Kayak carts: what works with a Cajo

Our recommendation is the YakAttack TowNStow bunk cart — especially the sand-tire version — for rough terrain and beach launches. It's bunk-style, which means the load goes through the bottom of the hull on padded supports instead of hanging from the gunwales. That's the load path we build the whole lineup around, and it's why we steer people away from top-loaded "landing gear" carts.

Why bunk-style over landing-gear

Cart styles come down to how they support the load:

• Bunk-style (TowNStow, Railblaza C-Tug) — padded bunks cradle the underside of the hull along the load-bearing channels, the same load path as a trailer or a saddle on a roof rack. The kayak rides on the part of itself it's designed to ride on.
• Landing-gear / top-loaded (Boonedox, Wilderness Freedom Launcher, Sidekick) — the cart clamps to the gunwales and hangs the kayak from the top edge, with wheels dropping down from there. Convenient — you can install or remove it with the kayak on the ground and leave it on while launching — but the load path is the problem.

When the full weight of a rigged kayak (boat + gear + drive + battery + cooler) hangs from the gunwales:

• Gunwale stress — repeated load cycles fatigue the HDPE around the clamp points. Cracking near the rail line is the most common failure mode.
• Bumps multiply the load — wheeling a fully-rigged Cajo down a gravel ramp puts each bump through a few square inches of clamped gunwale.
• Tip risk on uneven ground — a high center of gravity above the wheels means the kayak wants to fall sideways on side slopes.

Stress fatigue and cracking from landing-gear carts is the most common warranty rejection we see across the kayak industry. Damage caused by top-loaded carts is excluded from the Cajo warranty — and from Hobie's, Vibe's, and most other manufacturers' warranties. It's industry-wide, not a Cajo-specific policy.

The sand-tire version

For sand specifically, the TowNStow sand-tire version is the move. The wider, lower-pressure tires float over loose sand instead of digging in. Pulling a fully-rigged Outpost 128 across 50 yards of beach on regular pneumatic kayak-cart tires is exhausting and unkind to the boat — sand tires turn the same haul into a normal walk. If you're often launching from gravel boat ramps or pebbly creek banks, the sand tires handle those better than narrow pneumatic tires too.

What we recommend, ranked

1. YakAttack TowNStow Sand Tire — for beach launches and mixed terrain.
2. YakAttack TowNStow (standard tires) — for gravel ramps, dirt trails, and paved access points. Same bunk system, regular pneumatic tires.
3. Railblaza C-Tug — another safe bunk-style option, and it folds compact.

All three load the kayak through the bottom of the hull rather than hanging it from the gunwales.

What works on which Cajo

The TowNStow fits the entire lineup:

• Outpost 100 / Outpost 128 / Terra 116 — bunk spacing adjusts to fit each hull.
• Highlander 100 / 120 / 140T inflatables — the AirTrek bottoms ride well on TowNStow bunks too.

The Boonedox caveat

We can't guarantee compatibility with the Boonedox system because it's a top-loaded design, and top-loaded carts carry a high hull-or-rail damage rate on any brand of kayak, not just Cajo.

That's not a "won't physically fit" answer — the Boonedox can be installed on a Cajo, and customers do it. The gunwale clamps work on Cajo gunwales the same way they'd work on most kayaks of similar gunwale geometry. What we can't guarantee is the long-term load path: top-loaded carts pull on the gunwales and any rails or hardware near the clamps, repeated load cycles fatigue the HDPE, and bumps, drops, and side-loads multiply the stress. If you install a Boonedox on your Outpost 128 and a gunwale cracks two seasons later, that's not a warranty case.

The Outpost 128 and Terra 116 rails are mounted securely with brass inserts and machine screws — those inserts are strong — but if you attach the Boonedox to the rails instead of the gunwale plastic, you're loading the rail attachment points specifically. We can't certify how that brass-insert/machine-screw system holds up under repeated cart-load cycles either, because it wasn't designed for that load case.

If the Boonedox is already in your garage and you want to keep using it: be careful on bumps, don't load the kayak fully (drive, battery, gear) onto the cart for long ground transport, and inspect your gunwales periodically for hairline cracks. Damage from the cart still isn't a warranty path.

Will Cajo make its own cart?

No — we don't plan to get into the cart design game. Cajo's product strategy is to build the things the market hasn't solved well: the Traverse Pedal Drive, the Fatback Rudder, AirTrek inflatables you can actually fish from, the Outpost / Terra hull line. We pick categories where we have a real design opinion or where the existing options don't fit a serious angler.

Kayak carts aren't one of those categories. YakAttack and a few others already build cart products we trust on our boats, and we'd rather customers spend on water-time accessories (drives, rails, electronics) than have us re-engineer a category that already works. The TowNStow is what we use ourselves.

What about the YakAttack Wheelie Bar?

When it lands, the Wheelie Bar will be another bottom-loaded design that puts the load back on the bottom of the hull instead of suspending it from the gunwales. We're keeping an eye on it — looks promising. We'll update this once it's shipping and we've tested it on the Cajo lineup.