I just finished building some racks to hold kayaks in my new garage. This is a simple project that requires very little in the way of tools, minimal carpentry skills, and about $30-$35 worth of materials. I was able to complete the project on a Saturday morning – less time than it took me [...]
On a cold, rainy fall day at the end of the paddling season, here are a few things that a canoeist/kayaker can be thinking about.
If you’ve worked on improving your skills all summer, perhaps it’s time to consider purchasing a dry suit to extend your season.
If you prefer not to paddle in anything but warm, [...]
Just a heads up for those of you who are new to kayaking and may have just purchased your first polyethylene plastic kayak – don’t drag your kayak to and from the water, and don’t get in your kayak on shore and then push yourself over sand and gravel to get your boat floating. Whenever [...]
I just bought a new kayak a couple weeks ago. I had it on the water 10 times including some paddling in 2-4 foot waves on Lake Michigan in just the first week. I wasn’t really intending to buy a new kayak, but I was swept away and infatuated by her good looks and her [...]
In over 20 years of canoeing and kayaking, I did something recently that I have never had to do before – I had to retire a life jacket from service due to equipment failure. As I was getting my equipment ready before a class, I noticed the tear in the fabric around the neck. I [...]
In my last post, I talked about a couple of Werner fiberglass paddles in which the shaft broke while students were learning to do a standard paddle float solo re-entry. The first paddle to break was a five year old paddle with an older ferrule style in which the button sticks up above the rest [...]
Call it bad luck, but in the last month I’ve had two students break my paddles when learning to do the standard paddle float self rescue. Prior to this, I never had a paddle break in 13 years of teaching this skill. In both cases, the paddles broke at the ferrule. Both paddles were Werner [...]
April in the Midwest brings thoughts of severe storms and tornado awareness drills. A local Milwaukee television station has partnered with Walgreen’s in Southeast Wisconsin to promote and sell NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) weather radios at a discount. These weather radios only cost around $30 and sound an alarm whenever the National Weather [...]
Now that I’m a grandma, I’ve been thinking about how I’m going to teach my new granddaughter to paddle in a few years. I had a chance to do this many years ago when my son and my nieces were little, but it seems like it’s even more important nowadays to get kids outside and [...]