{"id":389055,"date":"2026-07-07T11:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T11:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/389055\/"},"modified":"2026-07-07T11:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T11:03:08","slug":"female-us-rower-reflects-on-surreal-record-breaking-journey-from-california-to-hawaii-us-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/389055\/","title":{"rendered":"Female US rower reflects on \u2018surreal\u2019 record-breaking journey from California to Hawaii | US news"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Grand Canyon river-rafting guide who recently became<\/a> the first US woman to row solo from California to Hawaii \u2013 traveling in record time \u2013 says she hopes her accomplishment inspires other women to push their limits and take risks.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really motivating to think [that], maybe one day, I will get to see another woman work even harder to do what I did,\u201d Kelsey Pfendler, 32, told ABC\u2019s Good Morning America program on Monday, three days after completing the record-setting journey across the mid-Pacific. \u201cAnd it would be so special to watch.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pfendler set out on 21 May to become the first American, youngest and fastest woman to make the more than 2,400-mile (3,900km) rowing trek alone, according to her website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

She launched from Monterey, California<\/a>, and pulled into a harbor in Honolulu on the night of 3 July in her 21ft rowboat, Lily.<\/p>\n

An archive<\/a> maintained by Ocean Rowing Society International \u2013 which adjudicates ocean-rowing achievements for Guinness World Records<\/a> \u2013 showed that it took Pfendler just under 44 days to finish the journey, which was said to be unprecedented for a woman who was as young as her or from the US.<\/p>\n

Her time was faster than both the previous comparable female record-holder\u2019s 86 days as well as the male record-holder\u2019s 52 days, as registered by both Ocean Rowing<\/a> Society International and Guinness World Records.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was very surreal,\u201d Pfendler said to ABC of having reached the end of her long-distance row. \u201cIt was hard to \u2026 soak in that I had actually made it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hundreds of thousands of people tracked Pfendler\u2019s progress on social media, where she shared the triumphs and tribulations of her trip.<\/p>\n

Challenges included blistered hands, difficulty sleeping and struggles with stiff winds as well as intermittently unfavorable currents that she recounted in video diaries.<\/p>\n

She also explained how she cooked, protected her skin from the sun, cleaned her clothes and made herself fresh water.<\/p>\n

At one point, she documented how a US coast guard crew pulled up near her boat to speak to her by radio and sing \u201chappy birthday\u201d to her.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is so cool,\u201d Pfendler says in a video of the moment. \u201cThis is so special for me \u2013 oh, my God.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s special for us, too,\u201d one of the US Coast Guard crew members replies. \u201cThis is a once-in-a-lifetime experience for us, truly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pfendler\u2019s website says she has been a professional raft guide since she was 18. For the last eight years, she has led trips along the Grand Canyon\u2019s Colorado River.<\/p>\n

She told ABC that she didn\u2019t \u201cexpect to get in that early\u201d after embarking from Monterey \u2013 but she \u201cpicked up a lot of speed at the very end because there was some good current going into Honolulu\u201d.<\/p>\n

Pfendler also said that she was in awe of the forces of nature she encountered on her way.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was definitely scared at points,\u201d Pfendler remarked. \u201cBut then you put that against some of the flatter days where you get to \u2026 actually soak in \u2026 how immense the open ocean is.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Associated Press contributed reporting<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Grand Canyon river-rafting guide who recently became the first US woman to row solo from California to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":389056,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8],"class_list":["post-389055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389055","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=389055"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389055\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/389056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}