I agree about the paddles. On a cloudy, rainy day I was trying to catch up with someone in a lime green kayak with a matching paddle. The first thing I could see was the flash of the paddle. This wouldn’t work if someone was in the water and the paddle wasn’t moving.
I have never chosen the colour of a kayak but bought what was available in the store or second hand. I’ve had white, three pink (two ugly and one pretty) and the latest is red and white. I recently bought a new PFD and reluctantly chose red for better visibility over the dull colour I preferred. I reasoned that if I was ever in a situation where I needed to be seen I would not regret my choice. Anyway it matches my newest boat.
Brighter is better. Unless you are a Navy Seal. .
The only powerboats I normally worry about are the ones where the operator is drunk or not paying attention. One of the few times I was nearly run over while kayaking was by a powerboat where the operator left the helm while traveling at speed to yell at his kids in the back of the boat. The boat was moving erratically.
The other time was in New England while I was on a 39’ sailboat motoring into a harbor in a narrow channel. We were being overtaken by a shrimp boat that had his booms out for stability and were wider than the channel. The operator was below deck while the boat was on GPS autopilot. They only saw us at the last minute.
Hi! I have 10 boats, none are yellow. Even used I try to go with colors I like but never pass up something good. I have Fuschia, Red, Green, Pink mix, Blue and Purple boats. I paddle with my clubs and having a unique color helps find my boat in a crowd. I paddle all kinds of water and what has worked best for me regarding visibility whether it be whitewater or the ocean is having reflective stickers on my paddles, high res PFD/paddle jacket, and in the ocean or large lakes/rivers with motorized craft around I also use a tall flag and lights in poor conditions. I say buy a color that makes you smile!
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I only had my choice of color with one new boat that I ever bought and I went with high visibility orange. Not because it was orange but because it was high visibility.
When i bought my first folder in 1976 there was one color, Blue. Now there are many colors available. I now have 5 boats and my Folbot Yukon is Red. I don,t think it makes much difference what the color is unless you need rescuing then a bright color can be seen from the air a lot easier.
Yes, this. Photo of the week. Blow all the safety whistles. Cite all the search and rescue color studies. Present safety statistic spreadsheets. Scold me right to pieces. You can have me singing Glory, Hallelujah, a Bright Colored Kayak will surely save me!! Yet still, try to keep me from feeling great about paddling a kayak that looks like this. I hope one day to have a strip built kayak.
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Same here, my first Pungo 140 was Home Depot Orange and I loved it…years later when I bought my second Pungo, had to settle for Mango.
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Minecwere yellow and orange. My Tsunamis are red, blue, and orange.
Hmm. Looking back at the succession of boats in my fleet, the colors have been:
2 white
1 yellow
2 red hull + yellow deck
4 red, 1 red + grey hull
1 orange
3 green (1 each pea, leaf and lime)
3 blue
1 blue/purple/white swirl
1 raspberry pink
1 blue + yellow deck with white hull (and sparkles!)
1 brown (skin on frame)
2 grey
Half have been sold or given away by now. I had no choice of color for any of them. Even the ones bought new were what happened to be in stock and a few of the models only came in one production color.
I admit that I am usually very picky about the colors of things in my life (clothes, home decor, vehicles, even my hair) and have drooled over the combos of some custom ordered tri-color SKUK composites I have seen on the beaches of kayak camps. SKUK offers over 200 custom colors for deck, hull and trim and there was a teal deck Romany with cerise hull and lime trim (and that fabulous Celtic dragon logo) that dazzled me at one group gathering last year.
So it was actually a relief that I never had a choice to make when buying any of my boats because that step might have induced selection paralysis…
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My kayaks have all been used so I had no color choice. I currently have all white hulls, one with yellow deck, one red deck, one yellow/red fade deck, one beige deck (actually very badly faded yellow) and one white deck. I’ve always liked the “classic” look of a white hull with white deck, plus some black trim. I know people may say the all white will blend in with whitecaps on a rough day, but I’d balance that with all white probably being the most visible in dim lighting or under a searchlight.
Mine is the old white one on the left, next to pretty new all white Cetus:
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