of rational thought convinced me the cost and labor of taking two additional bags on my family’s flight would have been insupportable for a half day paddle trip. A two- or three-day tour would have been justified and I would have flown Southwest Airlines, which didn’t have the best travel times for our trip but does allow two free checked bags per ticket.  Sadly, my Folbot will have to wait a little longer for its maiden flight (That would later prove to be to Honduras).

Back to City Kayak. Owned by Ted Choi, CK has been in business for seven years. Ted’s website is attractively designed, informative and backed by a ton of magazine and newspaper articles and endorsements.  His Trips section has a good range, from Beginner Kayaking Trips (no experience necessary) to Adventure Paddle to Alcatraz and my summit trip, Golden Gate and Beyond (beyond being Baker Beach, just outside the bay, No Swimming Allowed). Ted sounded like just the guy to make my GG paddle dream come true.

I called City Kayak but Ted was away on a short vacation. The CK representative said, yeah, Ted would be the one to talk to about a Golden Gate trip. She made the point that the closer, simpler trips such as around the Bay Bridge and downtown SF, are fun and very scenic. But I wanted GG. I asked where to put in for a proposed GG trip since City Kayak is on the Southeast side of SF, five or more long, contested miles from GG. She mentioned Chrissy Field as a nearby put-in. I began to sense a guided GG trip was not going to be cheap. The shop owner would have to load boats and gear and drive across town to get us started. And it would be just the two of us, not a cost-reducing group.

A couple of days later I spoke with Ted and to make this story briefer, Ted mentioned a dollar figure in the hundreds and the gate to my GG paddle dream closed. I simply could not justify the expense. Furthermore, Ted pointed out a successful paddle around GG required skill, planning and a lot of luck. All the reasons mentioned above were factors but so, too, was the weather, particularly the famous Frisco fog. Ted said paddling around commercial shipping in the fog is not advisable. (For the record if I’m given the opportunity to try the GG at some future date, I will try to paddle on the weekend or a holiday, when the shipping traffic is not as heavy). I could potentially agree to the cost and schedule a time and date with Ted and then the day could easily be fogged-in and/or washed-out. I was frustrated. About this time, I read an essay by David Foster Wallace, the late, very gifted writer, about his experiences at an Illinois State Fair. He explained his reluctance to ride certain carnival rides, the Near Death Experience ones with names like The Zipper and ThunderBoltz, with this comment: “Why pay good money to have something to occur you will be glad to survive?”

Many people have paddled the Golden Gate and maybe one day I will. For now, evidence was forcing to me to another path. I could show my proud southern boyish side and say, “Ah, Hell, I’ll just do it.”  But I’m not a boy any longer and while torn between the carpe diem hunger of saying I may never be this way again and the sober reticence of “C,mon, guy, you have wife and a daughter in college. Why do something rash?” Sulking, tossed between the winds of abandon and the currents of caution, I finally beached myself, reluctantly thinking, “What Paddling for Beginners trip can I take?”

As mentioned before, Ted offers a variety of trips, mostly two to three hours long. Some tour the downtown SF area, some go to Alcatraz or Treasure Island and a Fourth of July night trip offered a view of the fireworks show from the bay. Ted’s favorite is a sunset cruise, watching the lights of the city come alive. Given the family vacation schedule, I opted for a Monday (7/5) day tour. Not exactly paddling the GG but more suited to my abilities. Paddle northwest under the Bay Bridge to the eastern downtown area and then doubling back to McCovey Cove at AT&T baseball park and then continuing down Mission Creek to an area where immobile house boats form their own ‘hood. As Ted said, you could do the paddle in an hour if you were in a hurry but with noodling around and taking pictures it could be two to three hours. So, I signed up to join a group for this trip. Several days before the trip, Ted called and said I was the only person signed up. We could treat my original time as a rental, or I could take another group paddle over the weekend. I couldn’t do the weekend so Monday on my own would be the plan. This paddle sounded easy enough for going solo.

