Your journey

[Varmintmist]

As a kid, I was probably in a canoe 5 or 6 times. I played on a farm pond in a home made plank boat named Suicide. Not really doing anything but watching it leak.

FF about 30 some years and my son was in the BSA in a car camping troop They put me in charge of the camping merit badge and I picked up 2 ALICE packs and started changing stuff. After the week long camp or a weekend at a council event, they looked like a yard sale like every other troop.
Later, one father who owned the land that the fundraiser was held on had some hurt feelings and his son was out of the troop and we lost the fund raiser. The scout master quit in about 2 months IMHO because he had to deal with the mess w/o funds to be a car camping troop. Another guy stepped in and we figured out how to fund the needs, but not the cost of camps. We borrowed canoes and found packs and hit the woods. Lost some kids because it wasnt easy. Gained some because it was fun. We have the Allegheny river and the Allegheny National Forest and a ton of places we could go for free, if we were set up for it. We built a food truck and served burgers, fresh cut fries, and deep fried oreos at events. The kids got paid into scout accounts and bought gear from that. I had them over to my place and we camped in the woods and cooked on what we brought. I also tossed their packs into the pool right before the canoe trip to see which ones actually listened and made stuff water tight. That was funny. In borrowed canoes we did a 50 mile trip on the river in the first year. Knocked out a bunch of relatively short back packing trips and a lot of overnights doing 20-30 miles on the river.
I looked at the scoutmaster and asked if he thought we could run the whole trail. We noodled on it for a bit, planned the stops, and started in Kinzu and floated to Emlenton, 5 days, 107mi. They still talk about it. One of the funniest things that happened after was at scout camp a scoutmaster from another troop was touting his bunch because they did a 50 mile trip in 11 days. One of our kids put up his hand and said “So, what did you do after lunch”? We were the first troop from the council in Boys Life in 40+ years.
Its funny, but ADD disappears after 20+ miles on the river. If not the first night, then second. Also, after having them pack their trash and move out either in a pack, canoe or kayak, in about 2 years when we went to pick them up, at camp, the place looked like a yard sale, except our guys had their packs around a tree, ready to go.
I had picked up 2 canoes a 17’ Grumman, and a Discovery 169. I watched a guy paddle past in a kayak and thought that looked cool. I found 2 on craigslist that would work, A Sea Lion, and a Carolina for the right price. Put some work into them and later picked up a Easky LV for the daughter.
I like tripping, I still need to learn the other half of my roll. Its always been fun, but it is more so now that I am not a sheep dog and can just do my own thing,

[wanderiam]

I started at 9 years old. 18 ft grumin canoe. River Rapids with family. When I started my own family I bought a 15ft recreation kayak. Family not interested so I took it up to ketchikan.
Now kids grown up and I just bought a 12 kayak. Body aches but I love going down memory lane. Feeling the paddle dipping in. Peaceful.

[Mountainpaddler]

Reading all these I’m struck by how unlike many other sports/hobbies/interests, paddling definitely seems to be a lifelong endeavor.

I wonder if that says more about the people or the activity?

[kayakhank]

Been on and in the water all my life small boats, sailboats, ships across oceans…started paddling kayaks at about 40 and finally took a lesson at 56, now ten years later (at 66) I’m enjoying paddling more than ever and doing the most exciting open water paddling of my life despite not being the risk taker I was earlier in life.

Hint: Invest in yourself with lessons early in your paddling career/life…it makes a HUGE difference if you take the lessons to heart and practice! Lessons are much less expensive than the kayak and equipment you will end up buying and they are timeless. Wish I had realized that 15 years earlier.

[string]

I suspect it’s the water, not the craft.
My first swim was in the St. Marks River when I toddled off the dock at the NWR.

[willowleaf]

From my early 20’s to into my mid 40’s I was regularly active virtually every weekend in a wilderness sports club and was also an instructor and casual guide in all sorts of activities including rock and ice climbing, winter mountaineering, year round backpacking, XC skiing, whitewater rafting and kayaking, canoe tripping, spelunking and bicycle rail-trail and road bike touring. At 46 I moved out of state and lost contact with most of the crew and friends with whom I shared those outings (still did some road biking and took up flat water paddling since the Midwest geography where I relocated was conducive to both.)

When I moved back to my home area 8 years later at 54 I gradually began to reconnect with my old rugged sports companions and was surprised to note how many of them. like me, had shifted most of their activities to flatwater kayaking.

But it was not until I had run into a guy who had not only been my boss at an outfitter/guide service where I worked for several years, but who had been one of those type A multi-sport experts in every extreme of the activities our club embraced (windsurfing, aid climbing, Himalayan mountaineering, class V and VI whitewater, vertical caving, etc., as well as dirt bike motorcycle racing and black diamond downhill skiing) and discovered that he, too, was now almost exclusively kayak touring that I had an epiphany and shared it with him: kayak touring was the last “ultra” sport we geezers could still do that made us look way cool but didn’t beat us up too much. He laughed loudly at that “insight” but completely agreed.

[daggermat]

condensed version…grumman canoes, Housatonic River, age 7-12 ,loved it, lived for it, at summer camp in the 60’s. First sailboat, 11’ sloop, dad bought when I was 11. New passion, sailing. Cruising sailboat at 14, 7 weeks in the summer cruising, and every weekend from may-oct. At 16, worked summers, less sailing, then some years away. At 21, taught sailing and small boat handling. At 30, got my own 26’ sailboat, wife and I weekended and vacationed on it. At 40, first canoe for my 5 year old son and I to paddle weekdays, still sailing weekends/vacations. By 45, son was soloing, we had several canoes, multiple weekday paddles, sailed weekends/vacation. By 50, son was 15, we had a squirtboat, C1’s, OC-1’s, OC 2’s, poling boats, a bigger sailboat, 8’ sailing dinghy, Rigid Inflatable for fishing…18 boats totaling 256’ in length. Averaged 100-150 whitewater runs a year, and 70 days sailing saltwater. At 55, got out of sailing, son was gone, expense and inconvenience being a 65 mile drive one way making my decision, as well as overcrowded anchorages and the plethora of obnoxious jet skis. At 56, got great job with antisocial hours, no paddlers willing to change their Saturday to a Sunday, so it was mainly canoe poling locally, and started enjoying my home, wife and surroundings more, hikes, cc skiing, mtb, running etc…from the front door. Driving only for work and to my sportsmans club to shoot. Now, 61, newly retired, enjoying the RV, the home, sold all my beat to a pulp boats, saved my canoe poles, will be buying a new poling/plinking canoe either here or in the yet to be decided retirement locale. Hakuna Matata