[Paddlewise] Trip Report

Short Trip Report. 
  Even though this was a whitewater trip, one aspect of it was memorable. I
thought that I'd share it. 
  Yesterday I did a short class ll-lll run on the Mokelumne River in the
Sierra foothills of California. I was invited along by a friend. So I was
paddling with a new group of folks. One gentleman, by the name of Scott
Flemming had been paddling CA whitewater since the 50's, in rafts & homemade
kayaks. He was 74!! He was paddling a short, late model, low volume boat. His
boat was newer than mine! Other people in the group said that he had named
some of the rapids on many of the CA rivers. He didn't play a lot, but hell,
he was out there paddling down the river. With full wetsuit & helmet, he was
out there yuk'n it up, telling stories about the good old days. The guy I car
pooled with told me a story that Scott had told him, of making an early
paddling helmet. They would put on a plastic bathing cap, then apply
fiberglass & let it dry on their heads. You couldn't buy boats back then, so a
club would build a mold, then pass it around, so everybody could build their
own fiberglass boat. 
  So there's hope for all of us, for many more happy years of paddling. Hang
in there! 
By the way, Scott brought along a friend of his, who had recently got into
kayaking. The friend  was at least 65.

Ken Mannshardt
San Francisco Bay Area Sea Kayakers
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