Explore La Jolla Ecological Reserve's sea caves during a 90-minute kayaking tour. Follow your experienced guide through several diverse ecological habitats, home to one of the highest concentrations of sea life in California. Paddle toward the Seven Sea Caves, where you can get stunning views from inside Emerald Cave, the only north-facing cave in the state (conditions permitting). Explore a giant kelp forest inhabited by wildlife like otters, harbor seals and sea lions. Use of all kayaking equipment is included; no kayaking experience is necessary.

Explore La Jolla Ecological Reserve's sea caves during a kayaking tour
Follow your experienced guide through several diverse ecological habitats, home to one of the highest concentrations of sea life in California
Paddle toward the Seven Sea Caves and enjoy stunning views from inside Emerald Cave
Explore a giant kelp forest inhabited by wildlife like otters, harbor seals and sea lions
Use of all kayaking equipment is included; no kayaking experience is necessary

What's Included

Professional guide
2 person kayak with all required equipment

Gratuities
Concessionaire Percentage Fee
Hotel pickup
Hotel pickup and drop-off (if option not selected)
Transportation to/from attractions
Wetsuits are available for rental for $12.00 per wetsuit per person for the day.
Lockers are available to store belongs (small items) for $6.00 per locker for the day.

Meeting and Pickup

Meeting point

2261 Avenida De La Playa, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
Please, ensure that you arrive 30 minutes prior to your reservation time for Check-in at: 2261 Avenida De La Playa, La Jolla, CA, 92037 We have changing rooms, lockers available for rent, and anything else anyone would need to have an amazing experience available at our shop.

End point

This activity ends back at the meeting point.

What To Expect

Additional Info

Confirmation will be received within 48 hours of booking, subject to availability
Children must be at least 5 years old and accompanied by an adult
Wheelchair accessible
Refunds will not be issued if tour/activity is missed due to late or non-arrival of guests
Dress code is swim wear or beach attire (anything that can get wet)
Stroller accessible
Kayak weight limit is 425 lbs

Once you have purchased your voucher, please contact suppliers booking office directly at the number on your voucher to confirm the reservation. Failure to do so may result in not being able to participate in activity
Reservations, recommended two weeks in advanced, subject to availability
Please arrive 30 minutes prior to schedule tour time for check in
A maximum of 6 people
Surfaces are wheelchair accessible
Most travelers can participate
This tour/activity will have a maximum of 2 travelers

Cancellation Policy

You can cancel up to 24 hours in advance of the experience for a full refund.

For a full refund, you must cancel at least 24 hours before the experience’s start time.
If you cancel less than 24 hours before the experience’s start time, the amount you paid will not be refunded.
Any changes made less than 24 hours before the experience’s start time will not be accepted.

Cut-off times are based on the experience’s local time.
This experience requires good weather. If it’s canceled due to poor weather, you’ll be offered a different date or a full refund.
This experience requires a minimum number of travelers. If it’s canceled because the minimum isn’t met, you’ll be offered a different date/experience or a full refund.

Traveler Photos

Featured review

John_P

Simone was a great guide! Kayaking was fun and Simone gave us great information about history of La Jolla and environment.

Reviews

4.5

570 reviews

Total review count and overall rating based on Viator and Tripadvisor reviews

Reviews by Viator travelers.

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Showing 1-10 of 570 reviews

Highly recommended mini adventure!

Erin_H, Apr 2024

My friend and I loved seeing all of the different sea creatures and going into the cave! The state of the swells during your tour will depend on whether or not you can enter the cave, not the weather. Our tour guides were also awesome and provided great info about the area!

Worst Kayak Experience I've Had

Shun_Y, Apr 2024

I was a bit disappointed because in the pictures, it looks like you get to go inside the caves a bit, but we just saw the caves at a distance. Also, because of the waves, you need to "kayak surf" into the beach with a high chance of toppling over and falling into the water - which is fine but then they don't offer even towels for people to dry off. Instead you need to pay $18 to BUY a towel...

Canceled

Angie_B, Mar 2024

Our tour was canceled. We did not get to kyak due to bad weather conditions. What more can I say? Ridiculous, ther us nothing more to say.

The equipment was not...

Margaret_A, Mar 2024

The equipment was not maintained. The tour guide was unaware of the fact that she could not be heard when providing important information. Stupid people!

Nice kayaking but service is average

Uro_V, Mar 2024

So the kayaking was very nice. We had to pay additional fees on site and one female worker was rude. Luckily the manager was there to intervene.

Nervous at first since I...

