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Editorial: Travel With Loaded Canoes, Not Paddles

Photo: Don Stanfield
Editorial: Travel With Loaded Canoes, Not Paddles

Earlier this spring the Lawrence & Memorial Hospital in New London, Connecticut, was locked down while police searched the building for an armed man. Apparently, an emergency department nurse had spotted a double-barrelled shotgun poking out of the top of a worn and tattered backpack. She alerted hospital management, management notified the police, the police called in the SWAT team and the SWAT team took the building—like the final scene in a Bruce Willis action movie.

Meanwhile in the lunchroom, two hospital employees chatted about their weekends. One pulled a black, carbon fibre breakdown kayak paddle from the suspect backpack and thanked his friend for loaning it to him. Then they rinsed their coffee mugs and walked into the hall to start their shifts.

The hospital officials and the authorities called it an honest mistake. Surely the nurse did the right thing reporting what she thought was a shotgun. No charges were laid, though the two hospital workers were asked to leave their paddles at home.

Soon after hearing this story, I was flying from Vancouver to Toronto. I travel light and seldom check any bags. I had just a carry-on, a laptop bag and a canoe paddle. I’d broken the shaft on a river trip last summer and shipped it west for repair; I picked it up while I was in Vancouver to save shipping costs. At the security corral I placed my bags, shoes, keys, coins and my repaired paddle on the conveyor belt and walked through the doorframe to the lady with the wand.

Maybe our new heritage minister should launch a national program designed to put our youth more in touch with this country’s heritage.

Big signs are posted all over the airport, signs showing the items banned from air travel. You can’t board an airplane carrying jackknives, mace, chainsaws, or fire extinguishers. For the record, paddles are not on the sign.

Soon I was kneeling on the carpet in front of a half-dozen security staff who’d gathered around me in a semicircle. None of them knew what I was doing. I said it was the J stroke. Empty faces.

The conveyors were stopped, no one was checking through. People were going to miss flights. “Oh for Christ’s sake,” some guy in a suit shouted from the lineup. “He’s canoeing.”

Now here’s some wonderful irony. Canada’s national carrier doesn’t allow you to carry on a paddle. Yet, for hundreds of years the canoe was the national carrier. I had to explain to the staff of Air Canada that my so-called weapon was not a weapon but a canoe paddle. How sad.

I wonder how Pierre Trudeau, our paddling prime minister, or Beverley J. Oda, our new federal heritage minister, would feel about this. There is no symbol more Canadian than a canoe and paddle.

Maybe our new heritage minister should launch a national program designed to put our youth more in touch with this country’s heritage. After a full royal commission it would be written in a 600-page document that children should go away for a couple of weeks each summer and learn to paddle and explore, by canoe, nearby lakes and rivers. The report would recommend that they go to summer camp, a place where rows of canoes line the water’s edge and racks of weapons, just like mine, are for children to play with so that someday when they are standing in an airport they’ll remember that there are at least two ways to travel across Canada.  

This article on paddles as a flight security risk was published in the Summer 2006 issue of Canoeroots magazine.

This article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Canoeroots Magazine.

 

In Parting: The Kayak Cure

Photo: Greg Shea
In Parting: The Kayak Cure

Looking for me on a non-paddling day? I’ll be the one huffing in the bathroom with my finger up my nose.

Let me explain. I recently took a stroll through the land of Google and learned all about negative ions. Negative ions are negatively charged oxygen molecules that are concentrated outdoors in places where water and air get mixed around—surf, whitewater, and most of all waterfalls. The places, that is, where we most like to paddle.

Inhaling these little zingers does good things to our brains and makes us feel relaxed, happy and energized. Apparently these miracle molecules also kill germs and alleviate depression, allergies, asthma and pretty much every other ailment known to medicine while also—try this one on your spouse—boosting sex drive.

In other words, if you have a problem—any kind of problem—you can make a strong case for treating it with regular doses of the kayak cure.

One study found that albino rats breathing more negative ions did a lot more laps on their “activity wheels.” This could be your ticket to an afternoon off work. Just practice saying, Kayaking is proven to enhance workplace productivity, and be sensitive when you explain the part about the pale rat on the wheel to your boss.

Recognize there is some info out there that could weaken your case, like the fact that you can get negative ions from a machine, but don’t worry. Just point out that a good ion generator costs several thousand dollars and a new kayak will seem like a bargain.

