Re: [Paddlewise] Bundling up inside kayak

John Winters wrote:

>This is true. Most modern sea kayaks are designed for day paddling or
>coastwise paddling where there is little or no need to spend a night at
>sea. This would make an interesting thread. What are the realistic limits
>of the typical modern seakayak. If we discount the stunt paddlers who
>thrive on doing the ridiculous with their boats, what are reasonable
>expectations for the boats?
>
Depends on the boats .... Vituddens produce a pretty radical kayak  designed
specifically for blue water crossings, with a  canopy, and external floats,
yes I'll call them floats :-), to enable sleeping in appropriate conditions.
Details for those interested are at ...

http://www.vitudden.com/kayaks.htm

>It might be worth a visit to Peter Carter's web site to see what he has to
>say about bulkheads. It goes against the common wisdom so should start some
>thought.
>

I totally agree with Peter Carter's philosophy about sea kayak design. In
the light of this discussion, it should be noted that these cockpit pods are
designed to *minimise* cockpit volume - the idea being that there should be
enough volume for your seat, legs and feet ... and no more ! My current
boat's (Capella) only real fault is that the cockpit volume is enormous -
the huge space forward of the pegs and  between the back of the seat and the
aft bulkhead  means that completely emptying the boat needs a bilge pump, or
careful packing out with drybags. 

This is related, but not necessarily relevant :-)  - so my apologies for the
forthcoming ramblings .... I have had a very passing interest in inuit kayak
design for a while, but have always thought of innuit kayaks in Greenland,
Alaska etc. I was therefore somewhat surprised when I read last week that a
kayak arrived in Scotland, along the coast that I can see out of my window,
circa 1730, complete with native paddler alive in the cockpit. I can't
imagine what the local inhabitants made of this traveller, but the poor soul
apparently died three days later, unable to communicate  the circumstances
that led him to a beach in Aberdeenshire.

The boat is hanging on display in one of the University museums, and I
couldn't wait to have a look. This boat  is remarkable! This boat is *tiny*,
(imagine a squirt sea kayak :-)), long, very narrow,  with virtually no
freeboard, and a cockpit coaming which looks like a child would have a hard
time getting into - once in forget any leg room. The fact that its over 250
years old, and was paddled to a beach in Scotland by an inuit paddler is
stunning. 

Whether he actually survived a journey from East Greenland as some suggest,
or whether he escaped or was put off from a whaler, or whether he came from
another destination is a mystery. There is some evidence that so called
'Fin-men' paddling and fishing from kayaks were fairly regularly sighted in
the Orkney and Shetland Islands at this time (although again where they came
from is a mystery). There are two other native kayaks in Aberdeen, which
definately did come from whalers, and a fair bit of information in the
literature and in the library special collections at the University. I'll do
some research, and if anyone is interested I'll post my findings here.

So John, perhaps low volume single kayaks have been doing ridiculous things
for some time, and maybe a better question is what are reasonable
expectations of the paddlers ?


PS There was an article written in Sea Kayaker about the Scottish kayaks,
which I haven't seen yet, a few years ago:

Greenlanders paddle to Scotland?, "The Phantom Kayakers, A Scottish
Mystery," John Heath, Sea Kayaker Summer 1987, page 15. 

If anyone knows anything  more about the Scottish kayaks, or has a copy of
this article that they could either zerox and snail mail, or scan, I would
be extremely interested in reading it.

Cheers
Colin
______________________________________________________
Dr Colin Calder
Centre for CBL in Land Use and Environmental Sciences (CLUES)
MacRobert Building, Aberdeen University, Aberdeen, AB24 5UA, 
UK, Scotland
______________________________________________________

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