Message-Id: <v01530501ad347eacb6c6@[206.163.122.24]>
Date: Tue, 30 Jan 1996 19:30:08 -0700
To: baidarka@imagelan.com
From: teleport.com!tahnee@imagelan.com (Tahnee or James)
Subject: Re: Aleut paddles?
Aleut and other traditional kayak paddles are really neat, but
extremely hard for this former whitewater gonzo to get used to with their
really narrow, unfeathered blades and funky handgrips. I have built a few
different ones from Zimmerly's book and have used several others that my
friend Harvey has built--serious replicas complete with bone edgings and
other neat stuff. But I have never been able to get comfortable with any
of them, and I am not crazy about screwing up my reflexive bracing and
rolling for when I go to the river instead of the sea. The result: I now
paddle my baidarka with a traditional ultralight graphite 75 degree right
feather Lightning paddle. A guy in a Dyson baidarka with a aleut style
paddle tried to give me shit about it once, but since his boat was framed
in mere aluminum while my boat has an actual wood skeleton--I figured we
were just about tied.
--James McMullen