From dangerous white water rapids in Pakistan, to 130-foot drops off waterfalls, Dane Jackson has taken his Kayak to places no one else has ever been. We talk kayaking tips, the best rapids near your and his next big adventure. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Most Boring Things We Have To Do.
Dane Jackson: 01:21ish
Pointless: 32:15ish
Top 5: 54:07ish
https://www.instagram.com/danejacksonkayak (Dane Jackson Instagram)
https://www.youtube.com/danejackson (Dane Jackson YouTube Channel)
https://www.redbull.com/us-en/athlete/dane-jackson (Dane Jackson Redbull Page)
Interview with Kayaker Dane Jackson
Nick VinZant 0:10
Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant. Coming up in this episode, we're getting extreme on the water, and boring at home,
Dane Jackson 0:22
I'd say the most challenging, and it's probably the Indus River and Pakistani some of the biggest whitewater that I've ever run, as well as I have the least amount of portages, because I ran this one math about but it's the first person to run it. The biggest waterfall I've run is about 134 feet. I did it last beginning of last year, the biggest risk and the biggest thing people are trying to avoid when running big waterfall and having the front of the kayak stay up, which is what called a boo. And that means landing flat off the waterfall. And what that would mean is that that can often lead to breaking your back.
Nick VinZant 0:52
I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest has taken on some of the most dangerous environments on Earth. We're talking about kayaking through class five rapids in Pakistan, and dropping off of 130 foot tall waterfalls in South America. This is extreme kayaker Dane Jackson. So I was watching some of your videos on YouTube. And I was trying to figure out is this safer than I think it is? Or more dangerous than I think it is.
Dane Jackson 1:31
I would say that probably a little bit more control. And more that goes into the clip just seeing then you probably realize like scouting, we look at the features, we have safety. There's a lot of processing like a lot of things happen before we you know, fall off a 60 foot waterfall 100 foot waterfall run the biggest whitewater there's a lot of things that need to happen before that. Like it's almost like a star in a movie. Like we scout it out. We make a plan. We need this person here for safety. And there's a lot that goes into it on top of just our general skill to do it safely. until there's probably a bit more control than you think. But of course, it's always dangerous. The natural river
Nick VinZant 2:05
I guess because I was looking at it right. It's it's definitely not just like, Hey, I got a lifejacket on, like I'm gonna float. Right? Does it work? Does it work like that at the end? Like, all right, whatever happens, I got this life jacket and I'm gonna be okay.
Dane Jackson 2:18
Not quite, I wish it would that strike behind for sure. I mean, there are times that you know, the river maybe just goes into a big pool below. And even if you came out of your kayak, because you have that light jacket on, you're probably gonna be fine. But a lot of times when it comes to the much harder whitewater like, even if it's not even the most insane thing ever, there's a lot of things in rivers that can be dangerous, you know, water goes in between two rocks in a weird way. Or maybe water gets pushed under kind of like a cave, or maybe just delivered just keeps going and going and going. So if you came out of your boat, you wouldn't be able to stop essentially. So there's, it's not just safe, because you have the life jacket like jacket really helped. But there's definitely still a lot of dangerous factors in the river that we have to kind of maneuver around or deal with or be ready to deal with if something goes wrong.
Nick VinZant 2:59
What's kind of the most dangerous thing like what are you always looking out for? Is it a drop? Is it the speed of the water? Is it hitting something on the bottom or what is it?
Dane Jackson 3:09
It just depends on where you're at. You know, there are different risks and different things to look out for when it comes you know big waterfalls versus big whitewater or if you're in a very tight little technical river tight little creek or steeper whitewater. Usually what happened is, there's places where the water gets shoved in between two rocks where you wouldn't be able to fit through what's called like a sieve. So it depends on the way water you're dealing with. But in the end, everything has its own danger. I mean, even one country to the other might have a different style of danger because of the different types of rock and stuff. And when it comes to big water, you know a lot of times the issue with that is that like it sounds like big whitewater, if you're out of your cave, you ever came out of your kayak, you know, it's much more powerful. There's much more like scenes where like the two flows come together, you can get a lot of downtime, they're out of your kayak, like things like that. So there's everywhere had its own kind of risk. And there's a lot of things you're looking for at each different river like every river is different.
Nick VinZant 4:01
How did you get started in this man?
