If Me, my son, or my wife were to flip the canoe how hard is it to recover into and get everyone back into it safely if is in a lake?
We are all sort of a heavy set family. Hence why i got the trippers 1500 lb capacity.
I solo paddle it a few days ago and it went really well. But solo car topping and removal is a pain in the rear!!
At the moment I am the only one paddling it because they are nervous that it will flip and we wouldn’t be able to recover and get back in.
Of course we would all be wearing life jackets as that is one of dead set rules.
Once my older brother wanted to go with me out onto the lake, and he wouldn’t wear a life jacket.He said he could swim fine, so I had to educate him that if you don’t wear one you don’t get into my canoe easy as that.
It takes some training
the heel hook method is one way to do it if you lack upper body strength
The Old Town Tripper does NOT have a safe freeboard with 1500 lbs in it. More like 900. Old Town ought to be shot with those insane numbers. That is the old six inch freeboard. Believe me when the waves are coming you need more like eight or nine.
A canoe rescue class is in order. Also some instruction. If they are nervous lessons are called for. You fall in when you get stiff nervous and let your head get out of bounds of the gunwales.
Find a nice river to start with… slow moving or a pond and let the nervousness leave. Pick an area where they like to swim.
Your older brother needs an education. How well can he swim while trying to right a capsized canoe and holding on to a paddle. I take it he has three or four hands?
Its not about him. Without a PFD he can swim but can he help others?
My 2 cents worth…
Could it be done?
Yes.
Can you & your family do it?
Based on the limited information you posted; I would say the possibility that your family would succeed is poor at best.
In your favor would be having everyone in pfds.
Not in your favor would be your family’s weight issue; that’s not going to make it easier to reboard the canoe if it’s capsizes.
Not in your favor would be having 2 of 3 of your family likely feeling very uncomfortable in the water, if/when your canoe capsized. Panic on the part of one or both might be a concern?
Not in your favor (I’m guessing here); you & your family have little paddling experience.
Not in your favor (guessing again); your family has never never practiced reboarding your canoe after it is capsized.
If you don’t try; you’ll never know what will happen. If you do try; practice should be done close to shore, not in the middle of a lake.
BOB
tipping
"The Old Town Tripper does NOT have a safe freeboard with 1500 lbs in it. More like 900. Old Town ought to be shot with those insane numbers. That is the old six inch freeboard. Believe me when the waves are coming you need more like eight or nine."
Okay we would be under 8-9. More like brinks of 700 do you think that would be enough free board?
“A canoe rescue class is in order. Also some instruction. If they are nervous lessons are called for. You fall in when you get stiff nervous and let your head get out of bounds of the gunwales.”
totally agreed. I signed up with the local canoe/kayak club and am going to have them help me with learning the ropes. I noticed they had a warm water huge size pool they teach canoe rescue in so that will be an added bonus to joining the club.
I was thinking the small lake close to my town because its not a very wide lake, and you could swim to shore if it ever did tip. Plus there are usually a lot of fishermen there who may be able to help if it did call for it. Not that I want to rely on others.
“Your older brother needs an education. How well can he swim while trying to right a capsized canoe and holding on to a paddle. I take it he has three or four hands?”
Yeah he ended up using a stupid blow up raft since he wouldn’t listen to me about the PDF’s. I don’t care how good a swimmer he or anyone else is if he was to hit his head on a rock or the canoe tipping and go under he could very easily have drowned.
Could it be done?
Yes.
“Can you & your family do it?
Based on the limited information you posted; I would say the possibility that your family would succeed is poor at best.”
Yeah I understand that and want to have the family take the class at the canoe club so we could find out in there warm water pool.
“In your favor would be having everyone in pfds.”
Agreed even the dog has to wear one when i go out without the family.
Not in your favor would be your family’s weight issue; that’s not going to make it easier to reboard the canoe if it’s capsizes. Agreed thats one reason i was asking for advice or opinions.
“Not in your favor would be having 2 of 3 of your family likely feeling very uncomfortable in the water, if/when your canoe capsized. Panic on the part of one or both might be a concern?”
Yeah also why i want o do the classes.
Not in your favor (I’m guessing here); you & your family have little paddling experience.
I have paddled around a bit when i owned a colman ram x but only a few times so yes i am not very experienced.
Not in your favor (guessing again); your family has never never practiced reboarding your canoe after it is capsized.
