{"id":386292,"date":"2026-07-04T19:43:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-04T19:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/386292\/"},"modified":"2026-07-04T19:43:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T19:43:09","slug":"grand-canyon-river-guide-completes-record-breaking-row-from-california-to-hawaii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/386292\/","title":{"rendered":"Grand Canyon river guide completes record-breaking row from California to Hawaii"},"content":{"rendered":"

HONOLULU, HI (AZFamily) \u2014 An adventurer with deep Grand Canyon roots shattered records overnight after completing a solo row from California to Hawaii<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Kelsey Pfendler, 32, arrived at Ala Wai Boat Harbor<\/a> in Honolulu shortly after 9 p.m. local time aboard her 21-foot ocean rowing boat, Lily, according to Arizona\u2019s Family\u2019s sister station Hawaii News Now<\/a>. <\/p>\n

A large, cheering crowd welcomed her at the Hawaii Yacht Club as she completed the more than 2,400-mile journey from Monterey, California.<\/p>\n

Pfendler began the trip May 21 with the goal of becoming the youngest person to complete the crossing and finishing in record time.<\/p>\n

She did both.<\/p>\n

Pfendler completed the journey in 43 days, breaking the previous women\u2019s record of 86 days, 10 hours and five minutes, held by Lia Ditton. Her time also beat the men\u2019s record of 52 days.<\/p>\n

The accomplishment adds to Pfendler\u2019s already impressive outdoor resume. <\/p>\n

She spent eight years working as a boatman in the Grand Canyon and has competed on the USA Women\u2019s open raft race team. She has crossed the Pacific twice before, but this was her first solo crossing.<\/p>\n

Throughout the trip, Pfendler documented her journey on social media, sharing the highs and lows of life alone at sea.<\/p>\n

It was for a good cause. <\/p>\n

Pfendler also took on the feat in part to raise funds and awareness for the Whale Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to the mental, physical and financial well-being of the Grand Canyon river guiding community.<\/p>\n

So far, more than $30,000 has been donated to the nonprofit since she started the journey.<\/p>\n

Click here to learn more about the Whale Foundation and to donate.<\/a><\/p>\n

In a video posted on her 44th day, when she could see land and was only about 20 miles offshore, Pfendler thanked everyone who supported her viral voyage.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just want to say thank you to everyone that supported this and cared about the journey, and wished me well and believed in me,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf any part of this made at least one person feel a little bit more powerful in their own skin, i couldn\u2019t ask for anything else and I\u2019m happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? Please click here to report it<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send it to us here<\/a> with a brief description.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 KTVK\/KPHO. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HONOLULU, HI (AZFamily) \u2014 An adventurer with deep Grand Canyon roots shattered records overnight after completing a solo…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":386008,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[139870,2123,7,9,8,155083,155819,155100,155086,136130,14646],"class_list":["post-386292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-arizona-news","tag-azfamily","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-california-to-hawaii","tag-grand-canyon-boatman","tag-grand-canyon-river-guide","tag-hawaii-row","tag-kelsey-pfendler","tag-phoenix-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=386292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386292\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/386008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=386292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=386292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=386292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}