And that’s what I did, after spending five days sampling SF’s other diverse pleasures. A round trip to Alcatraz is a blast. The Coit Tower and Cliff House are stunning structures with magnificent views.  The museums are numerous and world class. Parks are lovely and abundant, the GG Park being many times larger than NYC’s Central. I did experience the Golden Gate Bridge, walking over and back on a lightly fogged day, the peaks of the central posts disappearing into a cloud. While standing on the bridge looking down on the water ,I remembered one story we had been following in the local papers.

Diana Nyad, an extreme swimmer, was going to try to swim to SF from the Farallon Islands, about 27 miles off the coast from the GG. Her total swim would be about 30 miles, more than swimming the English Channel. It had been done by two men previously, the last in 1967. I looked at a map and was amazed at her gumption. Obviously, the scope of her dreams is greater than mine. She had to worry about 10-15 foot swells in addition to all the conditions I discussed earlier, but she also had to be somewhat concerned about great white sharks. Her time constraints were difficult, too.  She needed to make her swim before the water became even colder and the sharks more prevalent. She tried once while we were there but her support boat to the Farallons had to turn back because of rough seas.  (Editor’s note: Nyad never succeeded in the Farallons to GG swim. She did become the first person to swim the 110 miles from Cuba to Florida without a shark protection cage. At age 64.)

Looking down from the bridge, sharks were one thing I didn’t fret. The freshwater in the bay discourages most sharks, and all the ones considered dangerous. The water below the bridge looked choppy but not deathly. One new observation did bother me. A lot of our time in SF had been close to the water. Today, staring down from the GG on a pretty Sunday, I saw no kayaks, not the first. Sure, there were plenty of sailboats and motorboats.  Six or eight windsurfers were working the waves below the GG, some of them riding the wakes of cruise ships. Maybe windsurfing is easier than kayaking, I don’t know. But I didn’t see any kayaks.

The SF mass transit is very efficient and comprehensible, so I took a train to Pier 40, where City Kayak is located. Walking down the stairs leading to the underground metro station, I noticed a homeless man sprawled on the steps, surrounded by a battered backpack, tattered grocery bags and other meager possessions. He was laying on his side, elbow perched, head in hand, reading what appeared to be a photocopy of a magazine article. The title: “Manipulation of Stock Options.”

When the train emerged above ground, I was treated to a fine view of the southern SF Bay with a calm water, brilliant sunshine and, lo and behold, two sleek, sparkly, fiberglass sea kayaks gliding along blissfully. The gods smiled. At least I smiled. With this encouraging image heightening my enthusiasm, I detrained in the shadows of AT&T park, home of the baseball Giants. Several hundred yards away lay the venerable warehouse of Pier 40, home of City Kayak. In the parking lot, I met Ted Choi, the owner, as he arrived by bike. We walked into the rear of the warehouse, home to several small maritime businesses, where CK houses gear.

Ted and I discussed trip options, and I mentioned the lack of kayaks on the water. Ted feels the sport is still in its infancy here and many people haven’t discovered the feasibility of paddling in the bay. He’s had a viable business for years now and seemed to be doing okay but the water conditions and maybe the urban quality of the surroundings have discouraged some newcomers.  It’s a shame because the city is beautiful from the water. And Ted’s location is in the quieter, inner waters of the bay.

  We discussed clothing and since the air temperature was about 65 and climbing, we settled on my wearing a long sleeve polypropylene top and bottoms, nylon shorts and a CK supplied dry coat.  From a paddling comfort standpoint, this proved very adequate. I probably could have done without the bottoms but if I were in the water I would have wanted more. Hitting the water would be cold but not to a dangerous point. The conditions were mild so the chance of entering the water was less. I was hot after paddling a few minutes but as Ted predicted, the wind picked up and cooled me to a comfortable temperature.

