Pushing away from the dock and taking my first few forward strokes, I can’t help but laugh out loud. I’m paddling a rocket ship! Then, fast as a rocket, my revelry turns to apprehension—this could be headed for trouble.

Sea kayaking, as anyone who’s followed the trend of ever-faster Vancouver Island circumnavigations knows, is sliding down the slippery slope to speed addiction. Now I’m worried it will take me with it.

My borrowed rocket is the Tiderace Pace 18, one of several new surf-ski inspired crossovers that are seducing touring kayakers with the siren song of speed. This is shaping up to be a watershed year for these hybrids, with Tiderace and Zegul’s Velocity 18 joining the Rockpool Taran, Epic 18X Sport, Point 65 I8XP, Stellar S18R, Valley Rapier and KayakPro Nemo in a growing line-up.

Blending elements of racing kayaks and surf-skis—plumb bows, long waterlines, cut-away decks and aggressive seating positions—with the essentials of touring design, these boats occupy a sweet spot for racers, fitness paddlers and people who want to squeeze a long trip into just a couple days off work. The ultralight trend that hit backpacking 10 years ago is knocking on sea kayaking’s door.

If I’m drawn to speed, others must be well and truly hooked by now. I often describe myself as an attention-deficit paddler who ditches straight lines for exploring nooks, crannies and play features.

Kayak designers, it seems, may be equal parts engineer and mind reader. The 2013 designs are more touring capable, with day hatches, compass recesses and durable layups to complement more stable hull shapes that can handle the varied conditions of multi-day adventures. 

As I zip along in the Pace 18, I can’t help but imagine the possibilities. It’s stable enough to apply full power in jumbly water, covers open water quickly and has enough maneuverability that it’s not on rails. I could fit a four-day San Juan Islands trip into three, or maybe even two. It would be a terrific boat to travel the hundred miles from my home in Portland to the Pacific, with the oomph to progress into persistent westerly winds.

Wondering if these speed machines can handle larger seas? Look no further than Jeff Allen paddling the Taran around Ireland, or Freya Hoffmeister racing an Epic around Australia. While the Vancouver Island record has been fought over in traditional touring boats—Sean Morley settled on the proven capability of a Valley Nordkapp after considering the twitchier Rapier for his 2008 record-breaker—a crossover challenger is only a matter of time.

My newfound taste for speed can be blamed on my friends. Lately, five of us have been paddling around a local island for fitness. Karl—the fastest, in Epic’s crossover—ties ropes around his boat to create resistance so the rest of us can keep up in our touring kayaks.

And then there’s Lawrence, a whitewater paddler turned surf-ski evangelist. Every time I see him he asks me when I’m going to get a surf-ski. I usually mumble, “When I can sneeze on-center.” He asks me again 15 minutes later, when I’ve gone a mile and he’s already coming around the island the other way. 

Of course, some will protest that our obsession with speed means we don’t take time to enjoy nature. But making faster miles means you’ll be able to do that in camp, which you’ll reach before lunch. The catch is convincing your friends to get fast boats too, or you’ll be paddling, and eating dinner, by yourself. Or tying ropes around your boat.

Neil Schulman paddles in Portland, Oregon, at a variety of speeds.

This article first appeared in Adventure Kayak, Spring 2013. Download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it on your desktop here. 

It’s the height of the paddling season and I’m chomping at the bit. I check the calendar of a local paddling club and find…nothing. Zilch. Naught. Nada. By contrast, a casual social media group has four paddles scheduled—all beginner flatwater.

Paddling clubs are dinosaurs. Their stereotype is that of a fusty group watching slideshows about paddling, while not actually getting on the water all that much. They’ll cite cumbersome pro­cedures, declining participation and tempest-in-a-teapot internal politics. Caught between the devil of liability and a sea of seat-of-the-pants social media invites, paddling clubs occupy the neth­erworld between professional instruction and friends going out for a paddle, with the benefits of neither. It’s time to re-envision paddling clubs. It’s time to become Scottish.

I Googled my old paddling club from when I lived on Scot­land’s east coast. They offer two weekly pool sessions, river trips, weekly surf sessions, kayak polo and slalom tams, two formal balls and they take over a local pub twice a week. They supply the gear, just bring lunch and your “paddling costume.” This, in a town of 17,000 souls, compared to my current home of 2.2 million.

At their best, paddling clubs play three functions. They gener­ate new paddlers, connect existing paddlers to other paddlers and disciplines, and build a social bond.

