I like a clean foredeck too but gave that up for in my case the necessity of making a priority of having nothing on rear deck to inhibit towing, rear deck carries, re-entry, re-securing the spares after waves/surf lossen them, and frankly (for me) finding I could not reach around and get my spares out in rough conditions without capsizing myself.
If others can accomplish these things with rear deck stowing that is cool, but I guess my flexibiity is such I can't do it easily .
odd man out I have a dinky boat, and I don’t roll. I am only on slow rivers and flat water, but I still carry a spare. different paddle for different conditions, you know. so mine is actually in the cockpit with me. It lines the inside of my little toy boat.
OK thanks for the picture you posted. I can see the PVC tube that the paddle shaft fits into. I can’t see the elbow part. I assume the 90 points down toward the deck and that there is a flange that you have mounted to the deck. Is that correct?
yep and nope yje 90 degrees is down and fwd but it’s flush with the deck. no attachment except the bungies. That’s why we did that pattern on the Tempest bungies, fwd.
On the waste elbow you actually cut off the threads.
I carry my extra paddle on my rear deck almost all the time unless I’m paddling in rough conditions and I want to make sure it doesn’t get washed off the kayak then I’ll have it on the foredeck.
Pipe elbow details My setup is a lot like Chris, and Steve’s. I didn’t thread the bungies through the elbows, but use a separate bungie knotted through a hole in the side of each one to hold a clip. The clip attaches to the bungies for security.
The other thing I did was carve donuts out of minicel to hold the shafts a little off the deck so they slide in and out easier. I don’t know if that will kick up too much spray, though.
Foredeck I use a short Greenland paddle on my foredeck as a spare. I’ve needed to pull it out and roll with it twice when my primary paddle was torn from my grasp in rough water and it worked perfectly. Try that with an aft-deck-mounted spare before you bet your safety on it.
spare …never had a problem with getting a one piece storm off my rear deck. I would never want a two piece paddle back there. The storm, being ready to go, makes a huge differance. I however am not able to re-stow it on the back deck after once removing it, so, it may have come off the rear deck, but it rides on the front deck untill I get to shore.