Hira_T, Mar 2024

Nervous at first since I cannot swim and the weather was a bit colder that day but AMAZING experience and the tour leader was wonderful. Only recommendation would be to have someone take pictures of groups during to have memories afterwards.

Terrific informative guides and a beautiful day!

Kristen_C, Mar 2024

Although we had a rather windy and wavy day and couldn't kayak close to the caves, we had a wonderful adventure with the guides, who were very informative and made the experience very fun for us ! My daughter loved it and it was her favorite part of the trip ! Thank you for a great memory!

Great experience!

Heath_T, Mar 2024

Really experienced and knowledgeable guides. They made the trip fun! A few of us went swimming as well which made it even better.

Became the highlight of our San Diego trip!!

Wes_P, Mar 2024

Had an awesome time with our guides Christian and Devan. We were fortunate enough to have a perfect weather day and saw Garibaldi, leopard sharks, and sea lions, and learned a ton about them from Christian and Devan. We were also able to get into the emerald cave since the waves weren’t too choppy. Had so much fun we ended up keeping our wetsuits on and renting snorkels to see the wildlife more closely since the clarity was unbelievable. We got really lucky with weather and seeing leopard sharks in March since they’re usually only around in summer, but this was a memorable experience that became the highlight of our trip to San Diego. Huge thanks to the friendly and helpful team!!

Wonderful people. Disappointing Tour.

Christopher_G, Feb 2024

The people at this place are awesome. Our tour guides jesse and keegan were professional and super helpful. However, we went to the tour to go into the caves, Not so much for kayaking. We were unable to go into the caves for safety reasons due to crashing waves. I really wish I knew that this could happen and that there was something provided it to come back at a discount to do the caves. I would definitely do this again if I had some compensation to come back. I now wonder if we could have joined another tour same day or next day to go through the caves. We traveled from the East coast and really wanted to kayak the caves, so very dissatisfied we did not go into the caves.

The guides who helped us....

Mythreyi_S, Feb 2024

The guides who helped us. We were the slowest and they kept an eye on us to make sure we did not fall back too much. One of them tied his boat to us and made sure we got to join the group. They made us feel safe while having a great time.

Meh

Jill_G, Dec 2023

Didn’t get to go into the caves?! That’s all No more. Water was quite cold, wetsuits were helpful. Great staff

Great time

Brett_B, Dec 2023

Great tour guides and the dolphins. Weather was great Small group size was also great. Would highly recommend

Sea Cave Kayak

Jennifer_L, Dec 2023

Excellent trip guides- very informative and friendly Nice beach and Great weather Dolphins swimming right next to our kayak

Below average experience

Daniel_E, Dec 2023

Would not recommend this tour as you do not go in or near the caves. False advertisement in the tour description. Avoid at all costs.

Depends on the tide, and they won’t tell you upfront

Anirban_G, Dec 2023

Sea kayaking was fun but we did not see any of the caves. The guides spoke for an hour about the marine biological ecosystem in the area which was thoroughly boring and repetitive after 15 minutes. Towards the very end of the trip, they gestured vaguely in the direction of the caves and said “those are the caves we’re choosing not to go to due to safety reasons today”. I understand that the tide was strong on the day we went and safety is paramount. However I wish they would have been upfront and honest about this at the start of the tour, and not tell us at the end of the tour after wasting an hour talking about pelicans. Now it felt like a bait and switch. Kayaking in the sea is wild though, would’ve been fun regardless if only they’d been honest from the start.

You will not retreat it, just go!

Alyson_B, Nov 2023

This was the best adventure to end my vacation. Andrew our guide was very knowledgeable about the area, he was also pretty hilarious. April was also an amazing sales rep, very happy I got the wetsuit, phone case and sunglasses band. Everyone was so kind and professional . Thank you

awesome adventure!

Josh_H, Oct 2023

Brody and Steve were great! I'd definitely recommend this experience. They did a great job looking after people of all skill levels out there, and went the extra mile to teach us as much as they could about the habits we were checking out

Great way to see the shore and get out on the water.

Hunyen_L, Oct 2023

Our guide Liam was awesome. He gave great instruction and kept the kayaking outing fun with great insights into the history and fun facts.

Good times on the water

Amy_B, Oct 2023

Loved this excursion! Our main guide, Phillip M and assistant Devon were upbeat, helpful and informative. We had fun and learned a lot about the history and sea life of the area. We got to pop into one of the caves which was cool. The surf was a bit strong for more cave exploration but we got a view of them from fairly close up.

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