More troublesome is the news that that mini-waterfall in your home, the bathroom shower, also produces negative ions. And one “doctor” claims you can increase negative ion intake by breathing really hard through your nose while plugging one nostril (left or right depending which brain hemisphere you want to boost). I figure the negative ion excuse should be good for a few paddling sessions. If that fails, then we can try the nose thing.

Screen_Shot_2015-07-23_at_1.03.01_PM.pngThis article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Adventure Kayak Magazine. For more great content, subscribe to Adventure Kayak’s print and digital editions here.

Skills: Build Your Own Beach Sauna

Photo: Dave Aharonian
Skills: Build Your Own Beach Sauna

Step 1. Choose site

The ideal sauna site is right next to a good deep-water jumping spot or swimming beach. You also want to be as close as possible to the spot where you will heat your rocks.

Step 2. Collect rocks

Gather several rocks that will withstand extreme heating and cooling. Rocks with moisture-containing cracks or pockets can explode dangerously when heated. For this reason, and to avoid blackening local rocks in a fire, the Bureau of Land Manage- ment in the U.S. advises campers to pack in their own sauna rocks. If gathering your own, look for crystalline igneous rocks or metamorphic rocks that are formed from igneous rock. For the geologically fluent, experts recommend peridotite, olivine, vulcanite and basalt. Stay away from sedimentary rocks such as sandstone or shale and collect your rocks from a dry area.

Step 3. Build sauna

Using a cheap plastic tarp that you don’t mind getting dirty, set up your sauna so there is just enough room for your group to sit inside without touching the hot rocks. Anchor the edges with rocks, logs or sand to create a good seal. Dig a pit in the centre for your rocks. Aim to have only one opening that you can quickly roll closed to keep the heat and steam inside.

Step 4. Light fire

Collect a lot of firewood and light a large fire in an existing fire pit or a low-impact spot. Let the fire burn down to a good bed of hot coals and place your rocks in the coals until they are red hot. Transfer the hot rocks into the sauna using a metal pot or bucket or pairs of strong, forked sticks.

Step 5. Get high

Strip down as bare as you dare, crawl into your sauna and seal the door. To make it a sweat in the native tradition, enter clockwise and exit the way you came in. Don’t forget to bring in water for drinking and extra for sprinkling on the rocks. When you’re ready for a break, make a dash for your swimming spot to complete the thermotherapy routine—hot and cold immersion gives you a natural high and is said to strengthen the immune system. The hot rocks should be good for two or three repeats. If it’s cold out, crawl back inside the lukewarm sauna to dry off after your final plunge.

Step 6. Erase evidence

The beach sauna is not a low-impact technique. Save the sauna for special occasions and suitable places—think ocean beaches, not alpine lakes. Make sure you’re getting rocks from a place where they won’t be missed and throw any blackened or cracked rocks out of sight into deep water. Burn your fire down to white ash and put it out before you leave.

Screen_Shot_2015-07-23_at_1.03.01_PM.pngThis article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Adventure Kayak Magazine. For more great content, subscribe to Adventure Kayak’s print and digital editions here.

The Hunt For Sauna Cabins On Lake Superior’s North Shore

Mist rising over Lake Superior
Not the kind of mist we're looking for. | Photo: Rick Mathews

The Finnish Sauna Society, a 3,500-member cultural association created in 1937 to celebrate the steam bath, says loyly is the spirit of the sauna. It’s the humid, steamy heat that rises from moistened sauna stones. In our effort to recreate a true sauna experience on the North Shore of Lake Superior, my paddling buddy Dave and I are looking for maximum loyly.

We put forth our best effort to capture the essence of the sauna at Swede Island. I do fine until we douse the stones with water for the third time. Seventy degrees Celsius of loyly sears my eyeballs, tightens my lungs and leaves me woozy. I feel my heart thumping in my temples.

“Run to the lake?” I gasp. It’s not so much a question as it is a plea. I’m not a Finn, but neither is my paddling buddy Dave. He’s out the door before me and I watch his naked body hurdle our two kayaks with Olympic grace. Soon we’re yelping in ice-cold, Lake Superior-in-May water.

[ Paddling Trip Guide: Find more Great Lakes paddling adventures ]

But the torture is addictive. Shortly—it may have something to do with the two-degree lake water—we’re back in the sauna, hooked on loyly like junkies on crystal meth.

“According to Finnish lore,” I tell Dave, “if a sauna, liquor and tobacco don’t help, your condition is fatal.”

“I’d take the first two and trade the smokes for a couple of Scandinavian supermodels,” says Dave. We douse the rocks again and again, and run naked and screaming to the lake another couple times before calling it a night.

