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Crackpot Kayak Dude
Every now and then some crackpot contacts me, and it irritates me enough to post the conversation. I get a ton of these types of emails and sometimes share them on my private FB profile, because they are humorous. But a few deserve to see the light of day. Here’s one of them. I have to wonder if it is because I give away drawings of kayaks for free on this website. Maybe I need to raise the price to $5 or $10 minimum for any drawings. Crackpot Kayaker: Hello !! I just tried to answer your questions about why you do not receive more pictures , answers or contacts…
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The First Roll Expedition
For Immediate Release: 4/1/2019 Grand Marais, Minnesota: PaddlingLight’s publisher and primary author Bryan Hansel is excited to announce a new world record attempt and a new expedition. Over the next year, he will attempt to roll his kayak in a new pool every day. Not only will the pools be different, but each pool will be newly constructed and have never had a kayak roll in it. “I’m excited about this expedition,” said Hansel. “Each day, I’ll explore a new pool with a roll and discover what it is like to roll in that pool. To me kayaking is about discovery and I’m looking forward to this expedition of discovery.”…
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NRS Boundary Boot Review
If there’s one thing about early season paddling it is this: your feet get cold. This is especially true if you have the wrong gear and keep sticking your feet into icy water. Over the years, I’ve tried different methods of keeping my feet warm and have settled on using a dry suit, warm socks and the NRS Boundary Boot, which is a classic piece from NRS. Every year, I think about writing a review for these shoes, but never get around to doing it. So here’s my NRS Boundary Boot review. The way that NRS describes the NRS Boundary Boot makes you think it is a shoe designed for…
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Canoecopia 2019 Trip Report Part 2
I forgot to include several products that I saw at the Canoecopia 2019 show in my last Canoecopia Trip Report. I shot these products on my phone instead of my real camera and didn’t realize it until today. These two products surprised me more than any other at the show. The first is the Kitigan Cross Canoe. It’s like a combination of a stand-up paddleboard, canoe and a sit-on-top kayak. You can walk on the deck, move seats around, stand up, carry gear, fish or even do yoga. It has hatches for dry storage. I has a retractable skeg. If it feels as stable on the water as a stand-up…
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Canoecopia 2019 Trip Report
Last weekend, I attended Canoecopia in Madison, Wisconsin. It’s the world’s largest paddlesports expo. I gave a couple of presentations. One on paddling the Lower Canyons of the Rio Grande River and the other on Photographing Seascapes. When I wasn’t giving presentations, I was in the Northstar Canoe booth helping out as a Northstar sponsored paddler. I did manage to walk part of the show, but not the entire show. When you know so many people in the industry, it is hard to make it from one side of the show to the other and up and down all the isles quickly. I wish I had gotten to spend a…
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Totally Lame GoPro: Setting a Kayaker on Fire
Someone posted the below video to my social media feeds today and made the comment, “There are thousands of good reasons and good ways to paddle, this is not one of them.” The title for the video was, GoPro: The Kayak Fire Fall with Rafa Ortiz. With a clickbaity title like that, how could I not click on the link and see what GoPro was doing now? My first thought when I started the video was, I wonder if they found a natural phenomenon like Yosemite’s Firefall. When the setting sun hits Horsetail Falls exactly right in the month of February, it lights up like a burning stream of fire.…
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Minnesota Border Route Challenges
The Border Route is a well-established 260-mile classic canoe route from International Falls to Lake Superior, following the international boundary between Minnesota and Ontario. The western half consists mainly of large open lakes, including Rainy, Kabetogama, and Namakan Lakes in Voyageur’s National Park and Lac LaCroix, Crooked, and Basswood Lakes in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA). The eastern half consists of numerous pristine wilderness lakes and streams, connected by frequent short portages and brimming with history from the fur trade era. Most paddlers complete the route from west to east, hoping for tailwinds and a light-weight food pack by the end when they reach the historic 8.5-mile Grand Portage…
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Combat Wipe Review
In the backcountry, you get dirty by the end of a long day of paddling and sweating in your drysuit or under your life vest. Before clawing your way into a sleeping bag, it’s nice to feel clean. While we are around water when paddling, sometimes the water is too cold to swim in or too salty or dirty. In cases like that, I like to take a sponge bath or use a wet wipe. I recently had an opportunity to review Combat Wipes, a type of wet wipes designed for the outdoors. Combat Wipes are a 100% bio-degradable wet wipes. They measure approximately 7 by 8 inches. The samples…
