Edit: sorry, somehow this bit got cut: this is just my preference. Not saying one thing or another is objectively better. If an efoil gets you on the water or an auto transmission makes driving pleasureable, I'm happy for you.

Having spent lots of kms in Greece this summer driving a 6 speed manual transmission rental car, this article spoke to me: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2022/08/stick-shift-manual-transmission-cars/671078/

"But the manual transmission’s chief appeal derives from the feeling it imparts to the driver: a sense, whether real or imagined, that he or she is in control. According to the business consultant turned motorcycle repairman turned best-selling author Matthew Crawford, attending to that sense is not just an affectation. Humans develop tools that assist in locomotion, such as domesticated horses and carriages and bicycles and cars—and then extend their awareness to those tools. The driver “becomes one” with the machine, as we say. In his 2020 book, Why We Drive, Crawford argues that a device becomes a prosthetic. The rider fuses with the horse. To move the tool is to move the self."