I’m a kayak fisherman and this is not really the fishing season around here (Santa Cruz, CA vicinity). But, I’ll probably get out more than usual in the next few weeks, as everything is in lockdown mode, and I go stir crazy after just a day inside.
I’m a CS faculty at SJSU and our classes are all online for the rest of the semester. If I could find a place with few people, good fishing, and a good internet connection, I’d be all set…
Here in NC, they closed the Northern Outer Banks, to non residents. This includes Duck,Manteo, Nags Head, Hatteras and Ocracoke. Prime paddling areas. Also this area is just getting back on their feet, from a major hurricane. More economic hardship.
I am closer to the southern outer banks. I spend most of my time in the Beaufort, Emerald Isle area. I hope to surf Bogue Inlet soon.
It’s supposed to be close to 80 on Thursday and Friday. I hope to try to catch the virus from a fish.
Even though I’m in what is considered one of the “hot zones”(New York) went out last weekend and shuttled with partners. We plan on going out again this week, if air temps come up as expected. This time we’ll be shuttling with everyone(3-to-10 of us) jumping on the open air backside bed of two pick-up trucks–Only the driver inside the cab!(Yep, it’s come to that here.) As noted, many river releases and festivals in the Northeast have been canceled. But I for one will continue to stand-up, paddle and confront/embrace any fear. stamd%20up%20cano|685x270
My brother, who has overexposed himself to the South Florida sun, looks like that to protect his face while on the water.
They checked me out to be sure I didn’t have a fever BEFORE they let me into the office. They had a setup and checked everyone entering… no sick people there.
Florida closed all bars and nightclubs and limited restaurants today. They’re having problems controlling the spring breakers…
First, my condolences for your club’s loss. The very fact that you spoke of him so warmly here honors him.
Second, as a prior small business owner (holistic pet store), let me say ‘thank you!’ for your comments. Few who have not owned a business understand just what the costs are to attend an event like Canoecopia. Attendees revel in the experience of so much gear in one place, love to touch and try-on equipment. Vendors love meeting the folks who use the gear but are putting out thousands of dollars to do that.
We can all help those small paddle businesses out by purchasing products from them instead of from mega-store retailers!
Interesting choice of words: hysteria.
As a retired epidemiologist I’ve long rankled at the political modification of health department recommendations. In this day and age the misinformation spread by the media and political influencers just compounds the problem.
I’m 64, but in pretty good health. Odds are if I contract the illness it will be mild. But the nature of microbial pandemics is that eventually most of us will be exposed, and many will be unwitting asymptomatic carriers who take the risk back to our home turf and expose those more vulnerable: the elderly, those with compromised immune systems, and those on drugs which help them survive but inhibit their immune response (chemo, HIV, rheumatoid arthritis, etc).
Spock said it best: The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. I’m staying on my home turf this year.
I hate to be mean but it is proving out that folks like you are prime vectors. This from a scientist. Fact check it
Here is how this virus works Best explanation I have read about the corona virus: Feeling confused as to why Coronavirus is a bigger deal than Seasonal flu? Here it is in a nutshell. I hope this helps. Feel free to share this to others who don’t understand…
It has to do with RNA sequencing… I.e. genetics.
Seasonal flu is an “all human virus”. The DNA/RNA chains that make up the virus are recognized by the human immune system. This means that your body has some immunity to it before it comes around each year… you get immunity two ways…through exposure to a virus, or by getting a flu shot.
Novel viruses, come from animals… the WHO tracks novel viruses in animals, (sometimes for years watching for mutations). Usually these viruses only transfer from animal to animal (pigs in the case of H1N1) (birds in the case of the Spanish flu). But once, one of these animal viruses mutates, and starts to transfer from animals to humans… then it’s a problem, Why? Because we have no natural or acquired immunity… the RNA sequencing of the genes inside the virus isn’t human, and the human immune system doesn’t recognize it so, we can’t fight it off.
Now… sometimes, the mutation only allows transfer from animal to human, for years it’s only transmission is from an infected animal to a human before it finally mutates so that it can now transfer human to human… once that happens…we have a new contagion phase. And depending on the fashion of this new mutation, thats what decides how contagious, or how deadly it’s gonna be…
H1N1 was deadly…but it did not mutate in a way that was as deadly as the Spanish flu. It’s RNA was slower to mutate and it attacked its host differently, too.
