Newport Beach to Doheny State Beach, September 26th 2005.

The launch from near the pier at Newport Beach was mild and easy. I expected a short boring paddle on this day but was pleasantly surprised to find that the Laguna Beach shoreline is spectacular. It has rocky cliffs, a few arches and caves (I didn't go into them) and rock gardens (a few I did go into despite being in a fabric boat). And of course lots of beach architecture. One spot I had noticed in the satellite pictures and the California Coastal Record photos looked like a trailer park from the air. Sure enough this was a strip of pre-fab homes, the kind that come split in half on two Diesel truck trailers. They were mounted on piers over the sandy beach. These must have been built before the advent of the Coastal Commission, put there by rif-raf, poor people who can no longer afford to do things like this since only the super-rich can get past the Commission now. Sure enough, the cliff right next to this strip had several incredible mansions built on it.

I rounded Dana Point after lunch and the afternoon wind and waves shoved me at over 5 miles and hour towards my campsite. The swell was large and dumping on the beach. I would have landed OK if my foot hadn't caught on something inside and tripped me into the wash as I tried to exit. The satellite pictures and Coastal Record photos had failed to show me an important detail of this beach. I thought it was a gentile sloping sandy beach leading directly to the campsites. But it turns out there were several 10 foot berms in the sand that didn't photograph well. I decided to put up with some wear and tear on the hull of my boat and dragged it up these big steps in the sand.

Doheny State Beach seems to be designed for trailers, RVs and car-campers. It was a long walk to find the kiosk and check in for the evening. They asked me why I made a reservation for a parking spot when I could have used the hike-n-bike spot. These spots have lots of extra rules, like you cannot check in until after 4:00 PM. The hike-n-bike spot at this camp was barely long enough for my kayak, right next to the toilet, didn't have a picnic table and heaven help me if a troupe of bicyclists arrived to share it with me. I hiked across the freeway to do a load of wash at the Laundromat. I could have eaten out but I returned to camp to boil dinner over my little gas stove. Besides, I had been lugging the food and stove up and down beaches for days, I needed to use some of it up to lighten the load!

My next door neighbors at camp turned out to be an interesting couple. They are "living on the road" in a Land Rover stuffed to the gills with all their worldly possessions, including two Feathercraft K1 kayaks just like mine. They came over to talk to me about my boat. Their truck was so full of gear that they have a sleeping platform on top of the truck and set up bivy sacks up there most nights. They have a tent packed away for rainy nights.