Nope no practice yet. I am hoping its do able in the class other wise i guess id have my answer right there.
“If you don’t try; you’ll never know what will happen. If you do try; practice should be done close to shore, not in the middle of a lake.”
Agreed id rather try than just give up on a promising hobby. I am thinking on taking them to the small lake by our house. Since i dislike river canoeing i have tipped before in the river with a current not fun.
JP
ask any kid
tipping for them is a blast. Of course they are a little more agile.
We oldsters need to rely on trick and techniques. In person they are a whole lot easier to learn. Books and computers are awful swimmers.
Your canoe club ought to be a valuable resource but run if they say they never tip. Tipping is actually a good thing in controlled conditions. Practice builds confidence and chases nerves away…
Its funny and just an observation of humans that the stuff comes first and the skills later. To some extent this progression is normal, but folks tend to focus on “right boat” rather than “how can I make my paddling team better”.
if there are no other canoes
nearby to do a boat over boat empty-out, your first concern is how to get the hull upright with a minimum of water. There’s the possibility of a Capistrano Flip but with a hull of that size and weight can be problematic. Adding extra air bags could help but can take up a lot of room. A shakeout might be possible but takes some practice and in rough weather can be a problem. If successful, then comes the part about getting back in with a heel hook et. al. As others have said some good training is called for. Not your cousin or friend, but someone who knows what they are doing. This is a quick and simple post and by no means covers the full range of discussion that is prudent.
learn not to tip it
First off, you said you had a hard time loading the canoe alone. This gets easier each time you do it, but just lift one end of the canoe on the vehicle, then push the other end up, sliding the canoe on top of vehicle. If you worry about scratches, use one of those pool noodles to ‘roll’ the canoe on top of vehicle.
As far as tipping; If you tip, your problems have just begun. 1st you have to flip it back up. 2nd you have to get back in. 3rd you have to get some of the water out. 4th you have to get back to shore. And do all this without getting hypothermia.
Best bet: Dont tip over! Learn to balance the canoe. Learn to kneel/sit on the bottom when in trouble. Know that a canoe in motion is somewhat less tippy. Learn to paddle correctly. A canoe is like a weeble, weebles wobble but they dont fall down. Remember those? Other than a very big wave, the only thing that can tip a canoe is you.
Of course we all know, the canoe spirits are gonna catch us off guard and we’re gonna get wet…
Regardless of what anyone here says
You won’t be able to get back in it.
You’ll have to swim it to shore.
Try it in shallow water near the shore and you’ll see what I mean.
jack L
You have to practice
It is a very difficult question to have a general answer for. A lot of things affect it, including how much flotation the boat has and the overall athleticism of the paddlers involved.
You have to take it out, and dump it and try to get back in to figure out where the issues are. Some combinations can't be managed, some can. I and most people can easily get back into a canoe with full float bags front and back for example. But my ultralight canoe without those float bags is another story entirely.
My thought too
Try it in shallow water close to shore on a hot day. It’s a good excuse to play in the water.
It is not a difficult question to have
a simple answer for!
Just reread the OPs post.
It is obvious that he doesn’t have any air bags.
They could practice till the cows come home, and they won’t be able to reenter the canoe if they tipped it.
It is beyond me why some people instead of answering a simple question have to give all kinds of BS answers.
Guy
how about trying a kayak?
Realistically
You have to be in decent to good condition to reboard a flipped canoe. If you cant do a pullup, I would put the chances of a successful reboard pretty low. The biggest guy I've ever seen reboard after a flip is about 6'0" 220 lbs and is decently muscular with a good sized belly. He got back in, but it took him a couple tries and it was a marginal recovery. If conditions were rough, I bet it wouldnt have happened.
As others have said, try it in safe conditions near shore. Even of you cant get back in, you will learn valuable lessons.
Float bags are your friend. Also, bring an extra flotation device with you when your try it near a beach. I always loop a PFD under my crotch when reboarding because it gives you an extra 15lbs buoyancy in addition the the 15 already provided by your PFD. instead of hooking it around your leg/crotch, you can also hook it on your foot so you retain the additional lift longer into the recovery. You could potentially use the largest flotation device that you find practical. Maybe you could make something like 2 milk jugs with rope connecting them you could use for a foot hook. That probably wouldnt work too well, but the idea is all Im after.
However as others have said, if you're in 'less than moderate' physical conditioning, you will have a pretty hard or impossible time reboarding regardless of assisting devices.
