Re: [Paddlewise] Weatherhelm

From: John Fereira <jaf30_at_cornell.edu>
Date: Tue, 05 Oct 1999 14:02:45 -0400
At 09:48 AM 10/5/99 -0700, Jackie Fenton wrote:

Sorry to piggyback your post, Jackie, I must have deleted Tomckayaks orginal.

>From: Tomckayak_at_aol.com
>
>> "Yes I believe"
>> 
>> A clean stern (no rudder) is the first thing I look at when I meet a Sea 
>> kayaker. Then I notice the sex of the paddler, age and body shape if
female, 
>> but that's hard with pfd and spray skirt on.
>>  Driving down the highway I will not wave to that passing S.U.V. with the 
>> kayaks on top until the state of "rudderless" is known. 
>> At the symposium I contemptuously mach past any demo boat with a rudder.
>>  If I help carry kayaks up from the beach I will not grab the stern of a 
>> rudder equipped kayak. 
>> I paddle a Mariner Kayak.

I wonder how you would feel about a kayak that I saw at a Symposium in
Maine.  I believe it was just under 13' long and was an inflatable.  The seat
was a partially inflated foil bag from a "box of wine".  Not only was it
equipped with a rudder but it also had a boat and paddle tether.  The owner
of this kayak was a woman.  Her name is Audrey Sutherland.  During a class
that I took with Chris Duff (you might have seen his slide show recently at
the West coast symposium about his circumnavigation of Ireland) he said
that when he grows up, he wants to be Audrey Sutherland.   Not only has
she probably logged more miles in this kayak (on a couple of shorter
inflatables) along the notorius Na Pali coast on the Island of Kauai (and
written two books about it) she has also completed at least two 650+ mile
solo trips down the coast of Alaska in it.

She made an interesting point about rudders.  She said that most of the
people that bash rudders on sea kayaks have never paddled for eight hours
straight in a 30mph crosswind.  

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Received on Tue Oct 05 1999 - 11:03:16 PDT

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