When Dave and I pulled into camp at Lake Superior’s Swede Island, we were incredulous with what we’d found. Here we would enjoy our second sauna in four days, and trade our damp tent for the warm, dry confines of a cabin.

Two yellow sea kayaks lie outside small cabin in the woods
The beauty lies within: Swede Island’s sauna. | Photo: Conor Mihell

There are more people of Finnish descent living around northwestern Lake Superior than anywhere outside of Finland, the self-proclaimed “nation of the sauna.” In Finland, there is one sauna for every three people. As Finns immigrated to northwestern Ontario, so did their national bath. Community bathhouses like Thunder Bay’s Kangas Sauna still draw standing room-only crowds most every day of the week. And on Superior’s North Shore islands, at least half a dozen first-come, first-served saunas can be found tucked behind the shoreline greenery like Swede Island’s, which is a tar- and cotton-chinked log classic with a cylinder-shaped stove, cracked window, rickety door and slivery bench.

Between Rossport and Thunder Bay, Ontario, the North Shore of Lake Superior juts out in a 150-km-long series of sizeable islands, massive peninsulas and progressively smaller offshore islets. Simpson and St. Ignace Island lead to the boot-shaped Black Bay Peninsula and the Sibley Peninsula, which takes the form of an 8-km-long, 300-m-tall sleeping giant. In between, there are hundreds of small- to medium-sized islands—similar to Georgian Bay except the crossings tend to be longer, the water icy cold all summer long, and the coastline far less forgiving. For the most part, the area is too isolated and rugged for most pleasure boaters and cottagers; derelict fishing camps and stalwart lighthouses replace cigarette boats and multimillion-dollar summer homes.

There are more people of Finnish descent living around northwestern Lake Superior than anywhere outside of Finland

It wasn’t necessarily wilderness sea kayaking but the siren call of the secret saunas scattered along the way that lured Dave and me into a mid-May trip. We began at the village of Rossport and finished at Silver Islet, a tiny cottage community at the tip of the Sibley Peninsula. We took a week to cover the 130-km-long stretch.

We spent our first night tenting in the rain near Battle Island, and given the weather and our predicament—Dave had somehow managed to turn most of his clothes into sponges—we were dead set on making it to CPR Slip for our second night. Located on the southwestern side of St. Ignace Island, it would be the first stop on our sauna tour. Getting there meant 45 km of cold, wet misery. Had we taken the time to admire the shore, we would’ve noticed bizarre honeycomb-shaped pillars of basalt on Simpson Island’s west side, and we could’ve camped on a number of cobblestone beaches along the way.

[ Also read: Paddling Lake Superior’s Rossport Islands ]

We arrived at CPR Slip somewhere between slate-grey skies and pitch blackness—on that day there was no sunset. The Canadian Pacific Railroad shaped a small harbour and built a retreat for its executives here in the 1930s. After it was abandoned, area pleasure boaters (and no doubt Finns) resurrected the four-bed cabin and built the best sauna on the North Shore. It’s well-sealed and features a concrete floor and two-tier seating; and it’s within a 15-m run
 from a prime deep-water jumping place.

Person on kayak on Lake Superior as darkness is falling
Searching for a sauna before the storm. | Photo: Conor Mihell

At 
CPR Slip, as with the other saunas along
the way, good etiquette says you replace any wood that you use and leave the place cleaner than you found it. 
Beyond CPR Slip, good campsites are a dime a dozen on Fluor Island’s southeast
shore. We camped out on our third night 
before hopscotching our way between
 outer islands, paddling by compass in the fog across open water before tracing the narrow, river-like channels between sphagnum-draped Borden and Spain islands. On 
the latter, we found but bypassed a sauna called Bahia Espana—it’s camouflaged and
 hard to spot in the brushy shore.

Then we pretty near circumnavigated Swede Island 
before beaching our boats in a shallow bay
 and stumbling upon a log steam bath and
smallish cabin.

For traditionalists, the process of having 
a sauna isn’t hasty. First off, pronounce it “sow-na,” not “saw-na” as it has been corrupted by North Americans. Gather the a driest wood you can find and heat it slowly.
 Then cut birch whisks that are used in the sauna to slap one’s body to increase blood
 circulation to the skin. These are best harvested in the spring when the leaves stick to the branches more tenaciously and fill the sauna with a pungent, vinegary smell.

