Hi I'd greatly welcome some advice on introducing my 9 year old son to sea kayaking. My 11 y.o. daughter fits reasonably O.K. in my faithful old 16 foot McNulty Huntsman fibreglass sea kayak (I now paddle a Feathercraft K-1 which is way too big for the kids), but my son is really too small for the McNulty (he is quite small for his age, though growing). They are both getting some pool sessions at the moment (with a qualified instructor), and are very keen. I've towed my son around in the McNulty in wading-depth water, but he really now wants to start some proper paddling (both kids have wetsuits). So I am looking to get a smaller kayak for my son in the Spring: almost certainly a general purpose/recreational polyethylene kayak. Some possibilities are the Pyranha Master Lite, the Dagger Blast, or the Perception Dancer Junior; there are other makes and models no doubt, not all of which are available in the U.K. where I live. We live on the North West Coast of the Scottish Highlands, right on the shore of a sea loch which gives reasonably sheltered sea kayaking on the upper portion of the loch: sometimes a fair skelp of wind and a fair bit of tide, but wave action is usually subdued. A drop-down or slip-on skeg would no doubt be a bonus. I have considered a double, but frankly it would be too expensive, too big, and neither of the kids is keen on being a passenger. So any views or ideas about the most suitable (affordable) first kayak for a young'un? And if anyone has any good advice about teaching youngsters, that too would be great. Thanks in advance Nick *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
In a message dated 1/28/2003 5:28:33 AM Eastern Standard Time, reiter_at_fodderty.u-net.com writes: > ... So any views or ideas about the most suitable (affordable) first kayak > for a young'un? And if anyone has any good advice about teaching > youngsters, that too would be great. ... Nick, I was inducted into (sea) paddling in a folding tandem over thirty years ago, was immediately hooked and have been unable to fight off the addiction ever since. My rugrats, my son's eight and my daughter is currently half his age, are suffering the same fate. Our family barge is a folding triple, with plenty of room for the kids in the forward cockpit. They seem to learn a lot about paddling merely from observing in those big boats. My son is still a little too small for my sixteen foot Yare (tortured plywood) and for the full sized singles in my fleet, but he has his own twelve foot folder and has taken to it very nicely! His sister still gets a little frustrated when she needs to concentrate on paddling straight for more than about three minutes, but when they work that boat together, they amaze me with their apparently natural ability to cooperate (oh, if only they displayed this on other occasions!). Letting them learn by playing -- under my eagle eye of course and with but a rare suggestion (!) thrown in -- seems at this stage to be the most productive way for them to acquire their initial paddling skills; that seems to have worked for me, too. My nephew, aged twelve, last summer readily extrapolated my brief propulsion explanations, truncated by him paddling a fourteen foot folder off into the lake ... he came back with a huge grin! Another addict in the making ... I believe it was Seakayaker magazine that ran a pretty broad section on "kid sized boats" a few months ago, perhaps someone on the list will remember when that was. My own potential recommendations might (!) just be slightly biassed towards folders, so I'll abstain. :-) Best regards, Ralph Ralph C. Hoehn Ralph_at_Atlatl-Kayaks.com / Ralph_at_PouchBoats.com www.Atlatl-Kayaks.com / www.PouchBoats.com phone: +1-203-324-0901 *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
> And if anyone has any good advice about teaching >> youngsters, that too would be great. We have two kids and have been taking them on weeklong ocean kayak trips since they were zero. Once they reached 10 they got their own boats. (a custom boat - Ursa 350) For the transition, we did a number of things. We would take a double and tow a single. We found we could tow a single quite well if we predominately weighted the stern. This gave us a lot of flexibility. All of the family COULD be in the double. (rear hatch and center hatch for the kids). My wife could paddle the single and one of the kids could be the other paddler for the double. Or one kid could paddle the single. We would change up depending on the conditions. The impulse to get everyone into a single as soon as possible was primarily my own. I dislike paddling doubles because of the lack of independence. I spent too many years as the engine in the back of a double. We generally went with another group of paddlers who also had kids. Some of the key concepts: do not paddle too long. Most kids prefer the beach. When they are under 5 we found that they would frequently sleep. The confinement from which they could see no escape and the boredom and the motion would put them to sleep. They could sleep sitting up in these circumstances. If you can possibly afford it, get a superlight paddle. This extends the age (at both ends of life) that you can paddle for prolonged periods. It seems "wrong" for the lunatic 10 yo to have the super expensive paddle and you have to keep an eye on it so that it is not used to scrape mussels off of rocks or dig for clams or chop kelp but it does allow them to start paddling on their own sooner. *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
