Sandbar Paddle Company

The lagoon at the Jensen Beach causeway is a mile wide, waist deep over most of it and flat as a table before nine in the morning, which is exactly when Dani Okafor pushes the boards off the beach. Sandbar Paddle rents kayaks and stand-up boards by the hour from a trailer on the causeway’s lagoon beach, and runs a guided two-hour trip at sunrise to the sandbars in the middle of the river, where the water is a foot deep and clear and the rays and small sharks go about their business beneath you.

Rentals come with a life jacket, a paddle and a short lesson on the beach; nobody goes out without knowing how to turn around and get back. Tandem kayaks take an adult and a child, and the boards are wide enough for a first attempt. The sunrise trip takes six people at most, and the guide carries the dry bag, the water and the story of the pineapple docks that used to stand here.

Afternoons bring wind and boat traffic; mornings are the time. From June to September the trips move to first light and finish before the heat.

Good to know

• Sunrise trips need booking the day before; rentals are first come.
• Wear a hat and something you can swim in; you will get wet.
• The causeway lot beside the trailer is free and rarely full before noon.
• Manatees use this water all year; give any shadow a wide berth.
• Children from six can ride tandem; from ten they can paddle their own.