I was stunned last evening to see a message that extreme sea kayaker, Eric Soares passed away suddenly and unexpectedly on Wednesday, February 1, 2012,.  He was only 58 years old.
For those of you who may be relatively new to paddle sports or are not familiar with sea kayaking in particular, Eric Soares was a [...]

Once more I apologize for not getting any new posts up on my blog.  Taking care of a husband with a broken leg who cannot drive and needs to go to physical therapy three times a week has left me with not a lot of extra time lately.  Please keep checking back as I will [...]

I must apologize for not having posted any new blogs recently.  In the last two weeks, things have changed rather significantly in my daily life.  Up until June 2nd, I was preparing for the trip of a lifetime, canoeing the Thomsen River for 16 days on Banks Island in the Northwest Territories of Canada.  Then [...]

Nearly four years ago, on Thursday, June 7, 2007, a tornado devastated the Bear Paw Outdoor Adventure Resort along the Wolf River in White Lake, Wisconsin.  Thankfully, no one at the resort was seriously hurt or killed despite several buildings being blown off their foundations.  Dozens of paddlers who had regularly stayed at the resort [...]

I’ve been pretty busy lately teaching kayaking at some local high school physical education classes.  The teaching isn’t too hard, but all the boat loading, unloading, and gear hauling takes its toll on me physically, not to mention having to get up at 5am this week.  As a result, I haven’t gotten a blog posted [...]

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 [...]

I’ve been wrestling with this question for many years ever since my brother died in a sky-diving accident leaving a wife and young daughter behind, and our parents with just one surviving child – me.  At the time, I was just starting to get more serious about my own sea kayaking activities, but I had [...]

Many kayakers, like myself, have benefited from the personal encouragement, guidance, and instruction of more experienced paddlers received when we were newbies first getting into the sport.  Those “mentors” helped us avoid getting into serious trouble, picked up our spirits when we despaired over learning a difficult skill, and pointed us in the right direction [...]

Most of us are probably in the process of buying gifts for the upcoming holidays in our families.  As you make your purchase decisions, I would ask you to strongly consider supporting local, independent businesses in your area.  (As paddlers, you probably have spent some money in at least one of these small, local paddle [...]

Five years ago, Nancy Koeppen shared the following poem written by Bob Carter on the Milwaukee Sea Kayakers Yahoo Site.  As we prepare to celebrate another Thanksgiving, I’d like to share this poem with all of my readers.

“Thanksgiving Upon The Sea”  by Bob Carter
O Creator of the glorious stars of the heavens above and the [...]