Re: [Paddlewise] Is this thing on?

On Sun, 29 Mar 2009 07:37:36 -0700, "Craig Jungers"
<crjungers_at_gmail.com> said:
> Hello? (tap tap) Is this thing on? Or has everyone just gone out
> paddling?

The crew I paddle with meets saturday and sunday at 10.  This being
early season we're only in shape to paddle about 2 hours.

Two of the guys had new boats so they were a bit tentative about
conditions.  One guy had a Huki S1-X special, weighing in at 25 pounds. 
The other hasn't decided what to get so this week was the rental of a
Think Legend (which was the fairly heavy fiberglass layup at 36 pounds).

The legend is interesting in that the rear portion of the boat has hard
chines.  One of the guys said the legend felt like his Greenlander Pro,
just less stable.

The wind was blowing out of the east, south east.  This is a good
direction for paddling from Lynch Park in Beverly Massachusetts to
Peaches point in Marblehead and back.  We started out by crossing the
river and then heading across Salem willows.  As we went around Juniper
point the guy in the legend wasn't happy with the beam waves and the
mild chaos of refractory waves coming off of the point, he was paddling
with short stability strokes only putting half a blade in the water. 
Eventually we got across salem harbor over to Marblehead and headed up
the coast.  Looking out toward the islands we spotted the early shift
paddlers, the trio looked to be riding the following seas very well as
they past Coney Island - some of the time the boat bows were elevated so
it wasn't all clean runs...  

The Think Legend was very stable going into or with the waves, but
twitchy in beam conditions.  Bill, paddling the Legend, decided he would
rather stick close to shore and suffer the refractory waves than paddle
off shore, get a downwind run, and have the risks of being offshore.  We
split up.  2 people paddled the shore back.  3 of us paddled a bit
further upwind, off peaches point, then headed straight for Salem
Willows.  We got a pleasant downwind run, scattered whitecaps with
nicely rideable small waves.  The guy on his new S1-X special backed off
when his heart rate monitor beeped at him when he hit 185 bpm trying to
link some waves together...   

We ended up paddling to the beach behind the Jubilee Yacht club where I
switched with the Think Legend paddler.  He was right, the boat was
quite twitchy in beam conditions and comfortable going into or against
the waves.  I tried riding it into the beach and was a bit disappointed
I can pull my boat up over a wave if the wave crest is at my feet.  I
don't know if it was the hull shape, or the heavier layup but I wasn't
able to get the legend up over a wave.  I went back to the beach, took
out the s1-x special and did the same downwind run back to the beach. 
The S1-X special felt smoother in the beam waves and I was able to pull
it up over a couple of waves when I outran the wave that I was on.   All
boats a a matter of personal preference.  Mike C. found his new S1-X
special very comfortable.  Bill K. didn't care for the Legend or the
S1-X Special.  

Paddling into the beach the nephew of one of the guys was headed out on
his standup paddle board.  We managed to talk him out of the paddle
board for a quick try.  I took the standup paddle board out and around
the cove.  As expected it's fairly slow.  I wanted to get out into the
waves, but didn't want to borrow the boat for that long.  The feel of
standing on the board and edging it brought back much of the feel from
when I used to windsurf regularly...

I'll have to try the standup paddle board again.....

Kirk
-- 
  Kirk Olsen
***************************************************************************
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/
***************************************************************************