What canoe did you start in?

1947 old town guide

– Last Updated: Nov-09-06 2:31 PM EST –

18' wood/canvas canoe, i bought it in 1965-i was 18- from a summer camp in n.c. for $80. that was a beautiful boat. i added a red cotton 50sf ratsey and laphorn lateen sail and a pair of leeboards and steered with a paddle. i sailed mostly on lake hartwell while i was a student at clemson. we had some great sails. had to sell it to get some college money. ouch! i'd love to have that boat now. my present (sailing) canoe is a perception/mohawk 17' fg semi decked boat, very sweet to sail, that i've owned for 28 years. http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/1117761197053419764GSPHmI if i were starting out now i'd probably be looking for a used fg boat about 16', those aluminum boats are very versatile but they leave me...cold

wow, did you add the deck?
Great picture…did you add the deck? and is the mast connected to the hull below the deck?



Your right too, about the aluminum canoes, too…nothing warm about them, just a utility vehicle.

Back in ‘73, bought a Moore Voyageur
for about $300. It is an 18.5’, shallow-arch “supercanoe” based on a design by Howie LaBrant for downriver racing on whitewater. A good fiberglass layup, but unavoidably heavy at 85 pounds. We still have it, but the split-tubular gunwales were damaged years ago when it blew loose from its hangers in the carport. It is not near as fast as a Wenonah Odyssey, but it is dryer and turns better. We once tandemed it down Chattooga III without incident.



When it broke, we replaced it with a used Tripper, another boat I loved. But the old Moore is still an outstanding boat for big lakes and for open whitewater. It’s just too damn heavy for portages.



I wish I could post pictures of the Moore, as it is visually very interesting, but I have no intermediary site. I might post to someone on this board who has picture posting capability.

thanks! yes i added the decks
they are cheap 1/4" luan plywood. there is a mast step glued to the floor and braced with 3/4" aluminum tubing bolted to the gunwales.

JEEX-NONE OF Y’ALL GOT IT RIGHT!
Those weren’t “Grummman’s”, folks, regardless of what company built’em. And some of us oughta know -those, who, like me, grew up on Long Guy Land where Grumman had what was, waaaaaay back then, an important plant (probably only planes, tho’) -and those of us, the REAL single blade afficiandos -oughta know better.



They were the one & only, gen-you-wine, o-rigginil “TIN TANKS”, folks!



And the the best and brightest of those wonderful boats that an awful lot of us got our first exposure to self-powered paddling were the near indestructible 17-foot tandems, the flagships and icons of ‘popular paddling’ back in the 60s & 70s.



Those Tin Tanks were the reason I, and a lot of both kayakers, as well as canoeists, still to this day



PADDLE ON!



-Frank in Miami

Grumman’s on Long Guy Land
There must have been a herd of about a thousand deer inside the fence at Grumman when I was a kid.

Grumman for me too
I think it was a 16 footer with the shallower keel. The boat is still next door at my dad’s house on the lake. I’m sure it is not over 50 years old. It is hot when it is hot and cold when it is cold. It is heavier than most 16 footers now made. It is easy to scare the fish for miles around by the sound of dropping your paddle in the boat or banging the gunnels.



But it is still there at the sandy edge of the lake and it is still ready to go after all these years.



As far as paddling like a pig, the grumman is faster than a 9 foot rec kayak and when it was the only thing available it was great!

Another Grumman Aluminum 14 footer

– Last Updated: Nov-12-06 7:04 AM EST –

Double-Ender modified for solo. Had it one season then purchased a used Swift Raven, followed by a Blackhawk, then an Evergreen Sequel switched to Kayaks with an Acadia then an American.

For a newbee on flatwater I would recomend an inexpensive boat that could be purchased quick and easy.

Mohawk solo 14
Mohawk solo 14 was my first canoe. but moved to a bell wildefire not long after. paddled a dagger caymen sot for many years(still do) but love my canoe for the current and eleven piont area.

MR Explorer
Our first canoe was a new 1989 fiberglass MR Explorer. My dad asked if I would buy one with him to split the cost. My opinion of canoes at the time was that they were a little narrow and lacking a motor. I was in my 20’s, but thought a canoe might be good to get off of shore for fishing the local lakes. We floated the Des Plaines river on our first day out, and still do often.



It wasn’t long before the lure of running rapids was creeping up. My friend and I bought a used Grumman with 2 missing ribs and a weld repair (our second boat) from an outfitter for $150 outside of Ely, and ran it down the Boise Brule twice the day we bought it. Not the best choice as a river runner, but it got us started in running class 1-2 water.



We have been through some pretty big waves both on Lake Michigan (not by choice, coming back out of an estuary), and on rivers in the Explorer, and I thought it handled them well. It is not the best river runner, but leaned to the gunnels with a center bag, the boat felt fairly stable.



