Achieving a Happy Bottom

With both sons in town from opposite coasts, the VOR in Grand Marais for a family campout, and the weather absolutely perfect, I probably should have spent most of my time playing outside. For some inexplicable reason I found myself in the garage, tinkering with the kayaks instead of paddling in them. I did manage to get out for a lovely paddle on Lake Owasso, a lake I've never been on before, but most of the morning was spent working on the fleet.

Almost everyone adds a bit of foam or outfits their boat in some fashion. As the owner of a couple Valley boats, the quest for comfort is a bit more radical. Out of the three Valley boats in the fleet, we've managed to break the seats on two of them and it was only a matter of time before the third one went. The boats handle great, paddle wonderfully, and are as strong and tough as they come. The seats however, are miserable. Unlike the old Valley molded seats, these are ABS and bolted to the deck. The back band is guaranteed to fold down underneath the paddler after awhile and the relatively brittle ABS will break, especially when you're learning some of the more interesting forward finishing rolls. These rolls are unusually hard on seats as well as Greenland sticks while in the learning phase. Yesterdays exercise involved ripping the seat and footpegs out of the Q boat and repairing the seat and dumping the backband on the Aquanaut HV.

I'd managed to get my hands on a 3' x 3' square piece of ABS after thieves tried to break into my Thule ski box by smashing the hell out of it last winter. A coping saw, torch, and some highly noxious ABS cement will have the cracked and broken ABS part as good as new in no time. Plus by double reinforcing the stress area it may prevent a repeat failure. Cement the crack, heat up the patch with the torch to conform it to the part being repaired, slap the cement on both sides, and press on the patch and wait for it to dry. It looks ugly but it does the trick.

That same coping saw can be used to shape the foam when seat and footpegs finally cause enough aggravation to be removed completely. Slicing off a bit at a time will allow the foam to be shaped perfectly for optimal comfort. I did purchase a foam seat from Chesapeake Light Craft, a seat that was in the Valley Skerry that GalwayGuy and I owned, a seat named, appropriately enough, the Happy Bottom pad. For a back rest I alternate between a shaped foam pad and an inflatable thigh support that seems to provide great support and flexibility for rolling.

Its tough to start cutting and wrenching on a pricey new boat but, as many others have also written, its well worth it in the end. Everyone has a different shape and modifying the boat to fit that shape exactly makes paddling more efficient, comfortable, and thus more fun.

Calhoun Rolling

For the first time in my career, I paddled to and from a business meeting. I had signed up long ago to help with a rolling session that our club, SKOAC, was holding on Lake Calhoun near uptown Minneapolis. A trade group that I belong to was working on some marketing stuff and I needed to be there, if only to hand off my part of the project. When 'Wednesday, late afternoon' was proposed as the time folks could get together, I told them that the only way I could attend would be if it was held at the Tin Fish, a little seafood joint in the old boathouse on Lake Calhoun. It was a beautiful day and the suggestion received unanimous approval from my 4 associates. The only condition from my all female group was a pleading request that no tight neoprene or spandex paddle gear of any sort was to be worn. I was happy to oblige. After the meeting, fueled by some beer and waffle fries (in the curious world of Minnesota liquor laws, certain establishments are required to serve food with their wine and beer), I put on my tuliq, demonstrated a couple rolls, and headed over to the north beach where the class was beginning to gather.

Rolling classes always seem to draw a crowd. I guess the 'Eskimo roll' is thought of as the ultimate kayaking skill, although I've always believed in the adage, "Roll for show, brace for dough". It seems very appropriate that the start of rolling classes always involves working on the low brace, high brace, and sculling brace. Watching how people work with those skills and concepts always seems to indicate how they will do when its actually time to tip over. Those who methodically view it as a process and work on the steps inevitably do better than the ones with the attitude of 'yeah, yeah, yeah, lets get this crap done with so I can tip over and roll up effortlessly'. Which of course, they never do unless they have the other skills down. I worked with a couple folks that were unlucky enough to draw the guy with the least teaching experience, but by the end of the session both had managed to break the habit of diving their paddle and had the nice airplane wing concept going on the surface of the water. All of the little memory analogies are fun as well. "Farting on a bar stool" for the concept of lifting a knee and butt cheek to drive the boat up, "serving a tray of drinks" for the hand position at the end of a roll, and "pretend there's a $50 bill in your armpit that someones trying to grab" for the idea of keeping the elbows in to protect the shoulder.

There were varying levels of success with the light coming on for some and the fuse needing changing for others. Everyone seemed to have fun, even with the onshore wind and cool temperatures, and I guess that's what its all about in the end. We have a great group of instructors and students, including RonO and the IrishPirate in the top image, and even had a rare pre nuptial appearance by an accomplished greenland style roller. I'll leave you with a video of some crazy behind the neck forward finishing roll by our soon to be wed Greenland paddler.