Ted also outfitted me with a PFD, a pump, spray skirt and foam paddle float, the type preferred in cold water rescues. He handed me one Bending Branches recreational paddle (heavy, I’m spoiled by lighter, fancier paddles) and accommodated me with a spare paddle when I asked. Ted inquired about my height, weight and what beam sized kayak I normally paddled. My Cooper is 24”, so he chose a Necky about 15 feet long and violently orange and highly visible on the water. The boat performed well although all hard shells feel different than a folding kayak’s suppleness.

The biggest adjustment for me was the rudder. The Folbot has a attachable rudder but I’ve only used it a couple of times. It performs well in steering the boat and keeping a straight heading; however, most experienced kayakers downplay the use of a rudder preferring to use edging and strokes to steer a boat. Some advocate a skeg, a non-steering fin, for use in windy conditions to prevent weathercocking, the wind pushing the stern of a kayak more than its bow, but I don’t have a skeg. They are built into hard shells but are not easily accommodated on collapsible kayaks. Ted explained most of his boats have rudders because the wind blows so frequently in SF and many of his customers are not experienced with other steering techniques.

So, the rudder keeps you straight in windy conditions and allows you to use the footpegs to change directions, an ability I guiltily came to appreciate. Sometimes when the wind and/or current was at my stern, I foot steered, coasting along in the equivalent of a recliner outfitted with a foot-controlled trolling motor. Okay, it did facilitate taking photos. Other issues with the system kept me from becoming rudder addicted.

I still have much to learn about forward strokes. Many helpful observers have offered advice on my technique, although sometimes it appears contradictory to me. Ted noticed I let the paddle cradle in the notch between my thumb and index finger and asked if I ever blistered there. Well, yeah, sometimes after long paddles I’ve developed a blister but the area has toughened and calloused and I don’t interpret it as much of a problem. He suggested using my fingertips more to hold the paddle.  I tried this but the weight of the paddle, the lubrication of salt spray and the pressure of wind didn’t make this grasp feel very secure or forceful. Still, my forward stroke needs refinement.

While I’m paddling, I try to use my foot pegs to push to add force to my forward stroke. This seems to work well with fixed pegs but is apparently not the way to do it with the pegs attached to a rudder. Each stroke/foot push would send me in a new direction so my course resembled a cloth edge cut with pinking shears. Continued practice improved my foot pressure on the pegs, limiting my deviation with each stroke but I probably won’t use a rudder unless I’m traveling a longer distance in cross wind.

I rented the kayak for three hours thinking I’d make the 3-4 mile trip very leisurely. The tidal current was slack when I departed so Ted advised going west first towards downtown and then reversing course and coming back southeast and then returning with the outgoing current. Current should always be a concern when paddling moving water but particularly so in a place where the current speed can exceed your paddling speed. On this day the currents were never too strong, about two knots per hour at the greatest but again on other days and in other parts of SF Bay the current can easily reach six knots or more, considerably more than the three or four knots per hour most people can paddle.

After noodling around a bit, getting used to the Necky and the rudder, I headed east towards the Oakland Bay Bridge. The Bay Bridge doesn’t have the romance of the GG but it’s still a heckuva bridge.  Or rather a collection of several bridges and designs (suspension, truss-cantilevered, self-supporting suspension) joined midway with a tunnel on Yerba Buena Island. The bridge opened in 1936, six months before the Golden Gate.

The bridge has two decks, one above the other, and in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, one section of the upper deck collapsed. Since then, ongoing modifications have been made to the bridge(s), including the innovative self-supporting suspension section on the Oakland side of Yerba Buena. I only paddled under the far western side of the bridge, near the twin suspensions the view truly is majestic. It only suffers when compared to the Golden Gate. It’s also noisy from the heavy commuter traffic.

