Since we love traveling and experiencing new things, we always save up our money for adventures rather than renting a bigger space or accumulating more stuff for our home. Lately, we realized we have made many like-minded friends who would also rather have experiences over things.
Tinggly let’s you gift some of the world’s best experiences. They have over 350 experiences in more than 80 countries. You can get cooking classes, skydiving, diving with sharks, etc. We, of course, wanted to test it out for ourselves first, and since we’ve been getting into water sports, we decided to go on the Channel Islands Exploring Experience.
First, we had to book a ferry ride to East Santa Cruz (Scorpion) in the Channel Islands with Island Packers which takes about an hour. We thought it would be a boring ferry ride, but it turns out there were lots of whale and dolphin sightings. That’s going to have to be a separate post now!
We spent roughly three-and-half hours out in the water exploring caves and learning more about the Channel Islands. Since you’re with a group, you’re taking turns steering through the caves, and you have plenty of downtime to rest while you wait.
The water was filled with thousands of tuna crabs! They aren’t normally up in this area, but we were told ever since El Nino, the warm weather has brought tons of them up to the California shores.
After we got back, everyone was ready to eat. They provided sandwiches and plantain chips for us. We tried both the Italian and the chicken so we could compare, and the Italian >> chicken. It has a bit of a kick to it. :) We also spotted some island foxes trying to steal our food!
Thanks Channel Islands Outfitters for taking the last photo of us going through the caves. All our other photos were taken with a Canon 5D Mark III, 35 mm / 1.2 L lens, and a EWA-marine underwater housing.
We had a great time on our outing. Jacob had gone kayaking in La Jolla, and liked this experience much more because it had many more caves to explore as opposed to just one.
We can see that Tinggly is a great gift for any adventurer or traveler friend. Once you gift it, they have 2 years to redeem it, and they can even redeem it while traveling abroad.
Gift an Experience HERE.
Pro Tips for Kayaking Channel Islands National Park:
- Bring a water bottle (these are our favorite travel water bottles) to take on the kayak with you. This one is really great on the go.
- If you don’t have a preference for sunscreen, they provide a huge jug for everyone to use.
- They also provided wet suits, dry bags, safe boxes to store up anything you don’t need while kayaking, and lunch afterwards!
- Watch your food and snacks at all times. The island foxes are quite sneaky.
- We wished we had brought our long lens to take photos of the island fox, since it could be stored away while kayaking.
- If you’re prone to getting cold, wear your bathing suit and an athletic (quick dry) shirt. You don’t want a wet cotton tshirt on or it will be colder. We didn’t wear shirts under and we were fine, but we also didn’t fall in.
- There’s always a chance that you’ll flip, so expect to get wet. We had a calm day on the water.
- There is a lot of hiking and exploring on the island. You can arrange to camp overnight if you’re interested. We wished we had. Sometimes you have enough time after kayaking, but our trip ended up running late.
- We brought these water shoes (mine are kids size) that are great for both water and day hikes.
- If you’re redeeming your Tinggly, be sure to read all the details about each experience in case there are additional costs. Ours did not cover transportation to Channel Islands, and we had to book a ferry ticket to East Santa Cruz (Scorpion) in Channel Islands separately.
- Bring dramamine (less-drowsy) if you’re prone to getting sea sick on the ferry and sit in the bottom back of the ferry.
- If you do end up sitting in the back of the ferry, it can get chilly, so bring extra layers.
Have you been kayaking before? If so, where?
What’s the most unique gift you’ve ever gotten?
Thank you Tinggly for hosting our kayaking experience & Island Packers for providing transportation to Channel Islands.
All opinions, photos, and text are our own. Thank you for supporting the brands that make Local Adventurer possible.