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Paddling 2019 Calendar
This year, I decided to offer a Paddling 2019 Calendar consisting of images that I’ve made throughout the years. The images are from the Lake Superior and Boundary Waters region with one exception from the Lower Canyons of the Rio Grande River. You can get the calendar here: Paddling 2019 Calendar If you order before midnight on 11/25, you get 25% off. So, act fast. Buy early and buy often. These make great gifts for you canoe and kayak loving friends. Save 25% on orders of calendars Use Code: BLACKFRIDAY25 Cannot be combined with other offers Does not apply to ebooks or services Ends November 25th at 11:59 PM …
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Is Wilderness Lost? and 2018 Endorsements
Every time I’m going to write something about wilderness protection, it seems like I always have to remind readers that one of the missions of PaddlingLight is “we believe growing paddlesport participation advances wilderness protection. Part of our mission is promoting the protection and preservation of our federal, state and local lands.” I have to do it even though that mission statement appears on every page of the website, because for some reason writing about wilderness protection triggers a certain subset of paddlers who are against wilderness protection and I have to put up with name calling and disrespectful comments. I’m leaving comments on despite knowing better. I wonder how…
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How to pick a Northstar Solo Canoe
So here’s a challenge – when Northstar already makes a bunch of really great solo canoes, and then keeps adding new ones, how do you pick a Northstar Solo canoe that is perfect for you? Two things are key – figuring out your “paddling profile” and understanding what characteristics makes a particular Northstar a good match for that profile. Back in 2008, PaddlingLight published How to pick a Bell Solo canoe. I really liked the Q&A format devised to help paddlers build their paddling profile and the scorecard that mapped the answers to a recommended Bell Canoe. What’s the connection between Bell and Northstar? Ted Bell sold Bell Canoes in…
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Bikepacking in Canoe Country
Bikepacking in Canoe Country can be just as fun as paddling in the Boundary Waters. Besides paddling, my other recreational love is biking and I love touring by bike. This year, I’ve gotten a few paddling trips in (canoeing the lower canyons of the Rio Grande, overnight on Lake Superior and an upcoming BWCA trip), but I hadn’t gotten a bike tour in. I decided to bike in my backyard and bikepack on the gravel roads of Cook County, one of the counties that contains the Boundary Waters. There’s something like 2,000 miles of roads in Cook County and much of that is gravel. I ended up riding a short…
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Sunyear Camping Chair Review – a Cheap Knockoff of a Heliox Chair, but is it Good?
On an 8-day canoe trip through the lower canyons of the Rio Grande River along the Texas border, we brought along Heliox chairs for lounging around on in camp. They were light and comfy, but at $100 I didn’t feel like they were worth it. While researching the chairs on Amazon I found a knockoff by Sunyear. I’ve been using these chairs since February and this is my Sunyear Camping Chair Review. Description of the Sunyear Camping Chair The Sunyear Camping Chair is basically a knockoff of a Heliox chair. It is even the same blue. The legs are made from aircraft-grade 7075 aluminium alloy and fold up into a…
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Best Backpacking Sleeping Pad for Paddling
In my S24O: Kayaking Kit List article, I wrote about my future needs, “As I’ve gotten older I don’t mind sacrificing a bit of weight for a more plush sleeping pad. So, I brought a bigger pad than I have in the past. While not a huge deal inside the kayak, it is bigger than I’d like. I’d like to get a smaller sleeping pad that offers big comfort. If you have a suggestion, please, let me know in the comments.” I received a few emails and I messaged some buddies of mine to see what they suggested as the best backpacking sleeping pad for paddling. From Max Watzke: You asked…
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S24O: Kayaking Kit List
I recently started doing more S24Os (sub-24 hour overnight), because it seems like with everything I’ve taken on over the last year I’m not getting out of personal paddling trips anymore. I recently visited the Fall River campsite on the Lake Superior Water Trail. The MN DNR is planning on building a bridge in front of the Fall River waterfall and next to the campsite ruining the privacy that the you get at the campsite, so I wanted to go there one last time before the DNR ruins it. If you want to take action, visit They Want to Put a Bridge in Front of the Fall River Waterfall for…
