I’ve used a rolled up towel, but I like that idea better.
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Thanks again for all the useful info/tips, this is gold. Its all also very timely. I’ve been trying to think of ways to improve my knee and ankle flexibility. I was worried my right ankle might’ve given me a bit of curry (tore the ankle ligaments completely when playing footy with the Army Reserves couple decades ago - was off work for six months and had to have surgery in the end), but so far so good.
Excellent point about flattening out my feet and sitting on the heels. For some reason this hadn’t occurred to me, I’ve just been training on the balls of my feet. Good thing you mentioned it, I certainly feel the burn/cramps in my feet when trying that one out. Would’ve been a surprise doing that one straight off the bat when I pick up the canoe. At least now that part should be a lot easier on the day (I’ll be taking mats/towels/etc too)
Totally see what you mean regarding trying to stretch the feet when wearing conventional shoes. I’ve actually been investigating barefoot shoes for a while now, it seems like they really help with a lot of mobility issues. Sounds like I’d just have to take the time to adapt to them. We’ve an excellent local company called ‘Sharkskin’, who specialise in dive/water sports gear. I bought some board shorts and a ‘High Performance Wear Long Sleeve’ top for snorkelling last time we went to Hawaii, and they were brilliant. They’ve recently come up with these water sports shoes (barefoot type) which I think might fit the bill nicely (i don’t know if the screenshot I’ve taken will load, if not then maybe Google them if curious)
Those wading boots look interesting. Funnily enough I was watching another YouTube video of a guy (American I think) doing a multiday trip through the waterways above your boundary waters, and he was wearing what looked exactly like those boots. I was trying to work out what they were, now I know. Never seen anything like those over here, but I think they’d be handy in winter.
As for the double paddle, I might try it sometime in the future, after I feel I’ve gotten a really good grasp/flow on the basics. As I mentioned, I reckon I could indeed resort to using it too early when things get a bit hairy. My thinking is that if I don’t have it, then I can’t chicken out and switch to it as soon as I start puckering. My focus on quickly getting my single paddle technique as clean as possible would sharpen intensely in those moments when I’m under the pump.
As for the risk of my training becoming gruelling, I fully expect my first weeks/months of training sessions with this canoe to truly suck anyway, LOL.
You’re welcome! But those videos aren’t by me. =)
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Oops, sorry about that Taliesan. That was me assuming, which is the mother of all stuff-ups 
Still, great videos 
What you wear on your feet will obviously depend on the season. The soles need to be thick enough to provide some protections as you walk around on rocks and sticks, but not so thick that it would make it tough to kneel or get you feet out from under the seat.
In the summer, a lot of people around here wear Teva sandals or water shoes. I use the NRS water shoe in the summer – older version of this.
Once the weather get colder I go to neoprene – NRS has lots of versions, and there are lots of other manufacturers. I have the low cut kickers, the ankle high paddle shoe, and the knee high boundary boot (but not this one the sole is too think).
Good new is once you buy all this stuff you will have it for a long time. I am still using a paddle jacket that my father bought 40 years ago.
Cool, thanks eckilson. Some good info there. I’ve got some neoprene bootie type things from the Hawaii trips, but those kicker things look a lot more robust. Think I might check those out (likewise the Astrals 
)
Those boundary boot things look interesting, but I can see what you mean about the soles being a bit thick/restrictive for kneeling.
And yes, I’m a firm believer in buy once/cry once. I’ve opted for cheaper gear before and have usually been disappointed 
BTW, out of curiosity, I’ve seen a couple videos of people with Prospecteur 15s where they seem to have removed one of the seats and filled the area with tripping gear.
Is this something that can be done with these canoes? I see the seats hang from the gunwales. Do they not impart some sort of structural integrity to the whole? Be handy for my soloing purposes if I could do that as well.
Assume you are talking about taking out the stern seat. I do think the seat provide some level of structural integrity to keep the gunwales from flexing too much. My 14’ solo boats with the seat in the middle has thwarts in the bow and the stern for that purpose. You could try it and see how sturdy it seems. It would also be pretty easy to replace the seat with a thwart. I think you will probably find that packing gear under and over the seat isn’t that much of a problem.
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Actually, the amount which the seats reinforce the gunwales is almost zero. Any force which will distort a gunwale will have virtually same effect if the only reinforcement in that area is a seat (UNLESS the seat bars connect without the use of hangers - in a Prospector, that would result in the seat being too high). Every solo canoe that I have ever seen has a thwart not far behind the centrally-located seat for this very reason. Look at pictures of solo canoes online and you will see that they all are built this way.
In order for the seat to reinforce the gunwales, that 90-degree bend where the cross bar of the seat connects to the vertical seat hanger would need to be rigid. But that connection is not even close to being rigid. The reason that joint is not rigid is easy to explain. For a joint like that to be rigid, two things would be necessary: that there be a sufficiently large contact area (larger in proportion to greater length of the “lever arm” of the seat hanger), and that the clamping force be great enough to turn that contact area into something approximating a solid, homogeneous piece of material.
On the connection of the canoe seat to each of its hangers, there is very little contact area . Also, the clamping force is provided by a very small-diameter bolt. The tensile capacity of each bolt is many times greater than it needs to be in order to support the weight applied through the hanger, but in terms of clamping force, it’s not enough to keep the 90-degree bend from flexing as a result of small push/pull forces. In fact, if you tried to apply the necessary amount of clamping force for joints with such small contact area (and long lever arms) you’d round-off the nuts or strip out the screw slots, or maybe even split the wood of the gunwales, and even then the wood around the bolt holes at the ends of the seat bars would easily rip if a strong lateral force were applied. Note that the connection of the top of each seat hanger to the gunwale has this same problem: pushing and pulling forces would be applied to a right-angle “lever” that is connected in a very non-rigid way.
So, why do thwarts work so well in reinforcing gunwales but seat clamps don’t? The thwarts connect directly to the gunwales, with no 90-degree bends in the system applying a bending moment (torque) to connections which must be resisted via special reinforcement in order to resist distortion.
In short, don’t have any fear about removing a seat, and don’t have any fear about changing the location of a seat. Just be aware that when changing the location of a seat, you will need to use a completely new seat, because every location on the boat where you might put a seat requires the cross beams on the seat to be cut to a length which matches the distance between the rails at that location. On your boat, it’s likely you would have to also move a thwart, if moving a seat.
In terms of carrying gear, the best seating arrangement is for the seat to be slightly behind center as with a boat that’s set up for solo paddling from the start. Then you put your gear in two packs so some is in front of you and some is behind. Fine-tuning the balance of that load can be a topic for another day! Though not ideal, paddling solo from a seat that’s a few feet behind center is certainly doable, and in that case all your gear gets stashed in front of you.
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Ok cool, once again really helpful info. Thank guys 
I know I’ll be spending the first few months getting to know the boat and developing my paddling skills/fitness, but good to know there’s scope to adjust things once I understand what I’m doing more intimately.