About the Folks Behind Sit Down Paddle Board
Enjoying exploring a new lake with Julie's Mom AND her dog, Brilla!We are an adventurous family who loves to get out in nature. One of our favorite ways to experience high mountain lakes, fun rivers and the ocean is on our paddle boards. Over the years we have tried out and used a huge range of gear while we have paddled in all kinds on environments in great and terrible weather conditions ...and we have dragged the entire family including the dog and the grandparents on our adventures. Many of the pictures throughout the website are family pictures from our family albums.
Along the way we have gained a wealth of experience regarding the best ways to paddle board and the best gear to use. We do not specialize in paddle board racing or race gear as that is not our area of focus. We also do not provide a ton of information about rigid paddle boards since we quickly moved to inflatable paddle boards (aka blow up paddle boards) because 10-12 foot rigid boards were simply not practical for us to take in our RV or our minivan. Plus, we usually have multiple boards with us since we are a family of six.
We love paddle boarding and our goal with this website is to help others start paddle boarding or experience more fun paddle boarding so you go out more! Moreover, learn from our mistakes, check out our paddleboard and accessory gear review pages to get the lowdown on the best equipment regardless of whether you are stand up paddling solo, sit down paddling with the family, including the dog or taking grandma out on a wild adventure.
Maizie and Chloe doing a few yoga moves while we were exploring a new lake.One of the big motivations for starting this website was the looks and comments we always get when we are out on the lake. "That looks really comfortable" and "Hey, I could do that." and "That is so cute, I should take my dog paddle boarding", are just a few.
Since we get so many questions about our favorite paddle board set up, including our folding chairs, harnesses for our dogs and other accessories we use to when we are out at the lake, we figured we should start sharing them online so we can help more people get started.
Our name, Sit Down Paddle Board comes from a brainstorm John (AKA "Dad") had while we were out paddle boarding on nearby Scotts Flat Reservoir. While paddling back from the river area to the day use parking against a strong head wind, John said, "Look at all of those people fighting the wind. They are either standing up and barely making any headway or they are hunched over on their boards looking very uncomfortable paddling without any support." We are beating them all back to the day use area while our boats were moving so smoothly thru the water and we were so comfortable. This was not an unusual occurrence and as usual people we passed were commenting, "That looks really comfortable", and "What a great idea, I love your chair!" All of a sudden John just blurted out, "Hey, we should start a website or a store called Sit Down Paddle Boarding. Get it? Like Stand Up Paddle Boarding, but for people like us who don't like to stand up all of the time and want to be comfortable and enjoy paddle boarding." And so it began...