Fast forward.
Now, here comes this Coronavirus… it existed in animals only, for nobody knows how long…but one day, at an animal market, in Wuhan China, in December 2019, it mutated and made the jump from animal to people. At first, only animals could give it to a person… But here is the scary part… in just TWO WEEKS it mutated again and gained the ability to jump from human to human. Scientists call this quick ability, “slippery”
This Coronavirus, not being in any form a “human” virus (whereas we would all have some natural or acquired immunity). Took off like a rocket. And this was because, Humans have no known immunity…doctors have no known medicines for it.
And it just so happens that this particular mutated animal virus, changed itself in such a way the way that it causes great damage to human lungs…
That’s why Coronavirus is different from seasonal flu, or H1N1 or any other type of influenza… this one is slippery AF. And it’s a lung eater…And, it’s already mutated AGAIN, so that we now have two strains to deal with, strain s, and strain L…which makes it twice as hard to develop a vaccine.
We really have no tools in our shed, with this. History has shown that fast and immediate closings of public places has helped in the past pandemics. Philadelphia and Baltimore were reluctant to close events in 1918 and they were the hardest hit in the US during the Spanish Flu.
Factoid: Henry VIII stayed in his room and allowed no one near him, till the Black Plague passed…(honestly…I understand him so much better now). Just like us, he had no tools in his shed, except social isolation…
And let me end by saying…right now it’s hitting older folks harder… but this genome is so slippery…if it mutates again (and it will). Who is to say, what it will do next.
Be smart folks… acting like you’re unafraid is so not sexy right now.
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All bars, restaurants, fitness centers, schools, universities, etc. in Michigan were ordered closed, but the restaurants can do take-out. Some have been creative in setting up curb service.
At least we can still paddle. I read that France has forbidden all nautical activity on the Mediterranean and that no sport or leisure activities are allowed in Spain.
You don’t mean to be mean??? I don’t know about that: “Experts” here like you are the reason I’ve mostly avoided this website like the plaque in recent years. Do you honestly believe you are the only one so well-informed about this virus that you feel compelled to provide ubiquitous readily available information as a public service pronouncement??? --And where in my post did I state that I (or the folks I paddle with)were more or less disregarding any safety guidelines whilst outside together? Shuttling is in own vehicles with boats on the backs of open air flatbed trucks–Nobody even in a cab together. We’re not going for beer in a pub afterwards(they’re all closed anyway). Nobody’s swapping spits, bodily fluids, or even paddling within 6 feet of one another…And If you’re so concern ed about me or anyone else being a “vector,” maybe you should contact the owners of this website that you spend so much time puking out advice on, to admonish them for this very day posting the same safety guidelines I and my crew have already discussed thoroughly in detail and have followed BEFORE the outbreak occurred.
Sounds like you have to get outside more–And, oh by the way, this might come as a revelation: Henry the Eighth didn’t live forever–and neither will you.
Further more…https://paddling.com/learn/practice-social-distancing-go-paddling/
Okay, so maybe two here last weekend were a little closer than need be(there were half a dozen more behind my canoe)–But everyone drove off by themselves in their own vehicles at Take-Out.
So your facts are that someone told you to be scared, so you are. There have been dozens of animal to human flu seasons in my lifetime. This scare is caused by sheeple freaking out. The standard response from researchers is, and should be an outright Oh shit, this is new and we don’t know what to expect so full cautions. That is their job, their life, their reason to be. They raise a flag at anything that has a potential threat. It is the job of us as people, and the job of government to decide just how serious it is. There is not a place on the face of this earth, including places without great hygiene, that has had an outbreak that justifies a global shut down of the economy. There are going to be at the minimum hundreds of thousands of people abruptly out of work. Largely lower earning people who can’t afford a sudden stop in the income flow. There will be many many small businesses who are paying fixed costs with no income that will not survive much more of this. The nation, and many other nations are going to end up in a recession, or an actual depression depending on how long this nonsense holds up. You can have your version of what’s going on, provided by people who spend their lives looking for problems, or you can actually look at the facts. I have yet to see a single statistic that says this has shown the potential to become half of what a boring flu season would be.