Unknown Speaker 4:03
My dad's a professional kayaker. When I was born, he was already broke. I could have just gone to the 92 Olympics for slalom. So he basically grew up doing that on top of doing a lot of whitewater. And when I came around, he made it he's retired from slalom made its full switch, basically over to whitewater kayaking. And when I was born, I was born in Washington DC and I have an older sister as well. But when we were about four years old, we moved into an RV full time for about six years. And all we were doing is traveling around going with my family to wherever my dad wanted to go kayak whether we go to this area because he wanted to run the river or we go to Colorado because that's where all the kayaking events are. So we're basically traveling around full time without a house for about six years. And even when we moved to Tennessee back in like 2003 we still travel most of the year in an RV and even now that I'm on my own program, I'm in my RV right now and I'd love to end up February and I won't be going back out of my RV until pretty much November. What do you like about it? One it gave me the opportunity through kayaking I'm sure my dad would have done with any sport, but through kayaking allowed me to grow up with my family and travel all these amazing places and have a very unique childhood. But on top of that growing up and even now moving forward, it allowed me to go to so many incredible places all over the world, while doing the sport that I love. And I actually just enjoyed going kayaking every day, if I can, wherever I am actually enjoy hiking, it's not like I'm just hitting for glory, you know, I just actually really enjoy hiking, when I get to go to all these amazing places with my family and friends and see places that most people might not ever get to see.
Nick VinZant 5:31
Why are you good at it? Like, are you? Are you technically proficient? Do you have like, the strongest arms in the world? Like, what what, what, what, why are you good at it?
Dane Jackson 5:43
I think there's a lot of things, I think there's a lot of different factors. A big part, it definitely didn't hurt growing up, and I had my dad there the entire time to coach me, it doesn't hurt to have the bet there all the time. But not only did I have my dad there, but I also grew up because I grew up surrounded by kayaking, rather than getting into it laid out surrounded by growing up, I got to hang out and watch basically all the top hikers of the world, whether in person or all the kayaking videos that were coming out. So I had a very strong influence growing up and a lot of things that I could watch. But on top of that, I did start to get pretty good and an early age, which allowed me to kind of progress along like just kind of learn things along the way that helped me even now like just things that I learned when I was 10 still benefit me and I can continue to learn even now 27 you know, but also I think a lot of it has to do with like mentally, I'm able to really like understand that like no matter how good I get, I can always get better or right now you know i i didn't always love huge waterfall, but I started to get a little better at running waterfalls, I decided now's a good time to maybe see if I can get better at running big waterfalls. And now I feel really strong running waterfalls. But on top of that, the biggest thing is that I do all aspect of hiking. So I do freestyle kayaking, which is like standing features, little short kayaking, do flips, and things like that. But I also do racing like to time trial, I had to had it like someone who like saw him in other places, like I do races like that. But then I also do a lot of Expedition and extreme kayaking, big water, waterfalls, whatever it is. So I think by combining all the different aspects, each kind of played off each other, and I can learn one thing in the freestyle aspect that allowed me to do better in extremely thing or stream kayaking, whatever it is, and vice versa. So I think that the main thing is always willing to try to learn new things progress, my skill, but also, everything kind of feeds off each other to have a lot of very technical things as well.
Nick VinZant 7:37
Not to imply that you're chasing this or anything like that. But when you look at the sport as a whole, like where's, where's the money in the glory ad, right? Is it in the Olympic stuff that I see in the Olympics, where they're going back and forth? It is in the crazy expeditions to places that nobody's ever been? Is it in the most extreme stuff? Like where does where's the money in the glory, so to speak,
Dane Jackson 7:59
it depends on how you presented and do it, you know, like there. In the end, obviously, big waterfalls, and extreme hiking is one one of the more one thing to watch, and one of the more dangerous aspects of hiking, but it's definitely in terms of even non hikers can kind of understand like, you're running a waterfall, like that's insane. You know, like freestyle kayaking, it's a little trickier, but you have to know the tricks and things like that. So I would say that in terms of general audience and you know, really capturing attention, you know, waterfall next to a guy can definitely the easiest, but the biggest thing is that you can find you can become someone in the sport in any of the aspects of it. It's just a matter of like, doing it right, like training it right. You know, maybe you make videos, whatever it is, everything kind of comes together. But waterfall definitely, I would say with the glory that but I don't want to really use that word. Because Yeah, you don't want to run waterfall. You don't want to run waterfall just because that you want glory. Like that's the last reason you should ever be running big water bowls and things like that, if you're just doing it for joy, and hiking very much a sport that you know, it's a smaller, nice sport. For the most part. If you're in it, you're just doing it because you love it. And anything that comes after that is is a bonus. But in the end, if you're not in it just because you love the sport, it can be easy to get burnt down on because the smaller sport it takes a lot of effort to keep going all these got to work hard at it. You got to you know, find ways to mark yourself, you know, I'm a videographer, photographer, all that stuff. So I have to do most of the work myself to presenting out along with my friend. So it's a lot of work to be a pro kayaker, but that was great that it's worth it because you actually just I actually just love the sport and Sony pretty much everyone that didn't.
