This is the article that was written by the good people over at Canoe & Kayak Magazine for their new SUP Magazine. I was asked to help them organize a SUP trip on the Central Coast. What better place to do that than the Big Sur Coast. Accompanied by the crew from Canoe & Kayak Mag and my friend Fletcher Burton this trip had everything. From trying to figure out where to actually put in with all the gear required for a multi trip SUP paddling adventure, to actually standing on a dead blue whale (NOT advisable!), to finding perfect 2-4 foot waves amidst the incredible scenery of rocky caves and alcoves. Enjoy! -vincent shay www.vincentshaymedia.com

1. Five wanderers dis appear on California s Bi Sur coastline
In a world fraught with uncertainty, escape is an oft-sought commodity. And
there’s no better place to lose yourself than California’s Big Sur, a 90-mile section
of rugged seascape between Monterey to the north and San Simeon to the
south—a perfect place to lose ourselves on a fall weekend.
“Where are you guys?” crackled Vince Shay through the cell phone. “Bad
news,” I answered sheepishly. “We were stuck in L.A. traffic for three hours … and
I just locked my keys in the van.”

2. i
My passengers, SUP Art Director Rob Zaleski and Associate Editor Dave
Shively, seemed ready to leave me at the Chevron pump with the locksmith.
But the van—loaded with four standup boards, paddles, camp stoves, drybags
and enough processed food to keep us alive for weeks—was mine. So they
were stuck with me.
It was close to midnight when we rolled up on Vince and Fletcher Burton,
who were bedded down on a dark roadside. Vince, a 39-year-old videographer
and Fletcher, a 31-year-old contractor, had driven up from Pismo Beach hours
before and scouted what little of our route was visible from the road.
Our plan was to paddle a 10-mile stretch of coastline faced by vertical
cliff walls and towering rock spires, and affording no access to the outside
world. We’d search out a campsite somewhere along the way, our criteria
being shelter and, most importantly, an empty surf break.
We slogged the boards down an old dirt road through a shuttered state
park, where Dave and I strapped drybags onto the noses of our 12-foot
boards. Fletcher and Vince, who opted for smaller rides in anticipation of
the surf to come, seemed to be second-guessing their choice. Fletcher’s
overloaded 10-footer was sinking up to his shins, and Vince wobbled like a
drunken carnie on his 11’0”.
He’d be off his board soon enough. Our first stop was the carcass of
a blue whale that Vince had spotted during his reconnaissance the previous
day. The blue whale is far and away the largest living creature on the planet,
stretching more than 100 feet and weighing nearly 200 tons. This one had
been struck by a passing ship a few days earlier, and sharks had been feasting
on the giant mammal’s greasy flesh.
As we paddled towards the whale, I noticed streaks of oil spreading
rainbows across the dead-flat water like gas spilled from an outboard. Before
the endangered species was protected in 1966, whalers would routinely take
more than 13,000 gallons of oil from a single blue—a factoid the boys were
clearly unaware of when they decided to clamber onto the whale’s belly-up
carcass. Dave, Vince and Fletcher apparently had a bucket-list item to check
off: whale walking. They hopped on the great beast’s underside, taking
pictures and ooing at the sizeable chunks taken out of its tail by passing great
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3. whites–which, fortunately, we’d yet to see.
Rob and I sat back and enjoyed the shit show, which got
markedly better when the three stooges tried to remount their
boards. The dead whale blubber was caked to their shoes and as
they stepped back onto their rides, each of them began slipping
and sliding, falling repeatedly into the potentially shark-infested faces were clean. And our egos were boosted.
waters. Blubber was everywhere, and the smell of dead fish hung The whale-walkers had a hard time getting traction on their
like a pall. Vince fell in near the whale’s head, blubber covering boards, slipping and sliding on the leftover blubber. They rubbed
his face. “I just threw up in my mouth!” he screamed. sand and kelp all over their boards until they gained footing.
We moved on but the whale remained with us the rest of the Fletcher shredded every wave he caught, while Dave paddled
trip, a silent but very smelly rebuke. Thankfully, the ocean did not into the biggest wave of the trip, a head-high, peeling right that
hold the same grudge: The miles slipped by easily as we wove came out of nowhere.
in and out of sea caves, playing with the soft swell. Big Sur’s We built a fire at the high-tide mark and huddled close to
notoriously rough seas were calm, glassy as a mountain lake. it during the cool evening. I can’t remember Campbell’s Chunky
Aside from overcast skies the conditions were ideal. A little swell ever tasting so good. We crawled into our sleeping bags on the
here goes a long way. soft, grassy chaparral and slept heavily.
After passing a few different waves that looked surfable, we In the morning, we enjoyed one more exhausting surf
came to a pristine cove with a grassy shelf just above the beach, session, packed up and paddled the last of our eight miles to our
a perfect spot to bivy. A small wave broke off a castle-sized rock takeout, enjoying the awe-inspiring coastline’s vertical rock-walled
in front of our camp, with a right and left-hander on either side of channels and exploring thick kelp beds.
it. We were home. Big Sur has a history of playing host to wanderers like Jack
We dumped our gear, cooked some lunch, and then surfed Kerouac, John Steinbeck and Henry Miller. Count us among the
till we couldn’t walk. The waves were anything but big, but the lucky. Count us among the lost.
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