When I was a drug dealer in my early 20s, I traveled most of Northern California.
Each week I navigated the winding back roads of Lake, Colusa, Humboldt, Del Norte, Modoc, Nevada, Siskiyou, Shasta, Tehama, Plumas and Butte counties. It was an ideal existence. My customers were educated and welcomed my demonstrations on the latest and most popular use techniques. There were times I felt as though I was changing lives, and many times possibly saving some.
One summer while driving along the Trinity River, I pulled my Ford Contour to the shoulder to watch some whitewater kayaks maneuvering in the rapids. Hypnotized by their skills, I figured that kayaking is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.
I found a “Kayaking for Dummies” paperback at a bookstore in Arcata and read it cover to cover that night. Excited, I started researching kayaks, gear, how to read the water and learning techniques on how to roll. I calculated there was enough time between my deals, so why not take up kayaking?
When I got home from that trip, my wife informed me that “we” were pregnant. A few months after my daughter was born, I quit drug dealing and forgot about kayaking all together.
Eighteen years later, a buddy of mine asked me to go on a whitewater rafting trip down the South Fork of the American River. I assumed that meant we all were going to jump in a rented whitewater raft and float with a guide. I didn’t realize my buddy was an expert in navigating whitewater until he invited me over to his place to prep his raft a few days before the trip.
While pulling gear out of his garage he spun colorful tales about dislocated shoulders, concussions and near-death experiences. He had pictures and stories of Grand Canyon trips, Class III and IV rapid runs, and exotic waterways in South America and Alaska.
My buddy looked at me, and like my past profession, knew by my expression he had me hooked. Heck, I wasn’t dealing drugs anymore (aka pharmaceutical sales), my kids were mostly grown, I had good life insurance, and so the itch to learn how to kayak resurfaced.
I didn’t have a kayak, but my buddy pulled and shifted a couple of his “boats” around and there it was, a dusty and faded blue, green, red and white tie dye kayak. A Dagger. My buddy apologetically laid the Dagger at my feet and carefully pulled back the metallic ribbons of duct tape on the front bow revealing a huge hole.
He explained the Dagger was retired now because it fell off a trailer and was dragged on the pavement for the better part of 10 miles, thus creating the offending gape below the bow. Channeling Jeff Spicoli, I muttered that I could fix it. My buddy was puzzled when I offered him $50 for the Dagger. He agreed, but I think he felt badly because he threw in a spray skirt, paddle and several other pieces of kayaking gear.
He then offered to load the Dagger to the bed of his truck and I could follow him back to my place, but we both knew that was a temporary fix. Immediately my brain’s creative juices started pumping to solve the problem. My mind, razor focused with adrenaline, quickly revealed a solution for transporting the wounded Dagger home.
I darted off, saying that I would be back with money in hand and to retrieve my Dagger. Thirty minutes later, as I loaded my Dagger on top of an improvised roof rack of pool noodles, zip ties and bungee cords, his wife looked at me and said, “It takes a crazy person to buy a boat with a hole in it.”
After several hours of YouTube videos, some novice plastics engineering with a heat gun, a plastic pool tablet bucket and screen door steel mesh, two weeks later the Dagger passed a pool float test. In the years that followed, the Dagger has withstood full days of kayaking on countless north state lakes and rivers.
The final tally: $50 for a kayak with a hole in it, $25 for a heat gun, free plastic pool tablet bucket, $5 of steel screen door mesh, making a screaming deal on a Dagger with your buddy … Priceless.
Dave Banathy of Chico is a columnist for North State Voices, which appears each Thursday. Email him at d.banathy@gmail.com.