Once the sauna is hot—the Finnish Sauna Society recommends 60 to 80 degrees Celsius—strip down and get in. Your birthday suit is always best. Alternate hot sessions with a cold splashes of air and water. Don’t forget loyly. Afterwards, you should feel pleasantly subdued, cleaner than you’ve ever felt before, and you might—if you suffer from an addictive-personality like Dave and me—be hooked on the spirit of the sauna forever.

Old car rusting in the woods.
Porphyry Island cruiser: A relic of government auto allowances for lighthouse keepers. | Photo: Tarmo Poldmaa

On our last night, we gazed across 8 km of Lake Superior between our campsite on Porphyry Island and the Sibley Peninsula—the longest stretch of open water en route. The crossing looked intimidating: Fog swirled over the water’s surface and blended into a blood-red sky, just above the distant yet distinct form of Sibley’s Sleeping Giant.

We’d grown accustomed to the amenities of Swede Island—we’d spent two nights there—and we wondered where we might’ve found other hidden saunas. No doubt there were once more—at the abandoned fish camp on Bowman Island and the active fish camp on Magnet Island, and lurking forgotten behind the few ramshackle cabins we saw along the way; and Ojibwa people did their own kind of sauna on the cobblestones of Wilson Island’s Sweat Lodge Point.

We longed for the smell of hot birch leaves, the steamy head rush of loyly, and to a lesser extent, the euphoric feeling of launching one’s hot, sweaty self into near-freezing water. For a minute, we imagined the mist swirling in the distance was loyly radiating from the biggest steam bath in the world. But returning to our senses, we realized that it was only fog rising from the largest, coldest freshwater lake in the world. On this trip, we would have no more saunas. Darkness fell, and we dragged our feet to the tent.

Trip planner

Outfitters and guided trips
Naturally Superior Adventures
Wawa, ON
1-800-203-9092
Superior Outfitters
Rossport, ON
807-824-3314
Resources
Guide To Sea Kayaking On Lakes Superior & Michigan
Superior: Under The Shadow of The Gods
Charts
2301, 2302, 2303, 2312
Topo maps
52 A/7, 52 A/7, 52 A/9, 42 D/12, 42 D/13

Logistics

Allow one week to 10 days to complete the 130 km between Rossport and Silver Islet. In the summer, paddle from west to east to take advantage of the prevailing westerlies. You can leave vehicles at Silver Islet’s public boat launch or near Rossport Community Centre and run a shuttle—2.5 hours one way—or arrange transport through Superior Outfitters.

Look for good campsites and saunas at McKay’s Harbour on Simpson Island, CPR Slip on St. Ignace Island, Fluor Island (south shore), Borden Island, Spain Island, Swede Island, Number 10 Island and Porphyry Island.

Beware of magnetic disturbances of up to 20 degrees around Magnet Point at the tip of the Black Bay Peninsula.

Difficulty

Lots of open water and the potential for southerly winds and large seas, not to mention a shortage of easy landings in rough water, make this route one of the most challenging on the Great Lakes. There are several crossings longer than 5 km and the longest, between Porphyry Island and Sibley Peninsula, is eight.

The North Shore is remote and isolated. Early or late in the season—sometimes even in mid-summer—you could go days without seeing another person. Come equipped with emergency rations and a good VHF marine radio.

[ Further reading: Paddling Red Rock, Lake Superior ]

When to go

Lake is Superior is calmest in May, June, July and early August; expect to be windbound one day per week during this time. You’ll experience more fog early in the paddling season and less predictable weather from mid-August on.

Water temperatures hover near freezing until July and often remaining uncomfortably cold throughout the summer. Drysuits or wetsuits are highly recommended.

Access

Silver Islet is about a 1.5-hour drive northeast of Thunder Bay, Ontario via highways 17 and 587; Rossport is located on highway 17, about 2.5 hours east of Thunder Bay. There are no intermediate access points.

This article was first published in Adventure Kayak‘s Summer 2006 issue. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions here , or browse the archives here.

Conor Mihell is a kayak instructor and guide who is living in Wawa until his Finnish citizenship comes through.

Not the kind of mist we’re looking for. | Photo: Rick Mathews

Rock the Boat: About that Dream Job

Illustration: Lorenzo Del Bianco
Rock the Boat: About that Dream Job

Charlie the seasoned kayak guide has a grave problem. His hobby has taken over his life. Flashbacks of weeks spent living by tide and winds fill his overactive imagination and unproductive off-season days. Ragged back issues of Adventure Kayak litter his chaotic apartment. Charlie doesn’t even need an ocean—just the thought of a float on the local moose-riddled lake brings a smile to his face. Sea kayaking has become a drug, and Charlie has a serious addiction.

