Sea Kayaker's Deep Trouble: True Stories and Their Lessons from Sea Kayaker Magazine

I have been kayaking for 4 years now and have read several books on sea kayaking, hands down this is the best book out there. Other books are good to serve as guides for where to paddle, but no other book I've come across offers so much. This book should be included in the sale of all kayaks. This book, if read and followed, will end up saving your life some day.

I have been teaching sea kayaking courses for 7 years ranging from 3 hour nature tours to 6 day self-contained trips. Teaching on the coast of Northern Califonia has presented me with many challenges and potentially dangerous scenarios. The safety intro in the beginning of this book is simply the most comprehensive I have read or heard from another instructor. It is a great jumping off place for beginners and experts provided they paddle with other experienced individuals. I also co-authored a boating safety instructional manual for California Department of Boating and Waterways and can therefore appreciate the power of word choice. Matt Broze has chosen his words carefully and with precision. The reader should pay close attention and learn all that is presented in the safety intro as well as the 'Tips" in each chapter. I look forward to another book by Broze if he should choose to write one.

I have kayaked for almost twenty years, and I read this book twice and will read it again. When paddling in the ocean or sea or Lake Superior, it is all too easy to "cut corners" and this book has served to focus my attention back to the essentials of basic safety. I have lent the book to many experienced paddling friends who are similarly impressed.

This book is a must-read for every kayaker, not just sea kayakers. These true, white-knuckle accounts drive home the point that the unexpected can and does happen, often with tragic results. It's too bad the kayakers who perished or were on death's doorstep in these stories did not have the benefit of reading this book first. It certainly would have sharpened their judgement and kept them out of harm's way.

I just can't let the first posted review stand alone. This is a book I read twice. Not because it wasn't well written. It was. It is so densely packed with stuff I needed to know that once through was not enough.The narratives are well crafted: concise, gripping - I felt like I was right there in the cockpit battling the waves, shaking off the salt spray, and bracing for dear life. The savvy sidebars are packed with right-on-the-mark stay/get out of deep trouble pointers...just the antidote for an anxious reader jarred out his complacency by these often harrowing cautionary tales.The book suceeded in a way I believe the authors intended. It's made me a safer paddler. I make many fewer assumptions that things out there will go well. I prepare for the worst and cut a lot fewer corners. I paddle alone a lot less often. I DRIVE away from a launch site, when conditions look borderline too challenging. The book has improved my judgment, doing the right things at the right time, without my getting wet. As an advanced beginner sea kayaker, I know I am at a high risk interval in my development as a paddler. The authors have recalibrated my margin of safety. It's a good thing. It's a great book.