A collection of travel and adventure stories

Gualala River Kayaking

Description and Directions >>

Description:
The Gualala River is located in Sonoma and Mendocino Counties of California and covers 298 square miles, although not all kayakable. The river enters the Pacific Ocean near the town of Gualala, CA.

Activities:
camping, hiking, kayaking, fishing

Directions:
From San Francisco and Santa Rosa areas:
Take Highway 101 north to River Road just north of Santa Rosa. Turn left on River Road and continue to Guerneville, where River Road becomes Highway 116. Continue through Guerneville on Highway 116 to Scenic Highway One and turn right (north) through Jenner for about one hour to the city of Gualala. After crossing the bridge over the Gualala River take the first right (about 1/2 mile) on Old State Road. There are a number of dirt roads that will lead to the river.

From Sacramento and Vallejo area:
Take Highway 80 West to Highway 37 in Vallejo, and then continue to Highway 101 north through Santa Rosa to River Road. Follow the above directions from River Road.

From Eureka and Northern California:
Take Highway 101 south to either Highway 20 from Willits to Fort Bragg then south on Scenic Highway One, or take Highway 128 from Cloverdale to Navarro River Beach then south on Highway One to the City of Gualala. After driving through Gualala, turn left onto Old State Road.

Story Date 7/21/2005
Publish Date 12/27/2005

Story Perspectives >>

According to Mikala: I love visiting the Northern California Coast. The views are very peaceful, and the smells are very refreshing. During our visit to Gualala, we stayed in a rental house on the cliffs called Sunset Cove. This was a great place to stay. The house was very private and the property was beautiful.

We had thought that we might kayak on the Russian River, but after driving along the river, we decided to try Gualala River instead. We put in just a few miles up, since it was fairly shallow at this time of the year. We tried kayaking up a little bit, but ran aground on a few rocky sand bars. As we kayaked back down the river, we had to get out of our kayaks a couple times and haul them over the pebbles.

The view is fantastic, since the banks are covered with tall pine trees. As you get closer to the ocean, the trees start to dissappear and you come to the sand dunes and rock walls. We pulled our kayaks out onto the sand and walked over the dunes to the ocean side, where we sat and ate lunch. It was pretty cloudy and windy, so it was cold. Once we got back into our kayaks to return, the sun started coming out. The sun shining on the blue water was very nice.

During this trip, we attempted to kayak on the ocean again at Van Damme State Park. It started getting very windy and was a little hard to kayak back to the beach (in fact a little scary). Up to this point, we had noticed a fairly flat water on the ocean...I guess we should have taken advantage of it when we had the chance!

On our way back to Sacramento, we decided to take a drive back up Hwy 1 along the coast. As usual, we saw many beautiful views!