Trips

Over Labor Day weekend I attended the second annual New England Intermediate Rough Water Symposium hosted by Tom Bergh of Maine Island Kayak Company. Tom brought in BCU kayaking coaches from England as well as top paddlers from the US. I was there as a local guide to the waters and as an assistant coach.

The video below is something I put together giving my impressions of the event.

Tropical storm Noel swept by New England in late October and sent some fun waves towards Napatree Point. I didn't get much good footage while paddling, but the resulting video is still fun.

More video from the reefs in the passage between Watch Hill, RI and Fishers Island, NY. This is out near buoy #2 on a day with about a 3 knot ebb. I'm paddling my Petrel. Also on the water were a Chatham 18 and a couple NDK Explorers.

After teaching my class at the WoodenBoat School, I got a chance to head up to Blue Hill for some play time. There is a reversing falls that has a nice play wave popular with the whitewater crowd. I took my Petrel in for a little surfing action:

I put together a somewhat longer video of a trip in Frenchman Bay, Maine. It starts along Long Porcupine Island near The Hop, and ends along Mt Desert Island near Otter Cliffs.

I hope this gives non-paddlers a feeling for what it may be like taking a small human powered boat into the water in a beautiful location. Sit back and let the shore move by.

ConnYak the local paddling club is having their annual slide show tonight, so I put together a couple videos from last summer's paddling.

The first shows the trip out to Ironbound Island from Gouldsboro, ME and shows the group paddling along Stave Island and Ironbound:

I've been playing around with taking video using a Pentax Optio W10 that I have strapped to a helmet. The quality of the video is not great, but the results are kind of fun. The first is one is from a couple days paddling the reefs of Watch Hill, Rhode Island and the Race and the second is an afternoon surfing off Napatree Point.

In both videos, the boat I am paddling is the Petrel.

I hope you enjoy the action.

It has been exceptionally warm this winter. I would like some nice cross country skiing weather, but a nice warm day out on the water is always appreciated. Carl wanted to get out around 9, but I didn't feel like rushing out of the house early. Pete, Kate, John and Beth were planning on putting in at Esker Point around 10 and that was more like it. As it was I just got there 9:50, but I had everything ready so I just had to pull on my dry suit and lift the boat off the car.

Wayne suggested the idea. At first I was waffling. I had been out on Saturday and wasn't sure I wanted to drive all the way to Rhode Island, but I woke up to clear blue sky and almost no wind, so I decided it would be a lot more fun to paddle on the ocean than going to the Connyak pool session.