I tend not to preach to people unless I'm in a situation of instruction or group organisation/leadership. I've seen plenty of people on hiking trips and elsewhere completely underprepared. And on one occassion I've seen some of them get into serious trouble in some nasty weather in tasmania due to inadequate clothing. The numbers of them are overwhelming. I guess if I saw some real idiots preparing to launch I might go up and say something, but would try and make it conversational and not harp on on the subject of helmets - this is one I don't preach on (but i'll state my view here) . If people ask I'll tell them what I think. I wear a helmet kayaking (and bike riding) and in my view you are are a fool if you don't. that's just what I think, and people can take or leave it. I won't shove it down throats and I don't argue it. I've become more laissez faire over the years about a number of things like this, mainly due to the overwhelming forces of ignorance, apathy and bloody-minded individualism one is up against. Individualism is fine if you're paddling by yourself, but in a group situation it can be a problem. I've had a number of occassions on bike and in kayak where I've been glad of helmets. I've banged my head in shallow water in surf and fallen off my bike and hit my head more than once. The helmets have made these mere bumps. having said this I tend to run gauntlets, go in caves and surf. If you do these things a helmet is a good idea. Some people think gauntlets and caves are foolish - but they sure are fun. I'm not advocating some sort of strait-laced , ultra cautious, take-no-risks form of sea kayaking. I hate the hovering clouds of ignorant official intervention as much as any sea kayaker. But the main point for me is: I'm not interested in drowning from a relatively minor head blow. That would REALLY cramp my style. Nick I did write about it in 1994 - http://203.147.209.230/mag/21/helmet.htm *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Tue Nov 02 1999 - 15:41:55 PST
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Thu Aug 21 2025 - 16:30:16 PDT