Social media formats like Meetup.com work for novice-friendly paddles, but become problematic when they venture beyond easy trips. Their spontaneous nature seldom vets skills properly, putting too much pressure on organizers. Unlike clubs, casual get-togethers can’t insure their leaders or subsidize skill development. Paddlers will grow out of them if they aspire to more than flatwater.

Even formal clubs, which often succeed at turning new pad­dlers into more frequent or better paddlers, usually fail at attract­ing new recruits. If we want the sport to grow, this is precisely what we need. In Scotland, with no gear, the fact that all I needed to provide was a sandwich allowed me to participate in a sport I couldn’t afford. Two decades later, I’m still thoroughly addicted— to paddling, not sandwiches.

North American clubs could mimic this initiation by establish­ing a fleet of boats and gear, partnering with paddling shops to provide storage, bulk rentals and instruction—things shops do already. Like clubs, shops have a direct interest in getting the vast numbers of hikers, cyclists, fitness enthusiasts and skiers to add paddling to their quiver.

My city has three separate clubs, one each for sea kayakers, whitewater canoeists and whitewater kayakers. Each has its own vibe, but it means paying multiple dues to join all or missing out on experiences. Paddling clubs should merge, or at least collabo­rate. The multi-disciplinary Scottish club gave me a chance to paddle whitewater, ocean, surf, and play polo, as well as meet people passionate about each. Combining also offers economies of scale on storage, classes, equipment and insurance.

Let’s take a cue from the Scots. Let’s trade our spray skirts for kilts, speak in thick brogues and make our clubs what they should be: the epicenter of paddling culture.

Neil Schulman lives in Portland, Oregon, and is a regular contrib­utor to Adventure Kayak. He first paddled whitewater on the Tay River in Scotland many years ago. After a long swim, he ended up borrowing a paddling costume.

This editorial originally appeared in the 2014 Paddling Buyer’s Guide. Download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it on your desktop here. 

 It wasn’t for the faint of heart. I sent my paddling mate, Andy, details about the trip I had planned—a 350-kilometer loop around Algonquin Park labeled the Meanest Link.

My emails outlined the difficulty of paddling up three of the six rivers we would encounter and that we had to portage 93 times, adding up to 68 kilometers of drudging along bug-infested trails. The problem was, he didn’t read my emails. Four days into our journey, Andy told me I was never to organize another trip, not for at least 10 years.

We weren’t the typical candidates for the route. It’s usually type-A personalities, striving for perfection and personal challenge that take it on. Our reasons for adventure were solitude and relaxation. The record for completing the loop was seven and-a-half days; I allocated three weeks.

We were the turtles, not the hare. Anyone who paddles the route is celebrated for trying and, if necessary, having the sense to call it quits. Except, maybe, us.

Local paddlers developed the route in 2004 in honor of Bill Swift Sr., one of the founders of Algonquin Outfitters, a man with a tough exterior but a heart of gold. Aside from sticking to the route, there are rituals to follow—camping on a specific site, travelling only by canoe and visiting 100-year-old Camp Pathfinder. That’s where our trouble began.

Andy had a scant 16 days of holidays and I thought it would take 20 days for us to complete the trip. At first, Andy planned to leave the trip on day 16 and let me continue alone. By day 12, however, he changed his tune. He wanted to cross the finish line. Finishing together was a far better way to complete the Link, I thought. A change of plans was in order.

We had to make a few shortcuts. First, we hired a boat shuttle across Algonquin’s biggest lake, Opeongo, as it’s more than half a day’s paddle. Then we hitchhiked the three kilometers of Portage Road. Our biggest time-saver, however, was to skip paddling up the Madawaska River to visit Camp Pathfinder.

At the finish line, on the afternoon of the sixteenth day, we learned of the controversy. 

I had posted online throughout the trip, sending photos and text, but not receiving. After writing about our change in plans we received righteous online lashing. A few Meanest Link alumni disagreed with our shortcuts and labeled us cheaters. Some even wrote we didn’t deserve to travel the route and had disgraced the institution of Meanest Link paddlers. Ouch.

On one hand, all others who completed the route kept to the customary ways. But the cheater label is hard to stick when you’re honest about what’s going on. Should I have kept to the plan and left my canoemate behind only to follow the rules? Or were we right to alter our trip to cross the finish line together?

In typical 21st century fashion, I let the device that initiated the debate decide our fate. I posted the question to Facebook and Twitter. Five cursed us and over 11,000 agreed with our decision. Andy and I had completed the Meanest Link together—guilt free.

Kevin Callan lost 10 pounds on the Meanest Link. His favorite section involved dragging upstream along the Big East River for four days. He recommends you try it sometime.

This article first appeared in Rapid Media’s 2014 Paddling Buyer’s Guide. Download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it on your desktop here.