I drive a car with pointy ends…
1959 DeSoto is a Greenland car isn’t it 
to stay closed longer in rough water
Valley and Kajak-Sport hatches as used on so many boats intended for rough water work very well.
Dang!
I am impressed! Good answer!!
other considerations
– Last Updated: Aug-11-09 10:12 AM EST –
Couldn't agree more. A boat for racing is probably not going to be a good boat for a casual day paddle. A good cruising boat probably not going to be a good racing boat. You really need to decide what you want to do and what you will do most and base your decision on that.
If I am designing a boat I lay out my goals for that boat. What do I want to do with it? Huge difference in one I want to camp out of and one I want to go fast in. A boat designed for paddling at race speeds will likely have more drag at normal cruising speeds and be slower at those speeds(require more effort).
I have an 15' boat, Curlew, that is easy (fast) at the slower speeds below 4.5 mph. But it's a dog in a sprint because of the short length. But I spend 99% of my time at these speeds, not sprinting. My 18' boat is much better sprinting but it feels like a barge after paddling the other one at 'normal' speeds. Guess which one I paddle most times?
Bottom line is everything is compromise. So pick what is most important and be prepared to compromise in the other areas.
kudzucraft.com
seaworthy
I own both the valley aquanaut and the prijon barracuda. the cuda is a fast boat in flatish conditions. As the conditions get more " textured",the aquanaut, for me, seems to go faster. It is so stable that I use less energy fighting the water.
Of course I am not the most skilled kayaker. Some people can take the barracuda out in conditions and have no problems at all.
Good luck with your purchase.
Kodiak is fine seaworthy kayak.
If you are a larger paddler > 200 lbs and want to carry gear on trips, the Kodiak is a really good choice. I’ve paddled one on long trips on the Baja Coast, explored seacaves and rock gardens along the way, it handles fine in rough water and was just as fast as any other kayak on the trip.
In my opinion the Kodiak hatches are not the best, also the rudder system is a bit fragile, but I don’t think any worse than many others you can buy.
Greenland style
– Last Updated: Aug-11-09 1:10 PM EST –
boat designs are always evolving, but just incrementally. The basic design is thousands of years old. Two pointy ends and a hole. From there it is parsing and production.
A kayak can utilize some of the features of what is called the Greenland kayak without rigorously replicating it. Calling it "Greenland style" is just a shorthand way of referring to certain design characteristics, just like it is common to refer to "British" or "North American" styles.
The major kayak builders do not want to replicate the vintage Greenland kayak. They are not gonna offer long boats under 20" in beam, with no toggles, scant or absent perimeter lines, a small ocean cockpit, a foredeck so low 90% of the population can't get their thighs under it, and a stern deck so low it is awash in mild conditions.
So making a "true" Greenland style boat (whatever that is)is a badge of nothing but niche marketing.
Calling something Greenland style is not marketing deception. It is adaptation.
There is a wide variation of boats under the Greenland style tent and I'm fine w. that. If I choose or don't choose a boat based on its "type" in a catalog....
Bring back any Inuit from 5,000 years ago and he will know what to do w. any of the Greenland style kayaks (or the Brit, or the North American).
I doubt he would care how "authentic" they are.
Hurricane Fast plastic kayak
Hurricane makes the new age plastic (vacuumed plastic) that is as slick as fiberglass (no joke!) and it has the flexibility of plastic. They cost $1500 at the the store 16.5’x22.75" very fast platic kayak.
On the other hand…
Hi Friendlyfire,
You wrote:
“Bring back any Inuit from 5,000 years ago and he will know what to do w. any of the Greenland style kayaks (or the Brit, or the North American).”
True enough. However, you also wrote:
“I doubt he would care how “authentic” they are.”
To a degree, perhaps not. However, it does seem to me that when we have certain words in our language to describe different things, it is because the differences do matter to us; even if the differences are subtle.
For instance, in the Greenlandic language, “qajaq” describes a very particular type of boat (a SOF in the style of the region that is custom sized for the particular paddler of that particular boat). Any boat not built to these specifications is not a “qajaq”, but a “qajariaq”, which means “similar to a qajaq”. If they’re going to go to the trouble of having different words to describe such things, I’m willing to respect this tradition, and not play too fast and loose with claiming “Greenland” as the style of just about any boat with pointy ends and a hole in the middle.
When I visit a different country, and try to speak the local language, I try my best to pronounce their words as they do. The “Brits” (and the “Americans”) are well known for butchering other people’s languages; out of either sheer laziness or simply not feeling that it’s important. I’ve been told many times by people around the world how much they appreciate my sincere attempts at speaking their languages as they do, as they consider it an issue of respect.
