Took my Tempest (have I mentioned I LOVE it??) out on the St Johns today. Not a very long paddle, just a decent workout and then back home. Trying to talk some friends from work into going to a local charity paddle in a couple of weeks and I’m excited there’s been so much interest. But one of my buddies is pregnant (as in 7 mos) and this brought me to the question of how exactly to get her in and out of a boat. Is it even safe? And being a gal myself, I’m wondering how it will affect my mornings on the water when my husband and I finally take the plunge. Anyone have experience with this?
So I’m paddling along, realizing that with so much motor traffic I may as well have brought the Kaos and just surfed wakes all day. I finally get back to the put-in and while I’m coming around the bend these two 17-20 yr old guys fishing on the shore start mimicking me paddling. Wierdest thing. I mean they literally pointed, hollered and laughed while making paddling motions. Does this happen to other people? I may not be Nigel Dennis but geez I don’t think I look THAT silly in a boat.
Got the boat all loaded up and was climbing in the truck and a random gust of wind slammed the door shut, hard, with my hand still holding the frame to pull myself up. The door swung shut so hard it actually latched in place and I had to use my right hand to pull the handle and open the door. We’re talking heavy-duty F150 driver’s door smashed my left hand. Had planned on going out tomorrow, since I don’t have any meetings till 11 but I believe now that won’t be an option. Oh well. Plenty of ice and slow typing. Arrrghhhhhh…
I had no idea where to post this or why even except that it was such a strange day and I wondered if other folks occasionally had their own odd experiences. Please don’t mind the babble.
Went on a multiday trip…
…with my 6 mon. pregnant wife. Her torso muscles were quite sore after the first day. I think this was due lack of paddling but also the fact that the abdomen mucles are going through some pronounced change as the baby is growing in mom. In other words, they are not as they normally are.
Moreover, try to get a spray skirt (not to mention immersion gear or PFD) on over all that. It may not fit.
Make sure the doc says it’s OK to do.
I can relate!
I also have had a weird paddling experience! Last Sunday, I’m paddling down our local canal which is not very wide to begin with, so it never occured to me that they might give tours on it, anyway I’m paddling along, and I see this huge boat with all these people on it coming towards me. As we get closer and closer together, I realize that it’s a tour boat. As I pass it, all the people (I’m talking 20 or so), start taking pictures of me! It felt so odd, like I was some sort of tourist attraction or something! I just smiled and kept paddling! I’m waiting for my picture to come out in one of our local publications: Unidentified kayaker on the Augusta Canal!
Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps
“I’m coming around the bend these two 17-20 yr old guys fishing on the shore start mimicking me paddling. Wierdest thing. I mean they literally pointed, hollered and laughed while making paddling motions. Does this happen to other people?”
Not to me. Perhaps they are like some species of birds and this was an attempt to win your attention ?
Oooh, I hope not!
Maybe …
God’s way of trying to tell you not to take a pregnant woman paddling?
Clarification
I did not take the mommy-to-be paddling. She was interested in the sport as she has done some WW rafting in past. However, perhaps you are right. Like I said, I have no experience with pregnancy and paddling and it makes me apprehensive, esp. since she is so far along.
Once in a while
Those guys making fun - I’ve encountered young males being total jerks more often when I am riding a bike than in a boat, but it happens. More likely in warm weather if they feel like getting silly about a woman - good luck guessing what gender anyone is in a drysuit, PFD, neoprene hood etc.
Possible they were pretty drunk too.
Hope that hand is OK.
i think the guys
were just jealous.
you know how boys can be; if they can't have it--or in this case be in it--then it has to be something only a loser would do.
the rest of it sounds like the metaphysical equivalent of a hiccup. 'cept for the hand, that just sucks.
Ouch…
that door thing must hurt.
Yes we had kind of a weird day in Saturdays Black Water River Race.