Air bags are not keys to success
I taught water safety to teenaged kids for the better part of 20 years.
Over the years, the canoe they used in the class were 17 foot, Osagians(aluminum), and 17 foot, Old Town Discovery 174s. NONE were ever outfitted with airbags.
One task each pair of partners were required to complete successfully was to get their canoe to the middle of a 200 foot wide, deep water lake. The next part of the task required that they intentionally capsize the canoe in the middle of the lake, reboard the canoe, and "hand paddle" the canoe to shore. They were not allowed to use, or leave the paddles they used to get to the middle of the lake. This was done "year round"; as we canoed year round, and were trying to duplicate the weather conditions they could expect if they capsized on the rivers where we paddled.
The kids canoeing experience varied, from having paddled a short distance 1 or 2 times(typically country boys, blundering downsteam) to never having set foot in a canoe in their life(typically city boys). I guesstimate that I taught in excess of 700 kids during the time I taught that class.
Not all were successful on their first attempt, but every single one of the teams of kids was successful; typically on their 2nd or 3 attempt.
Again, this was done in Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter conditions.
Participants could best be described as rank beginners.
No airbags were ever used.
Not one kid was ever evacuated for medical care.
The absolute necessity of having airbags in a canoe; to be able to successfully reenter a swamped canoe is pure, unadulterated BS!
Is it easy to do? No.
Can it be done? Yes.
I have seen it done hundreds of time, by young rookies.
BOB
its easier to do tandem than solo
and its easier to reenter a swamped recreational canoe than one fitted with air bags-
didn't say it was better or preferable- just relating my experience of how it was easier to reenter. If the boat is totally swamped out there's a good chance it will roll on you as you try to paddle it into shore. not sure how my poly canoe would work for rentry. Never have tried it out- so I think boat design and materials could change the outcome. I think ww boats would be harder to reenter.
My thoughts are get wet and find out for yourself if you want to know. Tandem we put our backs to boat and entered simulataneously with one of us on each side of the center thwart. Solo trickier- front wise,meaning your stomach is facing the boat, letting the feet float out to the surface, kicking and use hand over hand on a thwart.
here’s a pic of paddling a swamped boat
using the “dumbbell” stroke after reentry, sitting on the floor, feet in the birthing position- notice the rowboat nearby with pole to offer assistance if things went south
no need to do a pullup at all
Keep up with the techniques. Heel Hook is taught now for those with insufficient upper body strength . You essentially hook your heel under a thwart and roll in the boat.
I have had no failures. Even wit 75 year olds.
sounds good, I’ll have to give that a
try. For a real challenge try to reenter a Taureau.
Righting a canoe is very difficult
Righting a tipped and swamped canoe is nearly impossible despite what you see on videos. You have to experience to fully understand. I encourage you to go to a shallow part of a lake or a swimming beach and try it with your canoe. Even in shallow water with your feet firmly on the bottom is difficult.
MOST canoes do not have sufficient built in floatation. If you have an anchor in your canoe and it flips, there is a good chance your anchor will drag the canoe with it to the bottom.
It is possible to right a tipped canoe and shake out some of the water, but that is about it. If the canoe is half filled with water and you get in it, the canoe will sink and take in more water.
If you want to prepare for such and emergency, have a bailing device leashed to the canoe; a cut-out bleach bottle, or a bilge pump. This will allow you to empty out most of the water and then get back into the canoe… which is difficult, but do-able with practice.
Work in progress
To roanguy -
The OPer might go out and decide to try air bags after some practice. I mean, they can be added after the fact. You make it sound like if they don't have air bags now it will forever be imposible.
And, as is mentioned above by thebob, there are canoes where re-entry is more possible than in others even without air bags. I found wooden canoes can often be manageable for example, while my ultralight and big old aluminum canoes tend to be either so light or so heavy that some part of the process fails. Opposite reasons, but the swamped result is the same.
But to thebob - Air bags were not a necessity for re-entry when I was in scouts. At 60 plus they sure as heck are in many canoes, as they were at 50 plus. Possible has to include the reality of the paddler's age.
I looked below and saw the pics of people paddling a swamped canoe. That is pretty much what I look like after I have sunk my ultralight with no air bags in it. It can be fun, but since the whole point of an on-water re-entry is to get out of the water to prevent hypothermia... I would not call that a successful recovery for a brisk day in late October.