The more I study the Greenlandic boat and paddling traditions, the more I appreciate the very particular designs and techniques they’ve developed over thousands of years. This is why I’m now and then really taken aback when I see certain mass produced boats claiming a specific “Greenland” heritage. I’ve even seen a plastic SOT that looked absolutely nothing like any boat I’ve seen come out of Greenland called “Greenland style” on the manufacturer’s site.
Melissa
Then why do you use the word “kayak”,
…instead of “qajariaq”?
I have no problem using “qajariaq”…
…to describe the boats I currently paddle (glass and wood/glass boats). For purposes of communicating in a forum like this, where most people really don’t care about these subtleties, I’ve found it simpler to go along with “kayak”. Notice, however, that I still make a distinction between “kayak” and “qajaq” (meaningless distinction in one respect, though most people now know the difference when we refer to different types of boats with these different spellings). Modern day Greenlanders understand other people’s usage of various spellings, and the very commonly used English spelling of “kayak”, but when speaking/writing of their own boats vs. others, they will still distinguish between “qajaq” and “qajariaq”, and I try to respect that.
In any event, this branch of the discussion wasn’t just about the semantics/spelling of particular words, but about how we describe particular boat designs, and how manufacturers will use those descriptions to sell particular mass produced boats. When it comes to this sort of thing, I’d still like to know just where we’re willing to draw the lines between what is, and what is not, a “Greenland” style boat. Wouldn’t you?
Melissa
parsing & production
– Last Updated: Aug-11-09 5:15 PM EST –
as I posted, the major kayak companies are not trying to nor are they interested in producing qajaqs or qajariaqs.
They don't aspire to that degree of specificity. "Greenland style" does very well for them.
Well, maybe you can shake a finger at VCP who had the audacity to name a boat model the Qajariaq, and who committed further cultural affront by calling it the "Q-Boat" And here all the time I thought that was out of affection, not lazy imperialistic jargon.
Ironically, if the the British did not get involved in the 50s and 60s w. some of the very last remaining skin boats and paddlers in the villages on the island of Greenland (that word again, and the muddied origins of that are the ultimate geographic deception) however objectionable their bastardizations may be to some, we would not even be discussing or paddling these boats w. pointy ends and a hole.
Because they would have been relegated to the
odd archaelogical find.
So is Tahe Marine to be equally chastised for making the Tahe "Greenlander"in fiberglass grained to look like wood? Is that a cultural insult? Or is it just adopting a style to the realities of mass production?
What about the NDK Greenlander? What about the Betsie Bay boats?
So where along the gradient is the line crossed?
I submit that is a nonsensical question. Because as Melissa said it is not solely about wordplay and definitions. But that is not the whole picture.
It is about culture and its greatest ambassador, language, both in continual flux. Cultures borrowing from each other and modify what they borrow. There is no evil intent or disrespect. It just happens. Cultural exchange is the original and ultimate permeable membrane.
The people of the high Arctic are happily using snow machines. We are happily using kayaks. We are using a culturally modified term for "qajaq" and we have equally culturally modified what it looks like. Up in Nunuvut there is doubtless a word in their language for snowmobile.
This is cultural exchange.
There are those in certain cultures who want to keep their cultures "pure" and there are some in our sport who want to keep "qajaq" & "qajariaq" design pure. Actually, nothing made by humans is pure. It is all influenced.
All of it is like trying to hold water in our hands. We can hold most of it, but inevitably some of it seeps downward into the ground, opening up fertile new possibilities.
Great Reply!!!eom
I think you’re still missing the point
…of my original questioning of the word “Greenland” to describe certain specific mass produced boat designs.
Since a manufacturer is going to use the word “Greenland” to describe a particular design they want to sell, don’t you think that even with all you’ve said, you’d still want to know just what they mean by that? How does selling a particular boat as a “Greenland” style design distinguish it from their other “non-Greenland” offerings? Don’t they all have pointy ends and a hole in the middle, after all?
You do seem a bit defensive about my concern for bastardizing language, and how doing so might dilute or otherwise change meanings that actually still mean something to someone, so I’m a bit curious as to why this is. My original question/problem remains: Where do we draw the lines when describing/selling to each other various boat designs? Obviously, the manufacturer in question felt it important enough to draw that line somewhere, so even according to them, it’s not all just a wash of constantly and freely evolving design and language.
Melissa
You also wrote:
friendlyfire wrote:
“Well, maybe you can shake a finger at VCP who had the audacity to name a boat model the Qajariaq, and who committed further cultural affront by calling it the “Q-Boat” And here all the time I thought that was out of affection, not lazy imperialistic jargon.”
Actually, the use of “Qajariaq” is appropriate in this case, as they are actually following the Greenlandic semantic tradition of describing such a boat as “similar to a qajaq”.
Melissa
I’ll try again
– Last Updated: Aug-11-09 6:02 PM EST –
it's general term. I use it to generally distinguish it from other general terms.
