Pedals are great. Not my cup of tea but they do have a place in the market. From what i have seen in my life of kayak fishing is if you like distance pedals are not the best. They are great shorter distance but there is a very hard line. I would say that those who talk about legs being stronger than upper body, well simply put your paddling wrong. Weight of the pedal yaks is a disadvantage but truthfully who goes fishing without friends normally? I know there are times when we do but the bulk of the time you will have a friend to help you load and unload etc. Personally i want a hobie tandem with a pedal drive. I feel like it would make taking my son out easier. For now i use a paddle and will always have a paddle yak as my first choice but hobie is king of the pedal drive market and as agenst them i have been i still want one. The key is try to find someone who has one. Dont just do a 10 min demo. Get in real world situations and really see if you like it over a whole day of fishing so you can really evaluate if its the right choice or not. Great luck

Sure there are some disadvantages, but the benefits far outweigh those and I've never looked back. Hobie Pro Angler here.

The only serious issue for me is that if I want to fish a shallow creek, think smallmouth fishing for me, I take the paddle boat and leave the pedal boat for lakes and bigger rivers.

Keep your old boat and get a new one.

A comment on trailers, the Malones are a PITA to put together and take mucho, mucho hours to do just that. I had the Malone rep tell me it was a 6 or 8 hour project on the trailer that I was considering. They are all bolted together and I have read of some of them coming apart on the road

For about the same price I bought a welded aluminum trailer by Triton. Won't fall apart and saved me a day of frustration.

Yes, go test paddle first.

and one of these when you have to move it around. https://rdxsports.com/brown-medium-leather-6-padded-exercise-lifting-belt/

A Hobie PA 360 in a 12 or 14 is likely the new "money is no issue" standard at almost a boat price. Super great.

Hmm? I don't want to hurt feelings but I see defects in several pedalers, have a recommendation in the end.

One negative note is Jackson's pedal drive is just sub-par, I think. I had one on my Bluesky 360 and it was a poor performer. Mine was slow and I don't think I have ever seen a video where they performed well in tests against other kayaks.

And, while I love the Old Town small pedal kayak, the one that is 10'6", I think they made a rather major mistake not building the drive up off the floor where it sits on a lip. Once the drive is pulled up, it seems to me it invites water to enter the kayak rather easily. I've seen videos with 2" of water inside these kayaks. Not certain regarding the larger version.

On my Native Propel 10, the drive sits up on top of a lip and water intrusion is no issue. I can't speak to the pedal drive on these Old Towns but, whew!, the one on the their larger kayak is super fast. So, there is that.

Back to the Propel 10. Native has dropped the price quite a bit. Competition. I still regard it as one of the easiest to launch, fish out of kayaks. Mine has the Boonedox Landing Gear and I can load it super fast, be on the water in a flash. At 34" beam width, the 10 is remarkably stable. Mine has never tumped over. My drive has been flawless all these years. One trick on a Native 10 or 13 is to NOT lock down the one drive tab. If you hit something, the drive will just rock up. And, the drive operates exactly the same locked down on the third tab, or not.

And, I can't image why since the 10 certainly isn't built for paddling, but mine paddles extremely well when I get into the weed beds.

Even though it is now a rather old model, dang, what a kayak for the dollar!!!

Oh! Native just updated its pedal drive. It retrofits to its old models, has better pedals, sports a weed guard on the prop and a few other improvements.

Brad

Just as everyone else has said. Weight is gonna be the only disadvantage. But all of the other advantages are well worth it.

I’m fishing out of a Lure 11.5 w/ overdrive.

I have the longer Topwater PDL. I got it in September and I love it, but the above is a very good summary of its disadvantages.

Do you get the same pain with an Old Town PDL style drive?

The Mirage Drive also kills 1 of my knees within an hour of use and hurts for 1-2 weeks after, but I can still jog 5 miles/ride a bike 10 miles pain free.

Other disadvantages besides weight is lack of deck /storage space in many models, followed by poor paddling performance, in places where the pedals can't be used:

https://paddlingspace.com/best-pedal-kayaks/#Hobie%20Mirage%20I11S

The older someone gets, the harder it gets to have and enjoyable kayak experience, even for someone that is in great shape. But I still love being on the water fishing, and still manage 100 times per year on a 10lb float tube, which I like better than my previous noisy bass boat, with all it's complications....

I am with Brad on this. I have a used Native Slayer propel 13 and absolutely love it. While it is heavy, it is worth it because of it's stability. Never felt like I was going to flip in it so far. The Native drives are hard to beat. I crappie fish over brushpiles and around timber and bridges and the instant reverse is a lifesaver. In my opinion, if you are looking for a great peddle yak, the natives are hard to beat for their price and functionality. As for pedaling them, the biggest thing I can't stress enough is to not get in a hurry peddling. If you can feel your legs burn, you are doing it too fast. If you get in the right speed to where you feel no burn, you wont be winded and can go long distances. I typically peddle 3-6 miles a trip and while I am tired, my legs are not. I hope this helps.

Love my slayer propel! Liked my Hobie outbacks, but the boats themselves didn’t convince me to keep them long. Now as to the drives-the fins are easier to navigate shallow water and practically ignore CERTAIN types of grass. You also can stop pedaling and free glide much better. I prefer pedal drive for chasing stripers and for distance ~compared to the kayaks I’ve paddled. I’ve owned over a dozen kayaks, lol, and I never consider keeping one ‘forever’. But I actually have no plans to sell the slayer. For bass and striper it works too well, and you can’t argue with instant reverse! NOW-at the other end of the spectrum, the paddle kayaks I really liked were the OK Prowler and the WS Tarpon that I had. You’re gonna get wet, you can go fast, you don’t have the desire to pack too much stuff like you would in a glorified bass boat like most pedal drives have become. But when you hook into something big, it’s a whole different experience! And they’re simple. I’ve been strongly considering adding a Viking to my plastic navy, for all those reasons! Oh I also like the big front hatches the tarpon and the prowler had. My first reason for buying a kayak was to toss a metal detector in and hit some island beaches I couldn’t otherwise access. Just having a kayak got me back into fishing after about a 10yr hiatus.

Having done this for about ten years now, I’d be perfectly fine with either one, with a slight nod toward simplicity, weight, and ability to have storage right in front of me instead of a set of pedals.