Charlie gave up the mainstream life over a decade ago, trading in his computer and desk for a paddle and kayak and the mysterious vagabond existence of a professional guide.

Paddling may be his passion, but after ten years of cranky guests with unrealistic expectations, stressed out bosses and constant relationship friction after long months away from home, the romance of guiding has started to wear thin. Especially for what boils down to a single-digit hourly wage.

Charlie is faced with a major decision: should he abandon his frustrating yet re- warding guiding lifestyle for more respect- able but soul-sucking gainful employment, or should he up the ante and make the bold move from lowly guide to the wealth, contentment, and absolute power of an eco-tourism company owner?

One fine day Charlie makes up his mind. “I will live my passion!” he exclaims. “I will start my own sea kayaking company! I will call it ‘Sand in Your Shorts Ecopeditions’ and it will be my ticket to happiness!” Charlie spends the rest of his morning lying on the couch dreaming about his new career, until he nods off with images of endless beaches, breaching whales and generous, helpful guests filling the fjords of his brain.

As he dozes, his subconscious takes him to his chosen future bliss. As he expects, running his own business is not easy at first.

He gamely endures the tedious and office- bound tasks of registering, incorporating, and marketing his new company. He is a sea kayaker, not a graphic designer, but with limited funds he spends the entire winter learning how to design and print brochures and build and maintain his company website.

Next he tries to track down insurance for his fledgling operation and discovers—after many more hours at his desk—that no one really wants to insure “edge of capitalist society” sea kayaker types in a post 9/11 world. He ponies up the $10,000 his insurance agent demands for liability coverage, and then spends another $20,000 on a fleet of new boats.

Now he has to hire and train a crew of guides who will look after all this new ex- pensive gear and all his hard-won guests. It is difficult to find professional, qualified, personable, wildlife biologist / educator / adventure racer / story teller / risk manager /first aider / personal therapist / musicians who can cook up a storm, MacGyver broken kayaks and broken bones with equal ease, and are willing to work 18-hour days of intense responsibility and decision-making for $150 or less.

Charlie tosses and turns and cries out in his sleep. But the nightmare continues. His dreams carry him through the seasons and into a spring spent entirely on the trade- show circuit, hustling to fill enough cockpits with guests to pay for the insurance, gear and guide wages.

Finally, his first field season arrives, but he has to mind the office, filling out permit applications, answering the phone and digesting the bad news: increasing travel costs and American fear politics have resulted in half-full or even cancelled trips. Not to mention the ever-increasing competition. Several of Charlie’s guide buddies plus some American George Bush refugees have all started sea kayaking businesses on his favourite stretch of coast. Even the veteran companies who were the ecotourism visionaries of the 1970s and ‘80s are having trouble filling trips.


Charlie’s natural rhythm inexorably degenerates from the slow, calming tidal flow that is the root of his fascination with the sea kayak into the fast-paced tempo of the cable modem and electricity. The endless sandy beaches and towering coastal forests of his dream lifestyle have morphed into unruly pa- per piles and oppressive fluorescent-lit walls. His tan lines are replaced with the worry lines that mar his bleary-eyed face.

His nightmare finally takes Charlie to his first year-end. Time for the payoff from all that time spent indoors. His accountant crunches the numbers and—what’s this?— Charlie is stuck with the same meager wage he had as a guide, minus the travel and life- style dividends.

“Nooooooooooo……”

Charlie’s own scream wakes him up. He gives his muddled head a shake, towels off the cold sweat, and grabs his gear for an afternoon of playing hide and seek with a moose on the local lake.

“Company owner? Me?” Charlie thinks as his paddle blades takes its first satisfying slice into the water. “What was I thinking?”

Dave Quinn guides in the Queen Charlotte Islands and the Canadian Arctic. He is the co- owner of Treehouse Outdoor Education, B.C., and the Vice President of the Association of Canadian Sea Kayak Guides. 

Screen_Shot_2015-07-23_at_1.03.01_PM.pngThis article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Adventure Kayak Magazine. For more great content, subscribe to Adventure Kayak’s print and digital editions here.

Skills: Going Full Tilt

Photo: Paul Villecourt
Skills: Going Full Tilt

The ability to comfortably and confidently edge your kayak is an important step to advanced paddling.

It’s also the key to tighter turns and improved boat control in challenging conditions. So on the next warm day, suit up for swimming, head to some warm water, and practice putting your boat on edge.

