Baja “Lite” Kayaking

May 2024 my art class was interrupted by fun things! Went kayaking with Bill Vonnegut for a week in Baja Mexico. He’s down there for 5 weeks or so in the spring but this week long session was advertised as being ‘Lite’ & for people who weren’t confident enough for the full experience.

The joke was on us because once we were there we were told that conditions our week were bigger than they’d been all year and we were doing all the same things. This has redefined my thoughts about what ‘big’ conditions look like.

We stayed at a little cabin owned by Victor Leon – either inside the cabin or camping outside. I did both because I started camping but on day 2 my air mattress deflated and I moved inside. As you might expect in Baja, it was sunny and warm and we were right on the ocean.

All photos of me below are by Bill Vonnegut. Bill has a knack for making your run look really epic.

Bill also took this video of me at the “elevator”. It took me about 20 minutes of watching the waves and others before I was willing to get this close to it. By the end I was ready to get closer.

When we first drove up there were blue whales spouting just offshore. They stayed in the area for about 4 days and we were able to get quite close to them once. Photo by Victor Leon. I’ve been close to Orcas before but the idea that a living creature can be this large is just amazing.

There was no video of my best ‘near miss’ so I created this helpful cartoon to illustrate it. (Bonus cartoon of what it looked like when Kathy got surfed into a rock)

Summary: this was an amazing trip where I feel like I really leveled up my skill. A+ Would go again. Probably not until 2026, but I very much want to go back.

The captions read: 1. Me: happily entering. 2. Looming wave + Rocks/No Water + Sense of impending doom 3. Wall of sharp things. 4. Frantic back paddling + Exiting: like being shot out of a canon * I may be taking some artistic license here. 5. Woohoo! + I didn’t die!!