Nick VinZant 9:36
Do you know, is this full time living? You can make a full time living off of it.
Dane Jackson 9:40
Yeah, yeah, it's not always the easiest. But I'm fortunate enough to have some big sponsors on top of the fact that I also have a lot of ways that I can market myself and work whether teaching photos, videos, YouTube, whatever it is a lot of different things that I can apply to be a pro kayaker, and that's what a lot of people do AT Pro kayakers because it's not the biggest sport so you can't rely on Just 100% on skill alone, they use that the find something that allows you to continue to connect. So some people teach in the summer and then travel during the winter. Or like my friend of mine coaches, traveling kayaking program, things like that you kind of gotta find something that works with hiking. And if you truly enjoy the sport, they're gonna work hard, and every cent you make goes right back into be able to pack more.
Nick VinZant 10:21
Okay, I'll ask if you want to answer this directly, feel free to just put a number on it. But let me ask you this, essentially, when you when you look at your earnings, are you closer to ramen noodles or mansions?
Dane Jackson 10:33
Ah, it's all relevant. People might think that I'm a millionaire, the places I go. Like, I people think that because I'm in a big RV, I got a truck and I get to travel year round, they're like, you must be a millionaire. It's like, No, I just like hiking. I like what I do. So I then I put all my money towards kayaking,
Nick VinZant 10:48
when when you run a river? Are you fighting against the water? Or do you just go with it? And like, I'm just trying to survive here?
Dane Jackson 10:57
Yes, we are going against the water probably in a lot of ways. I mean, we're with the water, but water going against it. And that sounds very cheesy, like somebody just put out a card. But um, but basically, yes, we are going with the river, you know, like our goal. It's like some rapids and some rivers like a lot of rabbit, you don't even need to do much other than just say in the middle of the river. And you might have to deal with some features, but you're gonna be totally fine. And other rapids and a lot of times when it comes to river that I don't want to fighting isn't necessarily the word I would use. But basically, obviously, there's a lot of features on the way down a river down a rapid and those features are what make the challenges and the risks and things like that. So like, there's a lot of features that like you know, if you're starting the middle of the rapid middle of the river, and there's something dangerous in the middle at the bottom left of a rapid, you're going to be working against features, whether it's boiled, eddyline, slower water, big crashing feature, you might be working against those features to try to get to the right side of the river and away from whatever dangerous on the bottom left, if that makes sense. So I would say that you're the you're with the river, because you might use some of those feature to your advantage. And then you're also kind of working against it at time trying to get over these features that are trying to put you in either a bad spot and make you have a not as good of a line, if that makes sense.
Nick VinZant 12:17
Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? some fantastic, do it hardest run you've ever done?
Dane Jackson 12:24
That's a tough one. But I would say the most challenging and it's probably the Indus River and Pakistanis, some of the biggest whitewater that I've ever run, as well as the hardest, not only the hardest whitewater and the biggest whitewater for myself and what a lot of people aspire to go run. But also, when you don't run a rapid it's called portaging. And I think people have heard that term before the Indus River. It's even the world top hikers go there. The question people get asked afterwards is how many times did you Portage cut it the Rhondda gorge at the end is and there's a ton of rapids in it. And if you Portage one of these, like all that one Portage, I have the least amount of portages because I ran this one massive app, but it's the first person to run it. So I only have one ported on the entire section. And there's a lot of big white water in there. So I'd say that was my most challenging river I've done so the thing that but there's also some harder ones.