Edging is accomplished by dropping one knee and raising the other. Remember to keep your hips loose and your weight balanced over your kayak. Shift your weight slightly over to one butt cheek and lift the opposite knee. You should feel your whole rib cage shifting over to the “uphill” side of your kayak. Your stomach and side muscles will be working to keep your body upright, while your legs hold a steady tilt on the boat—particularly your top knee, which will be pulling upward on its thigh hook.

Your ultimate goal is to improve your balance and edge control to the point that you can take effective strokes while edging. A great drill to build this skill is to paddle forward in a straight line while holding your kayak on edge. Work on your right edge for about 10 strokes, then switch to the left edge. Keep practicing this drill, alternating from edge to edge until the transition becomes smooth and controlled.

You’ll quickly learn that edging your kayak will cause it to turn away from the direction that you’re tilting.

When paddling forward, if you edge to the left, your boat will turn to the right. Conversely, edging to the right will cause your kayak to veer left. The more you tilt, the more aggressively your kayak will turn. You can use this to your advantage, engaging your edge to make small course corrections without scrubbing forward speed or interrupting your forward stroke.

Edging is also very useful for keeping a kayak running straight. Wind, waves and current can all cause a boat to veer off course. Tilting a kayak on edge can help counteract the effects of prevailing conditions that are deflecting a boat in one direction, by encouraging the boat to turn in the opposite direction. One turn cancels out the other, keeping your boat moving in a straight line. It may be necessary to edge only for a few moments (as when crossing a line of current) or for an extended period (as when fighting a sustained wind).

With practice, you will find it easy to quickly edge your boat to either side, maintain it held on edge, and smoothly switch from one edge to the other. You’ll also be able to use your new edging skills to maneuver more efficiently and hold a course in challenging conditions.

Alex Matthews is the co-author of the book Touring and Sea Kayaking—The Essential Skills and Safety and the instructional DVD The Ultimate Guide to Sea Kayaking.

Screen_Shot_2015-07-23_at_1.03.01_PM.pngThis article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Adventure Kayak Magazine. For more great content, subscribe to Adventure Kayak’s print and digital editions here.

Boat Review: Composite Creations’ Splash

Photo: Ian Merringer
Boat Review: Composite Creation's Splash

“No, I want to carry it,” insists 11-year-old Aleisha Greve when her dad offers to portage her boat upstream from the class I rapid they had been paddling to the bottom of a class II on Ontario’s Madawaska River.

Alan Greve grins, not just because he’s tired of carrying the canoes on family river days, but because the boat Aleisha begins to work her way under is one that Greve helped design.

The boat Aleisha—with a little help—eventually gets over her head is the 30-pound Splash, a new Kevlar hull from Composite Creations that is notching a first descent by dropping a solo canoe into the kids’ whitewater market.

The notion that kids could paddle whitewater as well as they play baseball or hockey if they only had a boat that fit them occurred to Greve last year on the ottawa River when he passed a kid in a Jackson Fun 1, a kayak designed for a 60-pound paddler.

A few months later at the Gull River open canoe Slalom, Greve sat down at a campfire with Andrew Phillips, owner of Composite Creations, which manufactures airline, automotive and marine parts in London, Ontario. Three days later, Greve showed up at Phillips’ shop with a canoe-sized chunk of foam and the two started shaping.

Phillips, who had already designed and manufactured a 10-foot Kevlar river runner called the Bulldog, admits his first designs were a little too aggressive. It was up to Greve, the father of a pair of pre-teen paddlers, to bring him back from the edge.

With a hull reminiscent of a scaled-down Dagger Phantom and Esquif Detonator, the Splash errs on the side of forgiveness. Pre-pubescent paddlers up to 110 pounds should be able to initiate surfs gradually thanks to a blunted bow waterline that will be slow to dig into a wave’s trough and send the boat spinning. Down below, the hull is flat enough to allow for slow surfs, but decidedly rounded chines should keep kids from getting edgy as they cross their first few dozen eddylines.

Still, as Phillips points out, if a boat is too wide for the sake of stability, kids won’t be able to properly reach over the gunwales to the water. And if you keep the rocker at a minimum for better tracking, kids won’t be able to spin the boat and go where they want to go. with a respectable three-inch rocker and 25-inch width, the Splash is no tool of adult condescension.

A new Mike Yee children’s saddle and strap outfitting set-up ensures kids’ knees will, in fact, be able to reach the hull, and the built-in bulkhead buoyancy tanks offer fuss-free floatation.

