How Much Paddleboarding Experience Do You Need Before Attempting a Multi-Day Trip
My best friend Michael Whalen and I had genuinely modest recreational paddling experience before attempting our five-day, seventy-two-mile circumnavigation of Lake Tahoe, nothing close to the multi-day, open-water conditions we ended up facing. We finished it, and I've thought a lot since about what experience level actually matters versus what doesn't for something like this. Here's a realistic assessment.
What Baseline Experience Actually Helped
Some familiarity with basic paddleboard balance and paddling technique on calm water gave us a foundation to build from, even though it didn't fully prepare us for the conditions we'd eventually face. Knowing the fundamentals, how to paddle efficiently, how to fall and remount safely, how the board generally responds to your weight and movement, meant we weren't learning those basics for the first time while also managing the additional demands of a loaded, multi-day expedition.
What Experience Level Doesn't Fully Prepare You For
No amount of recreational, calm-water paddling fully prepares you for genuinely rough conditions on a large open lake. Our crossing near Sand Harbor, where a tailwind built swell strong enough to nearly knock us off our boards multiple times, tested skills that simply don't develop from paddling on a calm afternoon. That gap between recreational experience and open-water, multi-day conditions is real, and it's worth being honest about before committing to a route like ours.
What Matters More Than Technical Paddling Skill
Physical endurance and mental persistence mattered more to our success than refined paddling technique. Being able to stay upright and keep moving across six or seven hours of paddling, day after day for five consecutive days, drew on general fitness and stubbornness as much as it drew on any specific SUP skill. Decision-making under changing conditions mattered enormously too, arguably more than technical ability, since knowing when to wait, when to push, and when to switch strategies came from paying close attention in real time rather than from years of prior training.
A Realistic Experience Threshold to Aim For
Before attempting something like this, I'd recommend having enough paddling experience to be genuinely comfortable on a board in calm conditions, including falling and remounting without real difficulty, plus at least some exposure to choppy or windy conditions so the first time you encounter them isn't in the middle of a demanding, multi-day expedition. You don't need years of dedicated SUP training, but you shouldn't be attempting this as your literal first time on a board either.
How to Build Toward That Threshold
A handful of sessions spread across a few months, rather than crammed into the week before departure, builds more useful comfort than the same number of sessions concentrated right before your trip. Practice specifically in the conditions you're least comfortable with, whether that's open water, wind, or loaded-board handling, rather than repeating the same calm, easy paddle every time. If you have access to a body of water that occasionally gets choppy, use those conditions deliberately as practice rather than avoiding them until your actual trip forces the issue.
What We'd Tell Someone With Similar Experience to What We Had
If you're reasonably fit, comfortable with physical discomfort, and willing to make conservative decisions rather than pushing through conditions you're genuinely unsure about, a trip like this is achievable without years of dedicated experience. What you're trading for that lack of technical polish is a slower, more cautious pace and a wider safety margin built into your planning. Extra buffer days, conservative wind and route decisions, and a willingness to wait rather than push all become more important the less experienced you are going in.
What Confidence Actually Looked Like by Day Five
By the end of our trip, neither Michael nor I paddled with the same tentative caution that marked our early miles out of Ski Run Marina. That confidence built gradually, crossing by crossing, rather than arriving all at once from any single moment of realization. It's worth knowing that the experience you need doesn't have to be fully in place before you start, some of it will build during the trip itself, provided you're paying attention and making conservative decisions along the way.
Why Mental Preparation Matters as Much as Physical Skill
Beyond physical paddling ability, mental readiness for genuine uncertainty, not knowing exactly what each day will bring, tolerating discomfort without it derailing your decision-making, mattered enormously to our own success. That kind of mental preparation is harder to quantify than a specific skill level, but it's worth honestly assessing before committing to a trip this demanding, since physical fitness alone doesn't guarantee you'll handle the psychological weight of five days of genuine uncertainty well.
What I'd Say to Someone Who Feels Underprepared
If you're reading this and worried your own experience level isn't sufficient, the honest answer is that some uncertainty going in is normal, even expected. Michael and I both felt genuinely unsure whether we could complete this route when we started. What mattered more than eliminating that uncertainty beforehand was building enough conservative planning and safety margin to manage it responsibly once we were actually out there, which is a more realistic goal than trying to eliminate uncertainty entirely before you even launch.
What Michael and I Would Tell Our Past Selves
Looking back, the biggest gap in our own preparation wasn't paddling technique specifically, it was underestimating how much real-time decision-making the trip would demand. We spent real time thinking through gear and logistics before departure, and comparatively little time rehearsing how we'd actually make calls about wind, swell, and route changes once we were out there facing them for real.
The Bottom Line on Experience
You need enough baseline comfort on a board to not be learning fundamentals mid-trip, but persistence, sound judgment, and a genuine willingness to be conservative when conditions call for it matter more than years of technical polish ever will.
Why We Don't Regret Attempting This Without More Experience
Looking back, I don't wish we'd waited until we had more formal paddling experience before attempting this trip. The uncertainty we carried into it, and the way we had to figure things out together in real time, became part of what made the experience meaningful rather than something that diminished it. There's a version of readiness that only comes from doing the thing itself, and no amount of additional preparation beforehand can fully substitute for that.
Before You Close This Tab
What is a realistic experience level to have before attempting something like a Lake Tahoe circumnavigation, based on your own honest self-assessment?
Have you practiced in genuinely choppy or windy conditions, or only on calm water so far?
What would your own timeline look like for building toward a comfortable baseline before a multi-day attempt?
How would you build extra safety margin into your planning if you're going in with limited experience?
Dalton Johnson is a photographer, filmmaker, and brand storyteller based in South Lake Tahoe, California. Over the past decade he has worked with brands including Patagonia, GoPro, Arc'teryx, Four Seasons, Nike, Rivian, and Ford Bronco across all seven continents. He is the creator of the Follow The Journey distribution framework, which has produced over one million organic views per 30-day cycle without paid media. His work includes two published books, an award-winning documentary that aired on PBS, and more than fifty commercial spots directed. He runs Stories by Dalton on Substack, read by more than 34,000 subscribers.