Geekfoolery

One last post on the swim/paddle around Manhattan, then I’ll go back to things that have digital displays and USB cables.

I like kayaking and traveling, and because of that, both of my kayaks are collapsible for storage and travel. One is folder-a Longhaul Mark II double which has a wood frame, and canvas and rubber hull that is seaworthy enough to cross the Atlantic, run the Amazon, or explore the Arctic and is used by US Navy Seals. The other boat, and the one I took to Manhattan, is an inflatable from a company called Innova.

A quick word to non-kayakers before I go on. What attracts me to kayaking is the freedom and range that kayaks are capable of… you can go anywhere from a damp sponge to crossing oceans and pretty much everything in between. The skills required to handle a boat run the gamut as well… nearly anyone can handle a basic sit-on-top boat in a protected cove, and there are enough of them that you may never need to know more than how to get around a sheltered body of water. But if you’re ambitious, there’s almost no limit to the skils and journeys you can attempt at an average of 3 miles an hour sitting on the surface of the water.

Which brings me to my boat for this trip. It’s an Innova Sunny that I just got to replace an older inflatable that after many years of service had sprung a difficult leak. It’s just under 13 feet long, can be set up as a single or double, and weighs less than 30 pounds. The boat itself fits in a bag that could easily fit in the overhead bin of an airplane. Stored in a duffle bag with other gear including paddles, a pump and PFD, I easily checked in under the airline’s 50 pound per bag weight limit.

I ended up hauling the boat in the duffel bag around Manhattan more than I wanted to this trip due to some missed connections on the subway and the like. I wouldn’t want to do it every day, but it wasn’t that bad–especially when compared to the challenge of moving a non-collapsible boat around. I had a little trouble getting me and the duffel bag through the narrow subway turnstiles, but obviously a plastic or fiberglass boat wouldn’t ride the subway at all.

On the water, the Sunny is as easy to handle as it is packed up in the bag–it’s stable, and tracks a nice straight line when you want it to, and it cuts a sharp turn if you give it sharp paddle twist. The open configuration on the top means there’s no hole to wriggle in or out of and stowing gear is just a matter of tossing it in either the front or back of the boat. The downside is that a side wave might get you a little water in the boat, but all that really causes is a wet butt–even full up with water, you’re not going to sink.

So on race day, I show up and pump up my boat and take my place with the other kayakers. As Forrest noted in the previous blog, we took off around the island with the pack and finished up 9th, after a brief intermission precipitated by…. well, precipitation (and lightning).

What I found amusing came at the end of the race. I heard from other kayakers and a race organizer several variations on the theme of “You made it all the way around in THAT?” That, of course, meant my inflatable, or as one person referred to it, my “blow up” boat. The problem is that most serious kayakers aren’t predisposed to like an inflatable. An earlier generation of cheap inflatables has established in many kayaker’s minds the idea that inflatables are not serious boats, they are children’s bath toys, perhaps, little more. There’s been a lot of improvements in materials and construction since those days, and the newer inflatables are serious boats for the traveling kayaker (like me) or the kayaker who lives in an apartment. Innova in particular has a very solid lineup of boats, including the Helios which is used by the Canadian Rangers for search and rescue.

Which is not to say that inflatables are the equal of rigid boats in every way. Most were sleek kevlar or fiberglass touring machines, and probably every one would beat my inflatable in a flat-out race in open water. But on that day, I didn’t have to race or even keep up with another kayaker in a faster boat, I had to keep up with a swimmer in the water, and the fact is that I have a lot less friction to overcome paddling across the top of the water than Forrest did going through it.

So while an inflatable my not be all things to all people, it is what I need it to be–and more to the point, *where* I need it to be–when I am paddling away from home port.

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