Nick VinZant 13:10
The thing that I've heard is like, Okay, so this is class one, class two, class three, class four, class five, are is what you're doing class five, or is that like, hey, that's just that's for non professionals. And I'm doing something even above that, like class, normal acts or something.
Dane Jackson 13:26
That sounds way cooler than the grading system. grading system guiding is not very strong, because it's very subjective. So yeah, I'm doing clash pod. like to clarify, but my class five might be like someone that's only doing class two, which is the major river, and they step it up into something, they might think that the class five or because it's all about skill level, and like, certain challenges might appear harder to someone else than for myself. So it's a very subjective system. But in the end, yes, I am doing class five, but unfortunately, I wish we had a better system.
Nick VinZant 13:58
So people shouldn't ask you like, Hey, man, oh, that's only class one. And then the beginner gets in there. And they're like, doing double backflips, like he said, but he's kayaker me. Yeah.
Dane Jackson 14:09
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, it's my class. class three is probably a little little easier than most people. But yeah, it's all relevant for sure. It's all subjective,
Nick VinZant 14:19
biggest drop you've ever done.
Dane Jackson 14:21
On the biggest waterfall I've run is about 134 feet. I did it last beginning of last year. The salt O'Malley drop in Chile. It was one of the coolest waterfalls I've ever seen. But it's it's one of the few drops that I'd actually seen a photo like three or four years prior. And I just remember coming back to the photo all the time like oh, I really want to go do this waterfall but I hadn't. I people had told me to shallow 100% sure but ended up going to do it. They started last year and it was incredible. did a whole project on it things like that.
Nick VinZant 14:51
So when you say like 100 134 or 131 say 130 134 so the second tallest job has been done is that The whole like, I go off the waterfall I fall 134 feet I land in the water, or is that like in stages you go down?
Dane Jackson 15:09
No, that's one consecutive drop. When we say coming across a drop height, we're talking about the actual consecutive drop. Even if it's a 20 footer into 100 footer, we're gonna say a 20 foot drop and 100 foot drop, and this one with 134. So it's basically the lip where it becomes vertical and when it hits the bottom now,
Nick VinZant 15:25
did you test that out? Or did you just do it like you like put a cardboard box in a kayak and run it off there?
Dane Jackson 15:31
You just like now? I'm just yeah, that pretty much sums up the sport. Yeah, that pretty much sums up our sports to cardboard boxes. No, basically, like I was mentioning earlier, when it comes to something like waterfalls are definitely not everyone loves doing them because they from 10 footers to 110, footer, waterfalls, it definitely can be one of the more dangerous aspect of hiking on or at the very least good way to potentially like you can get hurt on waterfall. And one of the riskier aspects in terms of like just trying to avoid injury. Because even if you have a perfect line, there are things that can just be a little off and you might pull a muscle, you know, or dislocate your shoulder there are ways to get hurt even if you have a perfect line, waterfall, there. Like by the time you actually see us running a very big waterfall. It's almost like I mentioned earlier, like a stunt a movie, like there's a lot that goes into that one moment, like all you're seeing is the final product. But there's a lot that goes into being able to run that as safe as possible. One, you know, we don't if you've only run a temporary waterfall, you're not going to go fall off 130 foot waterfall the next day there is actual technique and things you can learn to get to allow you to have a better line. And for those that might be confused the goal for a waterfall when you're running it in a kayak and to be a vertical as possible. Hopefully a little bit in the flow that's falling but as vertical as possible and get your body as tucked up as possible. The biggest risk and the biggest thing people are trying to avoid in running big waterfall and having the front of the kayak stay up, which is what called a boob and that means landing flat off the waterfall. And what that would mean is that that can often lead to breaking your back now the crazy thing and the often scary part. It's someone that runs like hunting for waterfalls, people break their backs on 10 foot waterfalls 15 foot Waterfall by landing flat and some people might back in Ufa, I got 90 for waterfall be totally okay if you never know sometimes when it comes to that the ultimate goal is to land add vertical if possible. Sometimes you go over the handlebars and land on your head, which is not a bad landing flat, because usually what will happen is you eject out of your boat when that happened. So that's a much better situation than potentially breaking your back. So either way, we just got a waterfall the biggest question is like what's the best way to make sure I get the front of the kayak down the landed vertical as possible. And the crazy part about that is you actually only have the like split second at the lip, you only have that just like top like 10 feet of a drop to really set your angle you can make adjustments, but at the front of the kayak starts coming up at the top of the drop, there's not so much you can do to save it at that point. So there's a lot of techniques and skills and things you can learn to allow yourself to have the best time possible. And then on top of that, the best way is usually we actually will go look at waterfall without water before we even get to run it because we'll swim below we'll see there k behind it is there a shelf coming out from below the flow like there's a lot of things we scout before we even fall off a bit. So the perfect world we see without water we swim around below. We check behind the fall we check all the different things make sure it's deep. And then once it actually water weather, rain fed gambling, whatever it is, then we have safety team below we'll have three or four people maybe two people in their boats, two people on the shore with throw bag broke the thrill out of like so we have a lot of safety and planning that goes into it so that way if something goes wrong, we're ready. We're definitely not just showing up and falling off. But
Nick VinZant 18:45
Wow, man, if I was gonna go off 134 foot waterfall in a kayak seems like that would be the worst way that I would want to do that person. right because it looks like all right, what's the plan? I'm gonna slam my face into the water all right.
