It's been about 9 years since my last trip to the Maine Canoe Symposium. I love to paddle, and like to go play in other boats and talk to other paddling nuts which I get the chance. The canoe symposium is more of a tripping centered event. My 9 year old spend some time with the canoe pole standing in my family canoe (a dual sliding seat vacuum bagged kevlar wenonah jensen 17). He hasn't figured out how to use the pole on the bottom yet, but was comfortable using the pole as a kayak paddle, so he spent some time standing in the a canoe paddling around the docks and out around a little island. My 13 year old was more interested in swimming than playing in boats. The children's program was very good and both kids were busy 75% of the day. The younger boy's favorite part of the weekend was the session with the voyageur re-enactor who explained his voyageur kit to them then had them trade goods for pelts. My boys being the finest of sneaks did their trading with the youngest member of the other team and traded a small knife (which they had multiples of) for 2 beaver pelts. We've been to the symposium a couple of times so I only went to one seminar, balance and conditioning for paddlers. Rutabaga had come out with a trailer load of single canoes for people to try. I don't know if it's true but was told that sales of single canoes outpaced sales of kayaks - this might be for wenonah/current design, or rutabaga. I still see a ton of inexpensive kayaks in my local shops. The wenonah fusion is clearly aimed at the fisherman market. The 13 foot canoe had a rudder assembly, 3 rod holders in front of the seat, a padded seat with a flip up padded backrest, plus a rod holder behind the seat. The 3 position rod holder in front of the seat was built like a molded tool holder, with multiple slots to hang fishing hooks and tools from the rod holder/tool rack. I tried a few solo canoes this morning before most people got up (from 5 to 6:30) and latched onto a bell flashfire (now built by placid boatworks). Nice hull. I spent about an hour carving turns, side slipping, seeing how far I could go without making a sound - no gurgling from the hull and no dripping from the paddle... Seeing if I could do a 180+ degree turn with a single fixed position stroke.... At one point I was within 40 feet of a loon, not stalking the bird, he was just there. For the competition for the weekend I entered a mixed generation "canoe-a-thon" with a 10 to 12 year old girl who wanted a partner. We race out and around an island, portaged the paddle 30 yard in a loop through the trees, tied a bowline knot, poled back around the dock then threw a throwbag 30 feet through a hula hoop target. I clearly have not spent much time with a throw bag... We had to reload the bag twice, then were allowed to run the bag to the target. There was some excellant crashing of canoes into each other during the paddling portion - love the sound of colliding aluminum boats - with an inexperienced bow paddler... We just beat our a maine guide and his son who were our closest competition - I'm glad his son took the first throwbag toss we needed all the time delay we could get when we got to the bag toss. Sunday's events ended with a voyageur canoe race. Winona camps has a pair of 11 person canoes. We put 12 people in each boat. The bow paddler being jammed right up against the bow deck, with no thwart. The race was billed as a "grudge match" between sternmen. Harry Rock representing the old guard, 19 year old Ben Meader representing the youngsters. Harry recruited me at dinner saturday night. I suggested to Ben that next year he needed to plan ahead as he only asked me to join his boat an hour before the race. Team Rock had a somewhat stacked team, there seemed to be more kids on Ben's team, but Ben's team did quite well, finishing just a boat length or two behind team rock. With any luck kid sports scheduling next spring will be such that I can go back... 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/ ***************************************************************************
On Sun, Jun 7, 2009 at 6:48 PM, Kirk Olsen<kork4_at_cluemail.com> wrote: > It's been about 9 years since my last trip to the Maine Canoe Symposium. > I love to paddle, and like to go play in other boats and talk to other > paddling nuts which I get the chance. Paddlewise seems to be more oriented towards the west coast paddlers over the past couple of years so it's really nice to see these reports. Sounds like a lot of fun, too. I dunno about "more single place canoes" being sold than kayaks. Does not seem to be the case out here, at least. But then I don't really know what is being sold or bought lately. I'm pretty sure a lot of people are building their own whether SOF or S&G or strip. While I was over on Whidbey Island I took a spin to the Skin Boat Shop in Anacortes and chatted with two guys who were building SOF baidarkas under Corey's supervision. Extremely good work. I also got a chance to see Malagiaq's (sp?) frame built a few weeks ago. It's a lot of fun to see what else is out there. Corey's shop seems to fit the mold of Brian's shop. Lots of frames and kayaks all over. Well worth a visit. The SSTIKS (www.qajaqpnw.org/) meetup on Puget Sound is next weekend. Anyone going? I'm as yet undecided due to the work still needed on the Muthah-Ship. Craig Jungers Moses Lake, WA www.nwkayaking.net *************************************************************************** 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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