I got an Umiak for our younger kids and it has worked great. Our youngest started paddling it when she was 6 1/2 and she is not large for her age. At 8 she loves it. The adjustable foot pedals make it adaptable even for kids up to 5'5" or so. The kids paddle in Lake Huron, including some days when the bay develops 1-2 foot (or more) chop, and the craft is very stable. There are no bulkheads, so on trips you have to be a little more careful to waterproof whatever goes into the Umiak. Make sure to get a nice small paddle sized to the child. My youngest chose a small Greenland paddle I had lying around the boathouse and refused even to use the Euro paddle that we got with the boat. I highly recommend a boat like this for kids under 14-16. TFJ ------------------------------------------ The information contained in this e-mail message may be privileged, confidential, and protected from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, any further disclosure or use, dissemination, distribution, or copying of this message or any attachment is strictly prohibited. If you think that you have received this e-mail message in error, please delete it and notify the sender. *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
At 09:55 AM 1/28/03 -0600, Joyce, Thomas F. wrote: >I got an Umiak for our younger kids and it has worked great. > There are no bulkheads, so on trips you have to be a little more > careful to waterproof whatever goes into the Umiak. Keeping things waterproof may be an issue but if it doesn't have bulkheads it should have floatbags. There are a couple of other possibilities for kids kayaks. EPI (Englehart Products, Inc.) has been building kayaks specifically for kids for years. Like the Umiak, the EpiSea is a scaled down versions of a "real" sea kayak. Their web site is at: http://www.emc-epi.com/epi.html Another option could be building a kit from Pygmy. Their Golden Eye 10 model is targeted for paddlers in the 5-10 year old range. It would also make a great family project. I'm thinking about building one with my nieces in a couple of years. >Make sure to get a nice small paddle sized to the child. My youngest >chose a small Greenland paddle I had lying around the boathouse and >refused even to use the Euro paddle that we got with the boat. Werner makes a nice little kids paddle. One of it's features is that it has a smiley face on each blade. It's actually functional and not just a cute add on. Even my 4 year old niece figured out how to hold the paddle when I told her to "keep the smiley faces smiling". *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
In a message dated 1/28/2003 10:57:36 AM Eastern Standard Time, TJoyce_at_bellboyd.com writes: > ... My youngest chose a small Greenland paddle I had lying around the > boathouse and refused even to use the Euro paddle that we got with the > boat. ... My son just outgrew the adaptation of an Aleut paddle I made for him a few years ago ... and is pestering me incessantly to let him help me make a new one in his size! Best regards, Ralph Ralph C. Hoehn Ralph_at_Atlatl-Kayaks.com / Ralph_at_PouchBoats.com www.Atlatl-Kayaks.com / www.PouchBoats.com phone: +1-203-324-0901 *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
[Moderator's Note: Content unaltered. Excessive quoting (i.e. headers/footers/sig lines/extraneous text from previous posts, etc.) have been removed. Please edit quoted material in addition to removing header/trailers when replying to posts.] Homebuilt may be a great option...in addition to the Pygmy there's a few other designs available, check out Glen-L's "Kidyak" and I think Grant Golz has free offsets posted on the Squeedunk website for a scaled down boat, maybe named "Loon(?)". Right now I'm working on a "Zeb 2K" from Friedel Design, its a 21' triple, so I can infect my toddler boy w/ the kayaking bug! The single for him is definitely down the road, however! Regards, Joe ----- Original Message ----- From: "Nick Reiter" <reiter_at_fodderty.u-net.com> <previous message hacked to pieces by list admin> > I'd greatly welcome some advice on introducing my 9 year old son to sea > kayaking. > > So I am looking to get a smaller kayak for my son in the Spring: almost > certainly a general purpose/recreational polyethylene kayak. > So any views or ideas about the most suitable (affordable) first kayak for a > young'un? And if anyone has any good advice about teaching youngsters, that > too would be great. *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
I just started a course for a twelve year old girl. We are starting in the pool with a whitewater kayak on Monday nights and more-or-less playing at different strokes, swimming around the kayak, etc. Even though she is a tall girl the boat is a bit deep for her. Children grow fast so it's hard to be attatched to one kayak. Her dad is going to build her a Pygmy kayak which should keep her interest, and she is really excited about it. Hopefully by summer she'll have some semblance of boat control. I'm also going to rig an English gate in the pool for her to practice maneuvering around. Andree Andree Hurley http://www.onwatersports.com/ Port Townsend, WA *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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