1. Paddle leashes, either paddle-kayak or paddle-paddler.
2. A rope attaching the person to the boat.
A paddle leash is an issue I have no particular opinion on, besides my own personal choice. I've been talking about the danger of a guy roping himself into his boat with a bungee cord, not a surf boat, but a rod-laden fishing kayak.
My viewpoint is in concord with barracuda's - no to body leashes.So, to get you two off paddle leashes and back onto the topic of this thread, how do you feel about body leashes, ie., a guy tying himself to his fishing kayak?
PFD Not to venture too off topic. As far as wearing a PFD goes, there was an article in a kayaking magazine about a Texas person that regularly stowed his PFD behind him under the deck rigging. What struck me as strange is this person was seeking some surfing water, or fast moving stuff to challenge skills. It went bad and he ended up in the water. Luckily he managed to find and employ his PFD and lived to tell the story. Wear you floatation, once you realize you need it, it’s way too late.
hard to speculate or generalize about the conditions that someone else is dealing with and why s/he pursued a particular option/approach.
For myself, I thought long and serious enough about what I do and whether I would tether myself to a craft. I can't think of a positive that is not offset more negatives.
Chris Duff Chris Duff says that he attaches himself to his kayak whenever paddling on days where the wind is over 20 knotts.
I always wondered about this…seems that it would be an issue for entanglement; although he says he thinks that it could be a life saver if he had to wet exit for some reason on a windy day where the boat could get away from him very quickly.
Like anything else- If you think it’s a good idea, test it and train with it (in a controlled environment) and then re-evaluate.
I think 15’ of bungee is a poor choice. During a solo open-water crossing I might consider a short leash. But not until I’ve trained with it -including recoveries.
Try it out next time. Next time the wind is over 25 knots, try a wet exit. Pretend you are disoriented and let go of your boat for just a second.
I expect your partner will be paddling like crazy to go get your boat and bring it back to you.
I think entanglement is highly over rated. Hobie sailors and many others are wired to their boats by a metal cable. When the boat crashes, which happens very often, the sailors are often tangle up in a cable and a bunch of lines and maybe underneath the sail. This is where rescue knives and cool heads come in handy. If you cut the sail so you can breath it costs about a $1000 so you untangle yourself calmly and swim to the leech of the sail.
I’d rather be tangled up with the boat and found than unfound.
In big surf I’ve followed the boat in by holding onto a 25 foot long leash. This beats me getting maytaged and I can kepp the boat from broching.
In runnable surf I don’t attach my self to the boat because I want to jump out and away from it if things get hairy. Once my boat fills with water it is a heavy and deadly.
And finally it was good enough for my hero Audrey Sutherland so it is a good method for me!
If paddling alone Nothing we paddle in would normally make a person-to-boat leash a good idea. But then, we are never less than two and try to find other paddlers for the bigger trips in Maine where the risk is higher. Luckily we have started to find local paddlers where we vacation who are of like mind, frankly better paddlers than us which makes us feel better, and who are themselves happy for company.
That said, we did have a capsize once in 27 plus mph winds where a paddler lost the grip on their boat, and it is astounding how fast paddler and boat separate in that kind of wind. It happens in the blink of an eye and very few people could swim fast enough to catch the boat, especially if they have to fight current as well.
So - if I was paddling alone in risky conditions - being attached to the boat so that it wouldn’t be lost might be more important than the entanglement risk.
You need to figure this stuff out in the surf, not on the internet. People differ, boats differ, conditions differ. You need to get worked a few times in the surf to start figuring out what works for you and what doesn’t. As I mentioned above (speaking of reading closely), I use an ankle leash in my surfski. I don’t like paddle leashes but use them on SOTs in the surf in some conditions. In both cases, I use leashes that will break in big surf long before my body does (and yes, I’ve broken some). But that’s my preferences, my boats, my conditions.
On entanglement, my main thought is that if you’re reasonably thoughtful about how you set things up it shouldn’t be an issue, both because it doesn’t happen that easily and because it shouldn’t be a huge problem even if it does as long as you keep a cool head. The main thing that would scare me would be anything that could snag my upper body from behind and hold me close to the deck when I’m leaning back. But again, YMMV. (As may the guy’s you’re asking about; personally, I’d avoid critiquing others’ equipment choices on the basis of internet learning in all but the most extreme cases.)