Flying history

TheLegend and I experienced a bit of aviation history on Sunday when we flew a "mission" on the Aluminum Overcast, a B-17 Flying Fortress that is touring the Midwest on it's way to the EAA airshow in Oshkosh at the beginning of next month. I've wanted to fly in one of these things since I was about 10 years old. My dad was in the 9th USAAF, which flew twin engined attack bombers, A-20's and A-26's, and their base at Wethersfield, England also had a group of 8th Army Air Force B-17's. My godfather Owen was the top turret gunner on a B-24 and was shot down and spent the last year of the war in a Luft Stalag. My bro' in law's dad, as unassuming a fellow as you would ever meet, was a waist gunner on a B-17 and flew over 20 missions. When I was in England a few years back I ran into an elderly English gent with a chest full of WWII decorations on his suit coat. I noticed an 8th USAAF pin and commented that I noticed he had an 'allied' medal. He told me he was at his RAF base when the first 'Flying Fortress' landed in England. "When I saw those airplanes I turned to me mate and told him that old Hitler was in for it now!" After reading, listening to first person oral histories, and watching documentaries about the B-17, I finally decided it was time to pull the trigger and figured TheLegend, who watched these planes on the movie newsreels as 14 year old kid and is as much of a history buff as I am, would get a thrill out of it as well.

We lured him down here under pretense of a 4th of July beer and burger feed with the GraciousPartier and No1 daughter, the VOR, in on the surprise. I told him I had a tip that the B-17 was at Anoka Co airport and that if we got out there early, we could see them fire up the big radial engines for the first time of the day. He was all over that and off we went. He didn't realize we were going up until the crew chief came over, introduced himself, and asked TheLegend to sign the wavier. I'd been excited for 24 hours and now he was equally excited. We got our preflight briefing which did not involve exit rows, seat backs and tray tables, or lit seat belt signs. We boarded the B-17 with shoes on, jacknives in pockets, 8-10 ounces of any liquid we desired, and a sense of excitement and anticipation rather than the usual 'cattle to the slaughter' feeling you have as you shuffle down the jetway staring at the back of the poor SOB in front of you. We strapped into the webbing seats with military seat belts,plenty of leg room, and rumbled to the take off point. Smoke from the engines was wafting up through the belly turret and the four Wright Cyclone engines were pretty loud. We were told we were free to wander around right after wheels up which is exactly what everyone did. We went through the bomb bay on the catwalk, to the radio room, flight deck, and the awesome view from the plexiglass nose where the bombardier sat with his Norden bombsight. A bunch of pictures can be found here if you're so inclined. We were cruising at around 160mph and the top hatch was open so you could stick your head out a bit and look around. It was the highlight of the year and perhaps the decade for me. TheLegend put it on par with his sailing trip across the Atlantic in a 42 footer, which was high ranking indeed.

When we landed, the VOR and GP toured the plane on the ground. The GP commented that it was pretty sparse, much more spartan than she had thought. All the control cables run along the ceiling and under the deck and we were told that if we grabbed them, the pilots could feel it in the controls. All function and no frills. Creature comforts were completely lacking and we all thought about what it would be like to fly a several hour mission at -40F with anti aircraft fire and enemy fighters a constant worry.

During the briefing the crew chief told us that he had never had anyone get off the aircraft and say that it wasn't worth it. TheLegend and I would have to agree completely. The sheer physical pleasure combined the the historical background and perspective made it the perfect end to the 4th of July weekend.

Square Lake picnic and looking down

With us in town and a bunch of our friends up in the Apostles, the VOR and I decided a kayak picnic would be a good plan for our Friday off. We recruited BDahlieOfMahtomedi and the IrishPirate and headed for Square Lake in eastern Washington County, a 30 minute drive from our joint. Square Lake is the cleanest and clearest lake in the metro area, the lake that a number of local dive groups use for scuba training. We feared overcrowding on a beautiful day when lots of people were off but were pleasantly surprised. The park, the only park on the lake, requires a $5 parking pass and once again the truism, 'if you tax something you'll get less of it and if you subsidize it you'll get more of it' held true.

It is an interesting lake on a number of levels besides its amazing clarity. They have a slot from noon to 4pm on weekends and holidays where you can buzz around on your speedboat or jet ski, but after that the entire lake is a no wake zone. Its probably not as effective in limiting them as my Modest Proposal for a Jet Ski Hunting Season (two jet skis bag limit per season, either sex, license $28 Residents, $145 non residents), but it more in keeping with my 'lets all get along' philosophy from the last post. There is also a complete and refreshing lack of 'McMansions' on the lake. The common thing around here is to buy a parcel on a lake, tear down the small vintage cottage that was built in the 1940's or '50's, and erect a monument to yourself and your undersized male appendage for all to enjoy as it looms over the lake like some medieval castle. I don't know if its a zoning, historic, or just a common sense thing but the lake still has those tiny cottages from another era. The most interesting aspect however, is the clarity of the water.