Just beyond the BB are the piers and walkways of the eastern end of the Embarcadero, with the Ferry Building being most prominent.  The previous Saturday we had visited the Farmer’s Market in and around the building. This organic food fest is much like a supersized Carrboro Farmer’s Market surrounded by specialty shops and restaurants. My favorite food shop was In Lard We Trust.

Nearby is Cupid’s Span, a grand sculpture of a love-bow and implanted arrow, one of many landmark references to where Tony Bennett left his heart. Camera well exercised, I could have continued further west along the downtown waterfront, but I decided to stay on schedule and reverse directions to the southeast. At this point the only scary moment of the paddle occurred. The wind was generally mild and the current slack, so conditions made for easy paddling. Frankly, my previous paddle, made on Lake Jordan on a blustery day, was more difficult. After reversing direction, a twenty-foot power boat cut closer than was necessary or courteous and I had to turn quickly to meet its wake. As the Necky comfortably bobbed over the waves I was reminded once again how seaworthy and dependable kayaks are.

The eastern leg of the trip had more industrial views of working piers where naval vessels were dry or wet docked for repairs and maintenance. I kept the 100-foot distance dictated by security signs and appreciated the rudder as the winds picked up. Ted had mentioned a layover point at a city ramp near the China Basin. There resides a cafe, a put-in and a separate ramp used by Ducks – those repurposed amphibious vessel/personnel carriers you see hauling tourists around large, coastal cities like SF, Boston and Baltimore.  A couple of days after this, a Duck boat in Philadelphia caught fire, hit a barge, split apart and sunk, leaving 35 passengers and crew in the water. Two young Hungarian tourists drowned.

Just as I neared the ramp area, a Duck drove up and after some suspense-building by the tour guide, accompanied by blaring rock and roll, the Duck plunged into the water. My fellow mariners seemed to be having a good time and I took pictures of them and they took pictures of me. I suppose I now constituted local color. A brief respite at the ramp allowed me to wolf down a granola bar and water and to make a couple of comfort refinements to the kayak.  A bare end on a rudder cable had been steadily pricking my leg and with the spray skirt off, I found the rubber slip-on cover for the cable end and shifted it back into place.

The next highlight on my cruise was the AT&T baseball park and its famous McCovey Cove. The park is alongside the Mission Creek canal. The Cove, named after Giants’ legend, Willie McCovey, lies just outside the right field wall. McCovey Cove gained more fame when Barry Bonds was chasing the home run record. Dozens of paddleboats and kayaks would converge in the Cove, hoping to catch a Bonds home run. The park is quiet today but seems like a wonderful place to catch a game, from the stands or the water.

Continuing past AT&T, under two cantilevered drawbridges and deeper into the Mission Creek, I encountered the houseboat row. My pre-visualization of the houseboats was wrong. Although they are large, two story and occupy valuable space, they are generally shabbier than expected. The ones deepest in the cover were the sharpest and best tended but the estuarine funk was greater there, as was the traffic noise from the overhead I-280 highway.

The other side of the canal, which was maybe 100 feet wide, was lined by high rise, high dollar condominium buildings. I floated with the wind and current back through the canal, letting the Lazy Boy rudder do the steering. My final leg carried me past dozens of sailboats tethered at the South Beach marina. If kayaking is not firmly entrenched in SF, sailing is.

Back at Pier 40, I was cleaning and organizing the gear when a middle-aged Asian woman approached. She was interested in kayaking and mistook me for a City Kayak employee. She lived locally and we had a hearty exchange about the joys of the city and of kayaking. I had the pleasure of introducing her to Ted and perhaps contributing in a small way to the growth of kayaking in San Francisco Bay.

Hindsight. I think I could have managed a paddle around the Golden Gate on this day, particularly with a knowledgeable guide. If going solo, I would monitor the winds and weather, pick a sunny day, consult the currents chart closely, choose a slack tide period of a summer day, dress for the water, go on a weekend, closely watch shipping traffic, let someone know my plans and have a bomb-proof roll. And pray for luck, good weather and the GG’s blessing.