To start a blog on kayaking I should talk about the way I started Sea Kayaking. By the time I had began college I had been exposed to many sorts of paddle sports. Row boats, Rafts (inflatable and home made log), Canoes, and a couple of white water rafting experiences. My family has always had a place on a lake and water was my “Game Boy” and “Nintendo.” It freed me from my parents. It gave me independence. And it taught me to appreciate the dualities of nature. Pondering water’s life giving and life taking nature was probably my first Zen-like irony to attempt to comprehend. By the time I did an apprenticeship as a whitewater guide my connection to water was emotional, and visceral. That connection was about to deepen.

Along came a book in my senior year of College, Jaguars Ripped My Flesh, by Tim Cahill. Tim has the same appreciation for the ironies of nature and human nature I have. Reading those short stories in-between classes and homework was personally gratifying. When I encountered one story in particular my life shifted a little. “Kayaking among the Ice Children” set me on to a new path. This article reprinted for the book is probably the best kayak writing ever. Sure, it’s contains some of the “so there I was…” cliché. But, if you can read a story like this and not want to go paddling then I would suggest you check your pulse. In a neat narrative Cahill combines all that is important in sea kayaking; cultural history, natural history, wildlife, drama, excitement, beauty, and personal effort that some might call struggle. Here are two sentences to wet your appetite.

“Neither of us had ever seen Orcas in the wild, and now there were eight of them racing toward us, splashing through the snowy, blue reflection of Mount Wright. In that moment I felt a sense of wondrous privilege expand inside my chest, a sensation that I will forever associate with a warm spring afternoon outside junior high, when a girl named Jackie B. said she liked me too.”

To get more of this article you have to go to the source. The whole book is good.

With that I was hooked. I had to learn more about this activity

But that was the South in 1989. Unless you lived in Charleston, SC or in Florida you stood little chance of even seeing a Sea Kayak. To know about Sea Kayaking was to enter a secret club. I can remember the first Sea kayak I saw. Its shape was so beautiful that my hand still remembers the form. Because of that experience the Wilderness Systems, Cadence is the boat that will always be the measure for all others. Few other boats have created an emotional response like that one, even though I have never owned one.

At school I got wind of some sprint race kayakers who were trying to recruit new competitors and was going to allow neophytes like myself to founder in his boat for the experience. It was spring. The water was cold. I went 15 feet and said that was enough. Those boats were too tippy! There was a Wilderness Systems Cadence sitting on the car of one of the experienced paddlers and he was gracious enough to let me give that one a spin. Having also by this time read Derek Hutchinson’s Book on kayaking I had tall expectations. Fortunately I also had a tall imagination. Even on little lake Crabtree, three hours away from salt water, and under the flight path of jets heading to RDU, I was alone in a wilderness. I could see whales breaking the surface to disturb the reflection of distant Mount Wright.

From that time I have been charging to the water. My travels have taken me up and down the eastern seaboard to paddle. While I have not yet paddled in Glacier Bay, I have paddled in some amazing places. And Kayaking has been my teacher in the subjects of; cultural history, geological history, group dynamics, weather, physics, personal relationships, spirituality, natural history, nautical history, seamanship, wood working, literature, foreign languages, patience, leadership, decision making, health, first aid, and companionship.  If I have left anything out then kayaking and the water will delight in reminding me the next time I am out. To find specific examples of these lessons you will have to read on. Or you could come paddling with me…