A Yourlocalguides Experience by kayak along the coast of Barcelona
We are very excited to have Yourlocalguides Experience again with the canoeing school SK Kayak, after a wonderful first experience at its river base in Sant Pere Pescador, before the big pandemic. Today the guide and kayak instructor will be Dani Garcia, in charge of Barcelona’s base (since Pau Calero and Rai Puig are normally in charge of making the trips to the north coast).
What we share this time is the discovery of Barcelona’s skyline viewed while paddling through the sea coast. The kayak route led by Dani Garcia is suitable for all levels, you just need to sign up and enjoy the experience! It must be said that everything is very well organised and doing the activity is easy and comfortable, even the location of SK Kayak base in Barcelona is easy to reach – by car (if necessary there is a car park 50 meters away) or by public transport.
Nautical base Sk Kayak BCN on the seafront. San Sebastian Beach.
The activity lasts two hours, including the initial meeting and basic Kayak notions, the route through the sea, the farewell closure and the shower. By the way, a few days before they asked us if we wanted to do the morning route, the midday route or the sunset route. We thought it was best to do it at noon, to be able to complete the experience by chatting with the group while having lunch together. They say the mornings are quiet and the afternoon ones are spectacular. We’ll write it down for another day!
We are almost the same group that we paddled in the Fluvià river and we wonder how the open sea paddling will go. Will it be more agitated? Are we going to be able to stay on course? Will the paddling technique be the same?
The questions quickly fade away, after changing, putting on sunscreen and taking the kayaks to the beach, our guide takes us through the basic techniques again. With four basic tricks, we are already able to defend ourselves, but if you want to have a higher level to be able to make longer and more demanding routes you can also do other kayak courses to help to improve your skills.
Kayaking and paddling are the protagonists of this ecological means of transport.
We use open kayaks with two seats, the most suitable for short routes and for people who are not much experienced, like us. Dani Garcia reminds us that the boat has no rudder and that it comes to us through the rowing to direct it using a certain technique. We listen carefully, we wouldn’t want to be offshore without knowing how to go where we want to go!
Today there is a wavy sea and to get on the kayak we must get in the water first – after learning the movements that must be done on land because once in the water explaining it becomes more challenging and therefore, with calm, it is first practised on the sand.
If the sea is rough, the guide helps to enter it. He makes it so easy for us! 😉
From this point forward, each couple works together to direct the kayak where they can. At first, we laugh, it seems that we have not listened to the guide, the kayak goes a little “where it wants”. Thankfully at sea, it is difficult to collide with anything and gives us room to catch the necessary dexterity without danger. Little by little, we are moving the kayak toward our guide Dani Garcia.
We head towards the horizon to take visual distance from the city’s coastline, so we can see beyond the first line. We make kayak stops and meet to listen to Dani talking about the city of Barcelona enriching the whole experience. But I won’t be disclosing any more details, if you were to do the activity yourselves, otherwise, I would spoil it, wouldn’t I?
The weather is good, even though some clouds and the sea are rough.
Meetings are moments of relaxation. Take advantage of them! 😉
We tried to get to the Olympic Port but we didn’t manage to get there at the time scheduled. This has not prevented us from seeing the complete coastline with enough perspective to see it well. If the sea is calmer, normally, the route reaches almost the entrance to this marina.
The way back is faster because the stops have already been made to observe everything and we have improved our paddling with all the practice. We even dare to play with the waves that are now in our favour. Perhaps thinking that when we arrive we will go to lunch together makes us hungry and “in a hurry”.
Head towards the base of Sk Kayak with the sea in your favour.
Although the route is not long and can be enjoyed without complications, we can feel our arms have moved in a different way than usual and I’m sure we’ll have some soreness tomorrow, but it will be very welcomed. The truth is that when an activity is carried out with the good company and in a privileged environment like this, the effort lessens… Don’t you think?
We load the material in pairs to distribute the weight of the kayak.
When we get out from the sea, we help each other, either to get off the kayak or to move it up the beach to the nautical base. It weighs a little and we are a bit tired, but we overcome it without problems.
Finally, Dani Garcia asks us for our help to clean the things we have used with fresh water to prevent salt from damaging the equipment and it just takes a minute for all of us to do so. Immediately afterwards, we take a quick shower to remove sand and salt from us and change our clothes. Then, we say goodbye to the guide and thank him for this new experience.
GPS technology has allowed us to observe the route and the stops afterwards.
We got hungry! And as we already anticipate, we have reserved a huge table for finishing off this amazing experience, with a delicious rice dish.
The gastronomic offer in the Barceloneta area is very rich.
Finally, we would like to thank the SK Kayak team and Dani Garcia in particular for proposing this Yourlocalguides Experience. Everything has been very easy, very professional and highly recommended.
Surely we will see each other again soon! We are very curious to discover the morning outings or watch the Barcelona sunset by kayak…
Hugs!