[swinginFish]

Doctor said I need more lower body exercise. Wife wouldn't accommodate, so bought a pedal-drive kayak. Hec, I bought 2! Now have a Revo (for sale) and Adventure, an OK Trident 15 (also for sale), and have had 3 scupper pros, a Prowler 15 & 13. Also tried & reviewed a number of kayaks a few years back for Canoe & Kayak magazine. Point is that I've a bit of experience w/a variety of yaks, preferring paddling to peddling in general, but having to turn to/add pedals for issues of health. Having viewed this thread, offer following observation: Paddling is simpler - fewer things to go wrong. Also slower and not too easy to pour and drink a hot cup of coffee while searching for bait on a dark, cold morning.

Paddle yaks can go forward and backward. Hobies can't w/out the necessary bring-along paddle. Kelp doesn't like the Mirage Drive much, and if fishing boiler rocks w/ occasional waves, having a quick reverse is critical. Landing and launching w/out hanging pedals on the beach or serving as unwanted resistance to the push of waves isn't pleasant either, and a front hatch that’s too small to allow stowage of the pedal thing inside causes one to question what the Hobie designers were thinking. Should note also that fishing lines and fish tend to misbehave, i.e., they go where they want at times, and that means into your not-so-"Mirage" Drive and/or rudder system. The Hobie “twist & stow” rudder system is also something I find annoying and unnecessarily complex (over-engineered) - and I'm not referring to its now-"upgraded" dual knob approach for deployment. With pedal drives, there's just more stuff down there, so more vigilance is needed.

In my case, I figured the Hobie Adventure offered a reasonable mix of options, i.e., its long, narrow, tracks, paddles and pedals well. Down side - its long and narrow and, while fast, is akin to the Scupper Pro, i.e., wet and a tad tippy. Thus far, it seems storage and stowing comparatively sucks in all foot-powered Hobies (pedal drive takes up a lot of internal/central hull space - can't stow rods, nor anything of size like you can in a OK Trident), but it doesn't take an Einstein to recognize that everything's a trade off, and there simply is no "perfect" boat out there. IMHO, the real trick is to look at a lot of boats and how they're rigged, and outfit whatever you have/acquire so that it gets close to meeting your needs. Then, through use, refine the rigging so that its as robust and user-friendly as possible, and fish on it a lot so that reaching for stuff becomes second-nature.

In the final analysis, the kayaks we're most familiar with are all just pieces of polyethylene, with the thrill of catching a big fish from a pedal or paddle-propelled craft great no matter which is used (Not too long ago, it was the thrill - not the craft - that generated a sense of brotherhood amongst kayak fishermen). Granted, the pedaled craft can go faster and uses less energy to get you most of the places you want to go, but at a price. In my case, I’ve proven that I can/do get backlashes while chucking iron from any platform, and the fish under the birds I've been chasing still seem to head south no matter how – or how fast - I don’t get to them. Indeed, I’ve proven myself able to farm good-grade pescado from every craft I’ve ever fished on.

Life is full of choices, and whether we like it or not, it is also a moving target. In other words, our needs can/do change over time. The question of pedals versus paddle may be interesting, but in the greater scope of things, rather irrelevant. That said, bringing a thermos and having my hands free to pour and sip something hot as I pedal off to who-knows-where in the frigid pre-dawn hours has, at this time of my life, rather persuasive appeal.

Avery