Paddleboard News

Zoltan Torkos California Paddle Impressions

Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 20 September, 2007 : - - Zoltan Torkos offers his opinion on Tom Jones 'California Paddle.' How did you get involved with the California Paddle? I was good friends with Danny Misken from Huntington Beach, and Danny had taught Tom how to surf.  Tom came to my house to train in Santa Cruz, and we became friends, he told me he was going to do this stand up paddle down the coast, and invited me to become part of the team, that was about 3 months ago.

What is your role?
I am part of the water safety or you could say ‘water taxi’.  I’m one of the Personal Watercraft Operators. 

What was the first day on the water like?
It was really exciting because I was part of something that was going to make a difference to clean up the ocean. I believe in positive change.  It was a foggy day out of the Smith river, and considered a very sharky spot, and it was all new to me because it was probably the second time I had been on a Jet Ski in my whole life.  It was a very exciting moment, I was stepping into a new role, a new part of my life. It was really exciting. It was great.  Baptism by Fog. 

Foggy day, all gray, leaving early in the morning, all I knew was to press the gas.  Rhyn Noll came on board to get the California Paddle started, he’s from Crescent City.  Rhyn was very understanding and very kind in helping me on that first day. Rhyn told me to follow him, I wasn’t nervous, because I knew that Rhyn was leading the charge, and he was very instrumental for me in learning the use of the Personal Watercraft.

Any interesting coastal impressions?
How beautiful our coastline is and how important it is for us to keep it healthy for the future generations.  It’s the most amazing thing, more amazing than any painting.  What we have is Mother Nature, I can’t imagine it looking worse with trash, if we don’t protect it would I look like a wasteland in 20 years.  We have one of the most beautiful coastlines in the world. We have to protect it and respect our land and waters. 

Each little piece had its own character and significant feature to it that was so beautiful, its own feeling to its area.  The Golden Gate bridge passing underneath was probably the equivalent of me in my life going to the moon, because it was completely out of this world for me. I had drove over the bridge which has a truly different feeling than when you are on the water looking up at the entire structure.

I had never been under it or in the ocean in the San Francisco bay and it was just ‘big ships’ and heavy water moving fast on an outgoing tide.  It was nothing like I had ever done before, it was a significant ‘gateway’, symbolic in fact. It was sad because right before I came into the bridge, the first thing I find is a discarded floating bait tray, I pick it up and put it into my boat, I picked up the Styrofoam garbage, it made me feel discouraged.  This significant moment laced with trash.

Any interesting marine life observations?
The further down the coast we travel, the more I see fishhooks in seagulls mouths, first thing when we pulled out to Mavericks I had to pull a big plastic bottle out of the water when we came out of the harbor to begin the day’s trek, Further up north we didn’t see as much of that, the further I go the more I find myself doing water clean up, and seeing animals impacted by pollution and plastics. 

What does the California Paddle mean to you?
It means that people have a choice, that people can stand up and make sure our oceans are not a wasteland if everyone is aware of the problem someone can come up with the answer.  It may not be me, but someone like a scientist or someone of that caliper who can make products that are biodegradable so our children can have a future with the ocean and its creatures, without the disadvantage of our neglect.

How has this added to your life, this experience?
It’s made me really appreciate being able to go into the ocean and that I want my niece and nephew and my future, the children of this planet to have the same experience as me up and down the coastline with access without pollution.  It would be so sad if the future generations don’t want to go into the ocean because they could get sick from all the pollution we contribute towards.  That’s what it is like when you are a surfer, wondering after every rain if you are going to be sick again, paddling through crap and floating debris.

Have you witnessed a lot of garbage in the water?
The closer we get towards major metropolitan areas, the pollution is drastically increasing.

What has been the greatest hardship for you?
Seeing more pollution as we travel further south, we live on some of the most beautiful coastline imaginable and I see brown water, plastic, people that don’t know that is going on.  People say ‘why are you doing this?’ Because they aren’t aware, they aren’t watermen, watermen know we get infections from the water contaminants, my passion and love is for the ocean. 

We have had a big problem with people thinking that the four stroke personal watercraft we use are big polluters, when really it’s not true, 2 stroke engines and larger vessels have greater impact, we didn’t see any other personal watercraft on this trip so far, its hysterical the fear people project about nothing. 

There is a misunderstanding about our craft, our crafts are the cleanest boat you can have at this time, we did our research on the most environmentally friendly support boats and the four stroke PWC are it!  People have automatic prejudice against Jet Skis, Waverunners, and PWCs when they don’t know any better, they haven’t done their research, they assume something they don’t know anything about. 

That is dangerous, prejudice is dangerous, that’s been proven by the way people treat one another, we have seen it on this trip and been denied access because of negative people.

Creative ways to solve an obstacle or a setback?
We have been shut down on one side of the San Francisco bay, they came to try to ticket Shawn, we had to go to the other side of the bay out by Candlestick just to get into the ocean, we had to drive 45 minutes through San Francisco because people have been misled about PWC, but a rubber inflatable boat with a propeller and 2 stroke engine can go out creating more pollution in comparison of the two and it is permitted?  That doesn’t make any sense does it? The hardest thing is finding water access for our safety support team.

How does the team hold up spiritually, emotionally and physically?
We have to always remember through the whole trip we are not doing it for our own ‘self’ but we are doing it for everyone, our world, our friends, the future, the people, our children, we’re out there to make other people healthy happy and free!  Its easy to keep our hopes up because we know we are making a difference

What does it feel like to be in mid stride with the environmental paddle now?
It feels really good, I want people to become more aware and I hope we can reach more people about how bad this is.  Even with people who do not live near the ocean, all across America, the globe, getting the awareness out won’t end with the California Paddle, it is just a new beginning of an awareness outreach program.

Gratitude
I want to thank my girlfriend, Jamie Jansen, and my entire family for always sticking by me, and everyone who believes in positive change for our environment and believes in us, I would like to thank the people~

www.TomJonesTV.com
www.CaliforniaPaddle.com

More USA/Cen Amer. surfing news available here
Check the latest West Coast Surf Reports and Forecasts

New! B2B News ASBE-Surf   |  Receive News-Alerts

Shawn Alladio

Paddleboard - Surfersvillage