Dane Jackson 19:06
I guess when you put it like that it's happening.
Nick VinZant 19:10
But it looks cool. That's good. Did you have like any Did you get anything from it? Or were you just any bumps bruises? Nothing or do you just like alright, it's no Mario's Tuesday.
Dane Jackson 19:21
Yeah, well the one thing about that is um, so I ran that waterfall and sometimes waterfalls can be anywhere from feeling absolutely nothing just so much. It's like a transition and flow like almost just jumping into a pile of pillow that can literally can like I always do that reference but the only thing I can think of but it can sometimes feel like nothing where you you run the drop and you feel exactly the same after or sometimes it can feel like getting hit by a train. It just depends on the line, the drama and sometimes it just comes down to just the slightest change an angle, but that one I was totally, totally fine. I expected to have a much bigger hit but a very soft, didn't feel anything. And then I actually two days later on the morning, of my Flight. It was an 11 hour drive, but I drove like seven hours the wrong way. It's no way I could run another 104 Waterfall and I'd always wanted to do, I ran out like 7am and then I rallied 11 hours and barely caught my flight. I'm out of Santiago because I just always wanted to do that drop
Nick VinZant 20:14
this that kind of feeds into this other question run where you just got your ass kicked. Either from like a physical or a technical standpoint. Yeah, you just got your ass kicked.
Dane Jackson 20:24
Um, I've been pretty fortunate in the end like I tried to pick I mean, there's been times even on moneda on waterfalls, you know, I've had a few times where things haven't been as soft whether I've been not pulled through multiple that probably have broken a couple of ribs. There's one time where I ran a lot of times you want a good amount of water when it comes to running waterfall because the more water there is, there's more variation and bigger boil below so you know if you the big difference between jumping into air and water versus jumping into flat water, so the more water there is usually means that you can have a softer hip because there's more flow more boiled it doesn't always mean it's softer hit but you definitely don't want to fall off a waterfall had no water at all, but then he was landing in green water and that would be a lot worse. One time I ran a waterfall that wasn't didn't have as much water as I probably should have run it but dropped that hadn't been done and why and I really wanted to do it at about 50 feet, not crazy tall but still a solid side job. Didn't have I had a pretty good line but like I didn't want to stay tuck forward and paddle off to the side. I'm fortunately opened up a little bit I kind of landed behind the waterfall it wasn't a very high volume waterfall. I kind of landed in the green water behind it and from that impact actually kind of almost knocked me out essentially where I would actually like out of it for like 20 to 30 seconds kind of like luckily I stayed up right but I definitely blacked out for at least 20 seconds kind of like pattering the water like really confused and out of it. And then once I came to I was luckily still upright but it was definitely one of the bigger kind of impact I've had in on a waterfall and kind of anything in general
Nick VinZant 21:51
best place in the US to kayak best place in the world
Dane Jackson 21:55
depending on what you want to do. I wish that was an easier question to answer but I would say that every US had a couple different have depends on what you're looking for whether it's steeper kayaking or freestyle kayaking or big water whatever it is. The southeast is an incredible hub for kayaking because you can kayak almost year round even in the winter because you don't really get that much snow and a lot of areas so if it rains you can go hiking even over Christmas to Southeast an incredible spot but there's always California Idaho Washington tough depends on what kind of hiking you're looking to do. best spot in the world. Again, we're looking forward to one big water Africa is usually like the place to go like the damn big river that below the Victoria Falls. One of my favorite sections in the world. I go there every winter, the autumn river in eastern Canada for big water. And you know if you want waterfalls, Mexico, or you can go to Chile. They want to go to Pakistan if you want like if there's hiking all over the place. It depends on what kind of hiking you looking to do. Zealand, India, Indonesia, and it's everywhere. But yeah, no, I think North America and Chile as well as Africa like the strongest, the most popular areas for sure. And I'll do a ton in Europe. Favorite get really long. Yeah. Basically everywhere, everywhere. Everywhere. It depends on what you want a
Nick VinZant 23:12
day away from the Sahara Desert. Not the best kayaking. Right, but yeah, that's pretty anywhere else pretty much good. Your favorite? What is your favorite piece of kayaking lingo?