All of which is apparently okay with Aleisha, who sounds suddenly older thanks to the acoustics of the overturned canoe making her voice boom out from below the Splash on her way up the trail. She’s talking about slalom races she’s been in with her dad, in particular about crashing into a few gates she thinks he could have avoided. when the words “dead weight” slip out from below the canoe, a trailing Greve looks even prouder of his creation.

Specs

Price: $1600 + shipping
Material: Kevlar/carbon
Length: 7’10”
Width: 24″
Depth: 13″
Weight: 30 pounds
Outfitting: Mike Yee children’s saddle and straps

rapidv8i3cover.jpgThis article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Rapid Magazine. For more great boat reviews, subscribe to Rapid’s print and digital editions here.

Boat Review: Riot’s Astro 54

Photo: Desre Pickers
Boat Review: Riot's Astro 54

A quick glance at the Riot Astro might tell amateur kayak design historians that this is Riot’s attempt to return to the simple, and very successful, design elements of the Disco. The look is definitely familiar, but there are enough innovations here to make the Disco seem as current as platform shoes and leather bell bottoms.

The top view of the Astro shows the same wide, squared-off tips of the Disco that Riot had abandoned for several years in favour of a more surfboard-inspired hull profile. Why the retreat? According to designer Simon Martin, the increased surface area of the hull’s bottom profile keeps the boat on top of the water for easier launches and landings. The hull profile also crams more effective carving edge into the same sized package—think wakeboard, not surfboard.

Where the Astro improves on the Disco is in fairly subtle, but important, hull design details. The sides of the Astro are more flared than the Disco, allowing for easier forward to backward weight shifts while on edge. This makes it feel smoother, both when setting up for aerial moves, as well as when cartwheeling.

The most significant refinement is the Astro’s unique double chine. The bottom of the hull has a straightforward kick-rocker profile, extending the planing portion of the hull toward the ends of the boat. This isn’t new—it is the basis of modern aerial designs. The secondary chine, which is raised quite a bit from the planing hull, has a different rocker profile than the chine of the planing section. Viewed from the side, it’s as if a kick-rocker bottom has been added to a boat with a continuous rocker profile. This puts the secondary chine closer to the water in the middle of the boat—for better carving–but farther from the water toward the ends—so it is more forgiving.

Does this all add up to improved performance?

Like the Disco, the Astro launches from a pop. The Astro allows you to tap into aerial moves without generating huge down-wave speed, a real benefit to those of us that can’t always find the sweet spot on a wave, or don’t live close to Skookumchuck.

But what goes up must come down. This is where the Astro shines. The increased width in the ends and the forgiving chines allow for sticking sloppy landings. Every wave boat is a compromise between carving and landing ability. The Astro’s definitely fa- vours the touchdown.

But most of us don’t paddle on huge, fast waves. We can’t hit the New River Dries when it’s up and can’t take enough Ibuprofen to offset daily sessions on Bus Eater. Not to worry, the Astro is not just a big air machine.

Like most kick-rocker boats, it likes to be dead vertical when cartwheeling, but once on end, it is surprisingly forgiving—stable and slow in case you aren’t 18 years old or Jackie Chan. It is retentive enough to forgive less-than-perfect technique and provide enough time to enjoy a ride on a small foam pile.

Is it perfect? If you like hard-carving boats with lots of down-the-shoulder speed, then you will probably find the Astro frustrating. And this boat is only available in one size.

Riot has a winner in the Astro. It shines in the hands of expert big-wave paddlers. The rest of us can tap into moves in small holes and on eddylines that we may not have discovered otherwise. The Astro takes the Disco party to a groovy new cosmic level. 

Specs

Volume…………….. 54 gal
Length …………….. 6’2”
Width ………………. 25”
Weight Range…….. 120–210 lbs 

Thom Lambert is a moderator of the Boater Board at boatwerks.net.

rapidv8i3cover.jpgThis article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Rapid Magazine. For more great boat reviews, subscribe to Rapid’s print and digital editions here.

Boat Review: The Liberty by Riot

Photo: Tim Shuff
Boat Review: The Liberty by Riot

Riot’s Liberty 16 uniquely offers many performance traits of a high-end, semi-hard-chine British-style kayak in a smaller, less expensive light-touring package.

The Liberty has the slightly boxy cross section reminiscent of larger brit-style boats like the NDK explorer, Wilderness Systems Tempest or Necky Chatham 16—steep, high sides, semi-hard chine, a flat deck and very shallow V-shaped bottom.