At about the three mile mark, my wife and I (in our C-2) were in front of everyone and were flying along at about 7 MPH, (we had about a 2MPH current), and we hit a submerged log that tipped us before we even had a chance to brace. The water was way over our heads, and as we were trying to maneuver the upside down canoe and ourselves to a shallow spot, three boats went flying by. That wasn’t all of it. We got swept right into a strainer. The only thing this wasn’t your ordinary strainer. It was filled with poison ivey and the fact that we were still over our heads, we had no choice except to grab it to keep from getting swept under and we actually had to use it to pull ourselves to shore.
When I finally got my feet on something solid I could only laugh at the sight of my wife still in the deep water just about buried in the leaves.
As of last night the itching hadn’t started and as I am writing this it hasn’t, but I am waiting!
Cheers,
JackL
Hope Your Hand Is OK
That has to have hurt.
I dunno, a PFD, a neo-skirt, a beat up old hat, wind blown, salt residue everywhere, I have to look funny enough to laugh at when I am paddling.
Happy Paddling,
Mark
Testosterone poisoning
explains much about male behavior. And what cannot be explained by testosterone can be written off to alcohol poisoning.
Most of us were jerks, to some extent or other in our teens. They may have been showing scorn for someone who has chosen a kayak over a bass boat, or they might have been trying to impress you with hopes of being able to document the anticipated encounter with a letter to Penthouse.
Jim
well past my teens
PS: Just because you didn't respond is no guarantee that this will not show up in Penthouse!
No way!
That story HAS to be made up! I feel for you, JL: When it rains, it pours!
Welcome to the St. Johns
Weekends are a mad house and I think it is rare to paddle past French Street without some punks mocking me. One day back in march I paddled by in a pack of ICF k1’s (some Canadians were down here training for about a month and I was out with them) and they mocked us. Of course my urge (being in possession of a testosterone addled young brain myself) is to respond violently but I generally smile and procede without comment.
All I can say about your hand is, ouch. My old scout used to try to kill me with its doors, that just plain hurts. Hope your hand gets better quickly.
Sorry to hear that
A AR straped to the side of your yak will normally stop all mokery. If your worried about having that much money on your yak just get a cheap highpoint carbine.
Common things on my paddles:
Italian Gondolas - complete with Gondoliers in striped shirts - one even sings (just found out they can man fore and aft on windier days too).
The Queen Mary 2 (and/or many similar maritime monstrosities, plus dozens of $20M+ yachts to go with the $20M+ mansions).
A paddle wheel (fake) riverboat.
A boat made out of an airplane.
Pink drawbridges.
A Yellow Submarine...
A hand made Greenland Inuit style Skin on Frame Qajaq propelled with a skinny stick of a paddle... Oh wait, that's me!
Then there's the wildlife: Manatees, Mantas, Iguanas, Gators, Turtles, Tarpon, and you never know what else...
Those are the average days. Plenty to laught at, and if some on shore find me amusing as well - I just call it even.
I get far more possitive comments though, and for every joke I've heard about "Where's you motor?!" or similar there have been 2-3 dissabled motor boats I've passed. I'm way ahead on that one.
Poison ivy
Tecnu & CalaGel have worked for me.
http://www.teclabsinc.com/products.cfm?id=7088BA7C-AACE-1250-5B5229985B8E7AE4
I sometimes get this:
“STROKE… STROKE… STROKE… STROKE!!”
Makes you wonder
Several years ago at Jocassee we found a disabled powerboat at a distant (7 miles from ramp)waterfall. I’m betting that the occupants - adults and children - didn’t have any emergency equipment on board. At least I don’t have to deal with mechanical breakdowns!
Jim
Slightly Pregnant
On one of my first trips with a paddling group, I met a woman who is a very active paddler. It was my first time meeting her, it was February, there was snow on the ground, and there were large blocks of ice on the banks of the creek. Everybody had on lots of clothes, so it didn’t seem odd to me that she had the profile of the Michelin Man. Having seen her in the years since, I now know her face was a bit baby bloated, but at the time I had no idea she was pregnant. Three days later, somebody posted a note on the message board that she’d delivered a baby boy. I was very impressed. That family is one paddling crew! They even named the boy after a river. I think she is mostly a kayaker, but she was in a canoe that day, so she did make some adjustment for being 9-months.
~~Chip