Like I use "canoe" to distinguish it from a "kayak" even while knowing the British and the Canadians can use the term interchangeably. Most of the time. But we work around it. The world turns. I haven't brought home a canoe by mistake that I know of.
Catalogs are marketing tools- they are supposed to be general to have the widest appeal. They are not archaelogical disquistions.
The use of "Greenland style" in this context is logical and perfectly appropriate. They are not building "greenland kayaks". they are building boats in the style of greenland kayaks.
I say this is parsing because it is rapidly approaching it. Hell, it has jumped the shark
and been eaten by small aggressive pyranhas.
You are juxtaposing this general use of a general term to a very narrow set of specific traits of a qajaq or qajariaq and as a result seem to be taking umbrage that a kayak company should appropriate the term Greenlandic.
You seem to want a bright line. I don't. I believe I gave several examples why. In the final analysis I don't think the bright line is there. Because in part I don't think it's there. Nor do I think it should be, nor do I believe it can be.
I think the heart of our disagreement is on those points. I don't know how to further convince you that cultural exchange is at work in all things human, which includes catalog language used by kayak companies.
How do I evaluate a kayak? Not by the name or style name. I use my eyes and my math and my checkbook and get my butt in the boat if persuaded.
I can tell you what I DON'T do... I don't spend a nanosecond comparing it to, or worrying about its resemblance to, a qajak or qajariaq. It appears that you do. Which is fine, given your penchant for homebuilt boats and interest in the nuances of the history of their design.
What I'm saying is that is not a consideration in most of us who are buying production boats. And it does not make us or the people who are building boats for our consideration culturally obtuse or derisive of originating cultural ideas.
**************as an aside:
I love words and dabble in a few languages coherently. I am well aware of the iconic Ugly Americans talking too loudly, wearing shorts inside the Vatican, trying to videorecord Native American ceremonies, seeking BigMacs everywhere and insisting that everyone speak American English.
That is not me. I grew up in a somewhat multicultural household and with my dad travelled to several continents and a couple dozen countries before I was 19.
Long ago, before I realized I would have to make an honest living, I took a major in anthropology and worked as a research associate to a published cultural anthropologist. His work (our work) took us primarily to the Yucatan peninsula among villagers so for whom Spanish was, as it was for us, a second language.
I don't think I would have stayed on the road so long, or completed my assignments so joyfully and effectively, if I went in defensively.
I recently completed an 8 year assignment as office administrator for a 140+ person team that included people from all over the country, from Canada, Mexico, Peru, Nicaragua,Venezuela, Nigeria, Turkey, and Hong Kong. Part of my role, which I relished and took very seriously, was to make everyone welcome and give people an oasis of help and support esp. when adjusting to life in downtown Detroit.
So I am welcome continued discussion here or offline (since we are really derailing this thread), but please reconsider what seem to be your conclusions concerning my cultural insularity and knowledge.
we are
She is 5-2, 110 lbs and I am 6-0 188 and counting 
The Prijon Marlin which she paddled last weekend is actually a new boat for 2009, and it the same length as the Kodiak, but 2 inches narrower. We should’ve tried each others’ boats, but…
The Kodiak does look like an attractive boat to me, I am almost sold. My partner will need to do more research. When I learned that the Kodiak was used to paddle from Kamchatka to AK I was very impressed. Also, did not see a single mention of Prijon’s hatches leaking, unlike Wilderness Systems and Current Designs.
long trips
We would be doing 2-3 day “extended weekend” trips. I did notice that the Kodiak got more stable with the gear in it (about 50 lbs). We have pretty standard sets of gear we take backpacking, and my stuff and her stuff fit pretty nicely into the boats.
I could not get the point of that little round storage compartment with a neoprene baggy hanging down and a screw cap (in front of the cockpit). Both the Kodiak and the Marlin had it. It was not waterproof unlike the main hatches, so I could not put my camera in there.
I believe
I believe I read your report online. Prijon could not ask for a better testament. Did you actually cut the kayaks in 3 pieces? Do airlines ship them with no problem?
Bingo!
that goes exactly to my point.
Just who decided it was an acceptable approximation? Cuz it sure wasn’t a dead on replica, nor was it meant to be. The founders of VCP thought it was a marketable adaptation. Best believe it would not have made it to market based on how “authentic” it was. Be certain that the design of the boat has been tweaked several times since its inception, and why? due to market response! Consider the Pintail, sister to the Anas Acuta, which is also very Greenlandic in heritage… how often has that one changed? Considerable times. To the point that the Pintail is offered in a keyhole cockpit! Was that done in a cold hearted move to dilute its “Greenlandic” credentials? Or was it simply to get bigger bodies in the boats and relieve the squeamishness of the some of the big bods to wet exit?
Market response…
Not some mystical affirmation of what is “Greenlandic” and what is not.
I will have to take a break from this now. Not bec. I don’t enjoy the discussion, but we are destroying the original intent of the thread and life outside is beckoning.