[jyl]

I guess the main thing I would say is find a kayak place and get trained in wet re-entry. We used to practice that regularly. I like sea socks as the boat doesn't fill up with water when flipped. Don't know if your boat takes them. If no sock then install flotation in the boat. This is probably stuff you know already.

My favorite story is, we paddled out to San Martin Is, a group of us, got started late and winds were up, a 10 mile paddle turned into 8 hours in decent swells. One person capsized. On the way back a couple days later the sea was like glass and we moved effortlessly. Intercepted, or were intercepted by, a migrating whale. We sat motionless in the boats watching the spouts come closer. A pair of huge flukes appeared 60 feet away and the whale glided under my wife. The water lifted her as he passed. It was a blue whale, the only one I've ever seen.

The guy we took these trips with is the only man who has paddled from California to Hawaii solo. It took him 60 some days, I think. In a double modified so that he could lay down and sleep. He hit some storms where he couldn't sleep for days, had to keep paddling to stay upright. Navigated by sextant. Went through some dead zones where he couldn't catch any fish, ate his toothpaste. Met a Navy ship and asked them to tell his family that he was alive, they refused. (Edit: about the ship, that is what he remembers but he was hallucinating for some of the trip.) He was a great and a special guy. Last I heard he had gotten burned out on leading trips, and is teaching high school in SoCal.