Most paddles involve cruising along the shore at a steady pace, getting the forward stroke dialed in, and conversing about the sights along the shoreline. There was some discussion of the scenery but the focus quickly went downward into the water when the VOR spotted a turtle cruising below her boat. For most of the rest of the paddle we moseyed along, looking at the fish and vegetation, sometimes doing more sculling, bow rudders, and draw strokes than forward strokes. The vegetation was all native with none of the despised Eurasian Milfoil or Purple Loosestrife in evidence (thanks a lot for those fine invasives, Great Lakes ballast water!). There are lots of native snails and bass and bluegill nests, as well as the fish themselves, were evident all along the shoreline. It was a refreshing change from the lake weeds and algae blooms that we are starting to see here in lake country this time of year.

The day ended with an old fashioned picnic with grilled burgers, shish kabobs, potato salad, and beans. Oh, and an adult beverage or two was ingested as well. Another quick lap around the lake, a few rolls that could not be avoided in such pristine water, and we were outta there, some of the last folks to leave the park at around 9pm. Maybe this staying in town thing ain't so bad once in awhile.

The hugging of trees

A couple of things popped up over the past couple of weeks that made me scratch my head once again. One was the big '350' formation made of over 100 kayaks at the Inland Sea Society Kayak Symposium and the other seemingly unrelated event was the relisting of the gray wolf on the Endangered Species list.

The 350 formation was one of the highlights of the symposium for many people. 350.org is a group dedicated to reducing carbon in the atmosphere to the acceptable level of 350 ppm. There are a number 'actions' have been or will be executed over the next several months to bring more public awareness to the issue. Pulling this one off was a combination of hard work and pure luck. The formation was laid out using rejected webbing that CharlyR, head of the ISS, had scrounged . Field Marshal Gail Green orchestrated the setup, 10 boats at a time, a job much akin to herding cats. The weather cooperated by not blowing up the northeast wind, a wind that RonO and I used for some fine surfing, until two hours after the formation had been completed. It went perfectly but a couple of environmental purists in the crowd questioned the use of an evil, internal combustion powered, fossil fuel burning airplane to take pictures of the event.

On the wolf front, even though all of the state and federal agencies involved as well as noted wolf researchers Rolf Peterson, David Mech, and others agree that the Great Lakes population has recovered robustly and should be delisted, a number of interest groups won a lawsuit which plopped the wolves squarely back on the Endangered Species list.

Two "environmental insiders", Mike Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus wrote and published an essay, The Death of Environmentalism in 2005 and followed it up with a book, Breakthrough: From the Death of Environmentalism to the Politics of Possibility. In a nutshell, they contend that confrontational techniques and a strategy based upon restricting growth and development just doesn't seem to strike a chord with anyone, developing nations or the industrial ones. They argue for a new kind of development, one that takes ecological, economic, and social change into account and actually has an optimistic view of the future. Instead of the politics of fear and restriction, they suggest that we need to galvanize people and institution's creativity and enterprise to meet critical environmental challenges.

In other words, maybe if we can work together on some of this stuff, rather than flaunt and revel in our perceived ideological purity, there will be some significant progress. A prime example was two very different acquaintances that attended the Renewable Energy Fair in Steven's Point the weekend of the symposium. RangerMark, a guy who walks the walk on environmental issues and doesn't even own a soapbox and my cousin Joe, a pickup owner and Harley rider who's idea of fun is restoring old Ford Mustangs. I would have to say that the boys are about 180 degrees opposite politically but both took the long drive (in fossil fuel burning vehicles....likely solo....gasp!!) to explore possible alternatives. RM is working on implementing wind power at his place of employment and Joe is planning on building a flat plate pellet mill when he retires to use biomass to heat his house. A former colleague, the ZumbroFallsImpressionist, is passionate about land use and is a Sierra Club diehard. She helped negotiate a land use issue by reaching out to Ducks Unlimited, an organization not normally spoken of in the same breath as the Sierra Club. Different people with different backgrounds and philosophies finding that there is common ground on many of these problems.

Bottom line: we need to figure out how we can work together on issues like the two mentioned above and cut the ideological crap. The people whimpering about the airplane on the 350 formation probably drove their car up to Washburn with one or two people in it. The wolf huggers would probably think differently if they had a hobby farm in wolf country or their precious purebred mutt were attacked. Get off the soapbox, reach out to someone who it NOT like you, and let's git er done. As the Duke once said, "We're burnin' daylight".