Dane Jackson 23:24
Oh man, why am I blanking on the tongue? Um, I probably saved more too much. Rowdy, I don't like it. I'm blanking on it right now. It's the dumbest thing to be blanking on. I can I can talk for 10 minutes about all the places in the world I can't pick the one I'm embedded on like I don't know what what is my favorite
Nick VinZant 23:44
best kayaking scene in a movie?
Dane Jackson 23:46
Like it needs to be kayaking or kind of just involved with like the river anything anything overall will depend on whether or not you mean cheesy or epic You know, there's when it comes to you know, there's always like movie scenes where the person falls into the river they're like splashing around and flat water and all sudden it cut to some aerial shot and like the word CGI then bit falling off like a 600 foot waterfall and then being totally fine after, like, movies like that all the time. I mean, depends on what there's I mean, there's like, you know, there's hiking like into the wild, like a friend of mine did the stump word for that on the Grand Canyon. And then there's, without a paddle, there's a drop that they fall off, the three of them fall off. In a canoe they fall off like a 80 foot waterfall, which a friend of mine actually did some work for that as well. So it's but there there's not a whole lot of kayaking in movies, but there's definitely a lot of ridiculous scenes in movies where they're actually like, it's it's the worst CGI but that is falling out 500 foot waterfalls and being totally fine with it's like Rambo or pretty much any Harrison Ford movie or things like that.
Nick VinZant 24:51
If there was a fight between kayakers canoers and stand up paddleboarders, who's winning
Dane Jackson 25:01
Oh man. Well, it's gonna be between the kayakers and supporters started canoes but that's just kind of i think i mean i don't know they're they got big canoe words usually think maybe they like to hunt man that's tough you know kayakers I mean both suffered and kayakers have like they're they're tough you know supported the long paddle they definitely have more ability to you know they have a much better weapon although paddled are pretty long blades on both sides. If that can be a battle to the end, it can be Last Man Standing I think that would be that'd be a brawl, I think people will pay paper for that. Yeah, that's, that's gonna be a tough one. I think it'll be kayakers and supposed to be the last one standing. Who it's gonna be though I don't know.
Nick VinZant 25:45
mistakes that a newbie makes
Dane Jackson 25:47
one probably tried to learn by themselves and, or just more than anything, kind of get some be motivated or just kind of loses motivation when they're not progressing as fast as they might expect. Or maybe they're the other people progressing a little faster. So take the biggest mistake newbie make is is like something come will come fast, something might take a little bit more time. But just just have fun with it. Because if you're not having fun during the learning process, that doesn't mean it will be fun later. But it's always a learning process. And it's always a way to progress. So yeah, just making sure you're actually really enjoying yourself and having fun with it no matter how quick or slow something coming to you
Nick VinZant 26:24
tip or tip or piece of advice that you would say, changed your approach.
Dane Jackson 26:29
I can't really say I have like, like one like piece of advice, because I but I would say that the more the mentality that could become invited that just you know, some people want comfort, stability and things like that, but maybe my dad growing up, and my sister kind of motto as well. And everyone can live without compromise. Like a lot of people say, Well, if you if you love this sport, you can't if you got a job, you can't spend as much time doing things with your family, or whatever or whatever, like, you basically just do what makes you happy, do what you want to do, and find a way to make that work. Rather than doing something you don't want to do in the hopes that one day everything just gonna work out and then you're gonna do whatever you want to do like it, you start now and forever, you're not doing exactly what you want to do find a way to make it work. And it's not always easy, might not always be the most stable or response like the most stable or comforting way to do it. Sometimes you might not be my app, I spend all your money so we can go traveling the place you want to go or spend all your money to go travel with your family. So it basically, if you're not doing what makes you happy, don't expect it to come later on.
