Looking out over the Bay side of my fav birding trail are small... what do you call them?..... water ways that pass through the marsh. They are mostly just beyond where good bird identifying detail, can be seen from the path, though there's plenty of birds to wonder about. Ive long thought about, and wished for a kayak, so that I could paddle those places and get closer. Having capsized a canoe once, years ago in a New England salt marsh on a 20 degree day, trying to turn about in one of those skinny water paths, I worried about what binos I would take to kayak here. The little Zeiss Pockets seem about perfect, do to size, weight, optics, given the other gear to include paddle, I'd need to keep track of. I'm not sure though, I'd be happy to dunk them in the salt. Buying something less, to see less, seems a frustration though.
Last week, hiking with a fellow birder encountered on the trail, we saw a guy in a kayak paddling along exactly where I wanted to be. Envy, turned to surprise, then a bit of controversy, as my birding acquaintance started to yell at the guy to get out of there and stop disturbing the birds! Yikes. I confessed to her, that was exactly where I wanted to be and was surprised that the occasional paddler deserved such criticism. It was sort of fun, but maybe not so much fun for the birds, to see the flocks rise up, circle and then settle back down behind, as the kayaker passed. Harm?
So maybe for me, here, it's not such a great idea, but still. I wonder what others think?
A user review here :