I didn’t fully realize it at first, but paddling for me started to become more about a great way to travel, and see things I might not ordinarily see. More so then hiking or sitting in the woods I believe. This year alone we have been fairly close to a swimming bear, a couple moose, hawks, many birds, a mink, and countless other creatures from a greater distance. Fuuny how the things that first drew us in are still the same, but in a different way.


hmm
A community Grumman is what i started in, but my FIRST boat that was ALL mine, was the hull of a Sunfish Sail boat, the a huricane had ripped the mast out of. I Wedged a seat in the Bow and paddled it back-words all over the place. Then I up graded to a Mohawk as i just lived a few miles from the factory.

1st boat
Blackhawk 15’8" combi in 1992…bought from Phil himself during a demo day in Ann Arbor - for $875 - with an amazing ash/mahogany kneeling thwart. Great boat…except not enough use since I really needed a solo. Then a Blackhawk Shadow 14.

I wish I knew
I’ve paddled in many different canoes that were not mine, as I jumped on any opportunity to join the Boy Scouts or any other organization on field trips involving paddling. Outfitter supplied the canoes, and I just tried my best to keep the dry side facing up.



I think my oldest canoe experience would have been over 25 years ago in a Mohawk canoe that is no longer in the family.



Several outfitters I’ve paddled with in my school years had Old Town Discovery canoes.



The first canoe I get to call my own will be mine later this week. I don’t know the brand, model, length, or anything yet. All I know is it is a tin tank, and I’m getting it for free, and the donor says it’s in great shape.

Grumman 17 footer…
Started in a Grumman 17 footer.

Did a lot of paddling in an Osagian 17 footer too.



My first new (used) canoe was an OT Discovery 174, in the battleship gray color which they only made for a couple of years. Called her the Gray Ghost.



BOB

Sears aluminum: On sale, $119 new. :slight_smile:

Olde Towns wood’ncanvas fiberglassed
over. That was a long, long time ago.


:^)



Mick

A Kevlar Malecite.
The only time I haven’t started low end.

My father’s 1938 canvas cypress canoe…

– Last Updated: Dec-11-06 1:23 AM EST –

When he was only 17, My father built a canvas and cypress canoe in 1938 with local cypress milled locally. He and four other boys in two canoes and one homemade canvas kayak paddled the Neches River (Texas) in 1939 before it was dammed. I have photos, his trip journal and newspaper clippings about the 250 mile, nine-day trip.

When I was just a tadpole, he started taking me fishing in that same canoe on a small lake where we had a camphouse. By the time I was 6 or 7, I was paddling it by myself and continued through my teen years, when like most teenagers, I developed different interests. My father, who is now 85, still has the canoe. It still gets involved in the races and water fights whenever we have a family gathering at the lake, and another generation is learning a love of the outdoors. I have such wonderful memories of fishing with him, and in the late 90's rediscovered my love of the outdoors through hiking, camping and canoeing.

I now paddle a Wenonah Sandpiper solo canoe, but I will always remember the green canvas canoe that Daddy built as the most special canoe in the world. This past spring I moved back to my hometown to help my parents as my father enters the changes wrought by Alzheimers. He still talks about that trip, and no matter how many times I've heard the stories, I listen with love and true interest. I credit him with the independent spirit I was granted in this lifetime. That canoe is a symbol of all of that.

Jill

Hey, I had a BlackHawk Shadow.
That was a beauty.

I sold it a few years ago to someone through the P-net classifieds.

He appeared to be a expert paddler, so I am guessing that it is still in like new shape.

I wish I still had it, but you can only paddle so many boats, so it doesn’t make sense to keep a beauty like that just gathering dust when someone else can appreciate it.



The first one that I ever paddled quite a bit was in the early forties on Newfound Lake in NH and belonged to my uncle. It was a big old pig with a million ribs and I think the rest was a mixture of canvas with a bunch of paint.

Since I was the youngster of the group everyone else got to go out in the row boat with the 7.5HP motor and there was no room for me, so they said I could play in the canoe as long as I stayed right near the beach and didn’t go out of sight.

Little did they know that I would go way to the othe end of the cove, (probably a mile or so) and then get back before they returned.

That is when I learned that I loved to paddle and go the opposite direction from the stinky outboards.

PFD ! - What was that? All the life jackets were in the rowboat.



Cheers,

JackL

Summer camp
My first experience with a canoe was at a YMCA summer camp in the Catskills. They had 17 ft Grummans. The next summer I went to a sailing camp on Cape Cod. Aside from their sailboats they had the most wonderful nameless canvass & cedar ribbed 8 and 10 man war canoes! My first purchase was a Wenonah Adirondack in Royalex. Now I spend most of my time in my Kevlar Minn II and when soloing, I’m in my Perception Carolina. For Christmas I want a Grasse River Classic XL.