Nick VinZant 27:36
What is the holy grail of kayaking right now, the thing that like blew, everybody's everybody's going through this,
Dane Jackson 27:42
I would say that there's not like one particular thing because, you know, everyone kind of got different pursuits, you know, there are different things that are being progressed or pushed right now, whether it's downward or freestyling. For myself, as well, a few other categories, you know, downward and freestyle off of waterfall, where you're actually just running the waterfall normal, you're doing tricks off of the waterfall, which is even more dangerous. But there's we're starting to kind of learn it. starting to realize that there's more control than we might have thought we can start doing downward fruit off a bigger drop, or just more types of downward freestyle. There's obviously also the world record waterfall, it's probably right now the world record is 186 feet, please fall in Washington, massive waterfall I haven't done it looks like fun, I don't think I'm gonna do it. I prefer it. If I'm gonna rent something that big. I'd rather save it for something else. That's like four people have already done that drop. But I have a feeling that someone is going to go for the world record sometime soon. I don't know what it's going to be what drop. The hard part is that there's a lot of challenges with big waterfalls when it comes to what makes it safe to do or allow you to have the best life possible. And that drop watch attended about perfect but that drop kind of dropped get at that height. But I'm feeling someone probably going to go for something here in the near future where it's going to be what it's going to be. Maybe that 200 foot barrier will be broken. Who knows. But then with freestyle, you know, the one thing I want to do is the duck like when standing like big freestyle waves are super fun to surf. They're like big standing wave big bass. It's kind of like a an ocean wave but not barreling, we can do really big freestyle tricks and I want to do the double there's an airscrew with a barrel wonach I want to do two rotations and then land someone actually just did not not on a wave but on a waterfall another kayak or handle Sir soulstice just did a project in Chile where he did a double rotation off of a waterfall which was super bad at me not want to do it on a wave. I've been wanting to do it for the last three years I know the wave I want to go to and I've tried them a few times but the problem is I haven't been able the wave hadn't been coming again so I'm just waiting for the day that the wave come back in and we can get back into Canada to do it but yeah, I guess there's not necessarily one thing you know, we're we're all looking at different things when it comes to what's next on it and you know, but record might be broken soon. Things are gonna start getting thrown off of big waterfalls more often, you know competition to get harder that everything kind of got its its next level coming you know,
Nick VinZant 29:56
you've got one run, last run You can only pick one and you're going to be doing this one for the rest of your life. Which one are you doing?
Dane Jackson 30:06
Oh, boy, that's hard. I'm probably I don't know, I guess I probably have to say the Ottawa River in Canada. Because I grew up kayaking there. It's a big water deep waters, one of the most amazing places to learn kayaking, but you can kayak it. It's like a super long, super fun river with a bunch of fun big water rapid but in the springtime, it's some of the best big wave surfing in the world. And then in the summer, the water becomes super warm. And even at lower water, it can be 20 feet lower than it is in the spring. But there's still a lot of really good freestyle, but also it just summer amazing place to hang out paddle with people, just one of the most amazing places especially to learn kayaking, but in the end, it's still some of the best kayak came from the highest water, the lowest water. And so I would pick that because you know, it's good in spring, good in the summer, a lot of fun people to hang out with.
Nick VinZant 30:56
That's all the questions I got, man, anything you think that we missed, or what's coming up next for you?
Dane Jackson 31:00
Right now I'm just currently out here in Washington. Normally, this time of the year, I'd be traveling international weather, no Norway, or we're hoping to maybe go to Iceland or other places this summer. But obviously with travel restrictions can't quite go anywhere this summer. So right now I'm just trying to figure out what to do for the next month or so until I basically until things start to heat up in the East Coast weather rain. And then as I get into the fall after I finish up some races like October, November, that's the time where I can start traveling international looking for other places to go whether Bazile Ecuador, Mexico, I go back to Africa, New Year's, things like that. So just try to figure out the next month and a half. And then after that it's kind of back to full steam ahead and figuring out where the best place to go.