Where can you test your survival skills one hour and your ability to navigate a five-hundred-bottle wine list the next? Around the Channel Islands, that's where. Part American Galápagos, part American Riviera, this bit of California is proof positive, Patrick Symmes discovers, that you can have your wilderness—and eat it too

It is the islands that make every sea. For two hours, our ferry roared over a featureless, fog--enshrouded expanse at twenty-eight knots, before suddenly bursting into the sun-dappled clear and our ominous first sighting of our destination. Looming out of the Pacific like a lonely sentinel, Santa Barbara Island appeared as a dark mass, the rocky coastline topped with chalky cliffs. Then the ocean ahead of us shimmered and broke open to reveal the first of the elusive monsters that would haunt us on this trip: A minke whale rolled on the surface, its crooked fin sliding through the air like a waving hand. A second minke followed it; but, shy and elusive, the whales vanished before we reached the island's anchorage. The engines fell silent, and we heard the surge of ocean beating on rocks. A neatly orchestrated chaos of small boats quickly deposited us, our kayaks, and a haphazard stock of camping gear onto the dock, and then, with a deafening roar, the ferry slid back into the fog, leaving us alone on the most isolated and remote of California's Channel Islands.

Two old friends stood with me. The expedition was a delightfully last-minute, cheerfully ill-equipped college reunion for us. Scott had been my roommate twenty years before, and he brought the only real kayaking skills to this flotilla. For the last decade, Kevin, by contrast, hadn't ventured further into nature than an L.A. golf course, and he had a naive confidence in my skills as an outdoorsman. Out of a dozen possible destinations around the Channel Islands, we had come to Santa Barbara Island simply because we could: This was one of only six weekends a year when ferries call here. Our equipment, laid out on the dock, consisted of three kayaks, one tent, the ingredients for a peanut butter and jelly lifestyle, and five gallons of water in two jugs. That was the only water for drinking, cooking, washing, and brushing our teeth over the course of a weekend—or longer, should bad weather keep the ferry tied to the dock back on the mainland in Ventura Harbor.

Rugged and bleakly beautiful, Santa Barbara Island is so dry it can't offer a visitor even a glass of water, but it can quench another thirst: for nature's raw power. Rearing up amid wind, fog, and sea spray, the island is ringed with clear seas, where giant kelp forests sway in the currents. Huge colonies of seals and sea lions surround it, and the waters are a favorite of sea kayakers, who scout the rookeries, watch for whales, and hope to avoid the sharks and even orcas that frequent all of these islands.

The Channel Islands have been called the North American Galápagos, in tribute to the diversity and plenitude of wildlife that their relative isolation has preserved just over the horizon from the human tide of Southern California. A fleet of eight islands and innumerable islets, pillars, and stony reefs, the Channels burst from the sea, hulking and jagged, fringed with mist. Few Californians look for them, or even know where they are, but on rare fogless, smogless days, parts of the chain are visible on the horizon from the lofty wineries of Santa Barbara County, from the majestic Beaux Arts city hall in downtown Ventura, and even from the h in the HOLLYWOOD sign, high over Los Angeles.