Does anyone, or has anyone considered an arrangement where someone else stores your boat at the water’s edge for you? They get to use it when you aren’t, and you have it sitting right at the water ready whenever you want.
There are some obvious challenges to such an arrangement - scheduling, damage/abuse, access. I’m just trying to figure out if it could actually be made to work with someone you aren’t already acquainted with.
I guess if you don’t care anything about your boat and possibly paddle, etc., go for it. It wouldn’t work for me.
When we lived in Ann Arbor I kept two canoes in a woman’s pole barn right on the river. She charged something like $200/year and since she lived alone she liked having other people around. There was a combination lock on the door. There were about 10 canoes stored there in addition to mine and I kept good boats there (carbon fiber).
In the spirit of “think win/win” I personally believe that there must be creative options available to people willing to make the effort to find them.
I’ve also got neighbors with waterfront and I would not hesitate to store a boat with them and let them use it.
In Florida alone we have some 1800 miles of coast line water front. I’m sure there was some guessing there. Yes there MIGHT be someone that would like your deal.
We have a local canoe/kayak club with a lot of boats in the boat house that don’t leave the boat house much. The rent isn’t enough. They somehow expected us to take care their boat through two hurricane/tropical storms and let them know how they made it through the storm. Three months after a storm a member asked me if her boat was ok.
As a water front property person I got enough of my own to manage. You’d have to have a pretty good boat that I really wanted to paddle for me to trade privacy, storage, and bother for another boat to use. I need more storage space for my own gear. It just ain’t gonna happen.
If you’re doing the storing make sure the boat isn’t stolen.
Also if for strangers consider the liability for a commercial endeavor. …
Just remembered I’m storing two kayaks in my yard for friends :#
I fantasize about this in SoCal but suspect that people wealthy enough for beachfront property here have zero interest in sharing.
Seems like the hardest part is figuring out how to find someone that may be happy to help you. You might want to approach some small,business owners with waterfront and offer to pay some small fee. There’s a small business on a local river here where the owner is happy to let canoes launch on his property because he was a paddler. I’m pretty sure our local farmer would let me chain a canoe to one of his riverfront trees too. Maybe post a WANTED - WATERFRONT CANOE STORAGE ad at local restaurants?
I’m on inland waterfront and if the right person with a non-box-store kayak wanted to rent beach storage space, I’d probably go for it so long as the paddler’s intention was to paddle and not lollygag on the beach. I keep one of my own boats stored (and locked) on my dock so no need to use someone else’s. Unless it was a surfski. In that case I’d agree to free storage in exchange for using the ski.
As to keeping my Prana on someone’s Lake Michigan waterfront, nope. Even if it was free. That would be too limiting. When conditions are too rowdy on Lake Michigan for my taste, I have lots of inland options to choose from. Keeping the boat in my back porch allows me to make those choices, plus it’s a space protected from the elements.
Interesting to see the different viewpoints on this. In a perfect world I’d be able to leave a boat somewhere for a little while then move it somewhere else for a while. Unfortunately it isn’t a perfect world.
I test paddled a Trak yesterday. This is looking like a more viable solution for my needs.