The minimal rocker and long waterline of a racing boat give the Liberty decent tracking and optimal speed for its length when paddling forward. it’s playful on edge, however, turning giddily fast when moving or spinning in place with ease. Most paddlers will want to opt for the skeg to keep from skidding into a turn when they stop paddling. One tester commented that the skeg also improved stability, which is moderate.

The Liberty 16 is a fun little boat for medium-sized paddlers. It’s plenty deep and wide enough to comfortably fit everyone in Riot’s recommended weight range of 150 to 220 pounds (68 to 100 kilos), though many will find the cockpit opening too short to exit legs-first.

Riot’s Cross Light is an ABS-acrylic vacuum-thermoformed material that offers the light weight and look of composite with the lower price and durability of poly plastic.

The Liberty 16 is a great entry-level craft for someone who wants a taste of performance or an intermediate who’s working their way into the high-performance club but not prepared to lay down the plastic (pun intended) to pay fibreglass or Kevlar initiation fees.

Screen_Shot_2015-06-25_at_3.29.13_PM.png

SPECS

length: 15 ft 5 in
width: 21.5 in
depth: 11.5 in
weight: 56 lbs
cockpit: 30.5×19.5 in
bow hatch: 16.75×9 in, 65 litres
stern hatch: 16.75×9 in, 90 litres
day hatch: 7.7 in
MRSP: $1999 CA, $1599 US – no skeg, $2149 CA, $1699 US skeg

Screen_Shot_2015-06-25_at_3.19.29_PM.pngThis article first appeared in the Summer 2006 issue of Adventure Kayak magazine. For more boat reviews, subscribe to Adventure Kayak’s print and digital editions here.

Sea Kayak Review: Boreal Design Labrador

Person paddling an orange sea kayak
Get comments about your equipment. | Photo by: Victoria Bowman

“Your equipment is beautiful,” said a female passerby as I was changing into my drysuit. “Pardon?” It’s not every day that a man hears that. It took me a minute to realize she was talking about my shiny new mango-coloured Labrador demo boat. The Labrador is beautiful indeed, sleek and fast with capacity for long trips.

Long and skinny for paddlers who have the body dimensions to match, the Labrador’s narrow cockpit and rigid moulded thigh braces provide a performance fit superior to what small- to medium-sized paddlers will get from other manufacturers’ universally adjustable fit systems.

The hard-chine provides enough turnability to make course corrections and medium-fast turns with a gentle tilt—easing predictably from moderate initial stability to strong secondary without feeling floppy. The smooth shallow-arch hull adds speed by counteracting the drag of the hard chine—enough to lead the touring kayak class at races alongside other barely legal legends like the Necky Looksha II.

[ Further reading: Boat Review: Boreal Design Baffin ]

Boreal Design Labrador Specs
Length: 18’4″
Width: 21″
Depth: 13.25″
Weight: 57 lb fibreglass; 51 lb Kevlar; 48 lb carbon
Cockpit: 30.5″ x 16″
Bow hatch: 9.5″, 97 L
Stern hatch: 16.5″ x 11.25″, 120 L
Total volume: 400 L

borealdesign.com

Experienced paddlers can track straight and control weathercocking in moderate winds with tilt and strokes alone, but will appreciate the rudder’s efficiency for racing or long trips.

British traditionalists can make the boat as pommy as they please by mixing and matching skeg, day hatch and bucket seat options.

Glass, Kevlar, Kevlar/carbon and clear-coat choices provide more fun decisions.

Our large rear Kajaksport hatch cover seemed to leak slightly—something to check out on your own demo—but the bow was bomber.

Overall our demo showed flawless construction with pleasing touches like spectra-fibre rudder cables, strong glassed-in bulkheads, a moulded paddle-park fore of the cockpit and Boreal’s signature funky-patterned seam tape.

If you’re not already getting compliments about your beautiful equipment, put the Labrador on your short list and be ready to blush.

Cockpit of orange sea kayak
Mind the size of thy thighs. Early Labradors came with aggressive thigh braces (shown_ wonderful for paddlers with the legs of a chicken and the heart of a lion. New models have a more democratic pared-down version. Two seat options: Boreal’s new padded “comfort seat” (shown) (standard with rudder version) or a traditional bucket-with-backband (standard with skeg versions). | Photo: Tim Shuff

[ Paddling Buyer’s Guide: View all sea kayaks ] 

This article originally appeared in Adventure Kayak‘s Summer 2006 issue. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions here, or browse the archives here.

Get comments about your equipment. | Photo by: Victoria Bowman

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