First off… thank you for your kind reply KayakerBee and yes, the memorial gathering has been moved back by a month and, I suppose, can be moved back again if the situation has not improved by then.
Second, I’m also thinking that Rutabaga, the paddle shop who organizes the whole Canoecopia sheebang, might be on the hook for a great many expenses - reserving the Alliant Energy center where the event is held, the motel pool for demonstration sessions, janitorial services, and who knows what else is a MAJOR undertaking, and one that is surly not without up-front costs. Let’s hope it is not devastating for them financially. (Of course, this virus is something countless other small business, from restaurants, to motels, to who knows who else are being effected by, as are all of us.)
And finally, I’m put in mind of my late grandfather. He was in the medical corps in France during the WW1 Spanish Flu epidemic and worked in the tents fighting that flu. (And, BTW, also worked on Yellow Fever mosquito control during the Panama canal construction.) Tending to flu patients, at the time, was probably more dangerous service than the trenches, though it received less recognition.
We’re more than a bit spoiled, you know. We have lived our entire lives under the benefit of antibiotics, public sanitation systems, mostly reliable clean water sources, and vaccinations for such things as Small Pox, Polio, diphtheria, and so many other illnesses that have killed so many millions of every generation of humans back to the origins of humans. We may be the only generation in history or prehistory not to have lost large numbers of loved ones, relatives, friends, co-workers to these epidemics. So now we may (may) be facing one. It might get ugly, but its nothing that hasn’t been faced before, and often. No matter what happens, we’ve had it good. We have tools and more understanding of disease processes than anyone before us ever has. Even the fact that within three months of recognizing the disease we have RNA sequences and developed test kits for it would have been unthinkable a mere 25 or 30 yeas ago. We’ve a lot to be grateful for and realistic reasons for optimism.
Hardly. I have been paddling. Ocean kayaking with husband or hiking in the woods. The lake paddling not possible as we still have iced over freshwater
I believe the scientists. Has this affected my life or my paddling. Absolutely NOT!
I am old and refuse to stay in the house as advised but I do not run around seeking others either. I just wish the millenials would join society and not be the me generation. Just think before you do. It might be fine or might not be fine
Thank you, Kayakmedic, and I am sorry that you got some meathead reactions to your sage summary of the risks we are in the midst of. I would advise anyone who thinks we are “overreacting” to check out some of the horrific news releases from Italy.
As a student of history (with a degree in North American Archaeology) I would like to remind everyone on here that we live in a Hemisphere that was almost completely depopulated of millions of residents within less than a century 500 years ago by microbial pathogens that were immunologically “novel” to the native peoples.
Living in a hot zone (at this time, NY is #1 on the list of states with the most confimed cases) and shuttling when even people living in “calmer” areas are avoiding close contact with people does seem like ignoring the risks.
Erring on the side of caution does NO harm to anyone, so why flout both common sense and published pleas to practice social distancing? The immediate gratification of continuing close contact for recreational gratification comes across as both immature and foolhardy. NOT as brave, because there are other people who unwittingly could be infected by such indulgences.
Nobody’s dismissing the facts. Nobody’s diminishing the threat. Nobody’s not practicing social distancing, even while shuttling.
I am dismissing people who feel the need to use a subtle form of passive-aggression, by commenting on the replies of others EVEN BEFORE THEY THEMSELVES HAVE MADE ANY COMMENT ANSWERING THE ORIGINAL POSTED TOPIC…Or, in this case, the OP’s original question. (Go back, read closer.)
I am not brave. But I do believe in facing my fears and properly assessing threats. Someone would have had to have been living on Pluto with no communications for the past month, to have missed what things have come to. (“Oh, Italy? Gee, where’s that???”)
If this thing goes “airborne” and becomes like the “Andromeda Strain” then I’ll totally suspend going outdoors and stay home collecting rolls of toilet paper like everyone else here who poops their pants.
In the meantime, I’m (safely as possible)going paddling…And yes,even with others.
I wouldn’t use the word “hysteria” referring to the precautions being taken.
