Falling in

[rebeccmeister]

scrottie and I took an Introduction to Sea Kayaking class yesterday. When the instructor had us go around and say why we were there, S said it was because he has taken up sailing and I'm not interested in sailing.

We spent the morning going over the same paddle strokes as in the first class, but the review was useful. We also learned about the high brace and the low brace. I think I need to watch some videos to get a better understanding of the "hip-snap" and how to move my body to rebalance a kayak. Along with that, I learned that secondary stability is often more important than primary stability. Primary stability is how things feel when you're trying to sit level, while secondary stability can be experienced while the kayak is more up on edge and on the verge of tipping over. There are lots of interesting details to kayak hull shape. And it turns out that the deck lines on top of a kayak aren't simply decorative. Good to know for the sake of future kayak shopping.

Then we spent the afternoon learning how to self-rescue and partner rescue. That was awesome. It wound up being a somewhat warm day, so flipping the kayaks to go in the water felt great and relaxing. Climbing back in wasn't all that hard, either. We learned about these things called "paddle floats," which you slip onto the end of a paddle, and then you can use the paddle as an outrigger/brace to stabilize the kayak while you climb back in.

So now we're certified to go kayaking in calm coastal waters. The instructor suggests that we next look into a tides and currents class, and it looks like there are a couple more classes that would be useful for the sake of longer-term safety and comfort in more interesting water conditions.

Comments

[randomdreams]

I love sea kayaking but I never got any emergency preparedness courses like that and now I wish I had.

[rebeccmeister]

I am so glad that we're doing it!

But it's also the sort of thing that works best when one is likely to do a bunch of kayaking in the near future. Which might be a bit harder to orchestrate in the middle of the country, eh? I would think more wilderness first aid type things would be more useful in your present circumstances.

But OTOH...I mean, for me, there's no substitute for water time. And I am just as happy in a sea kayak as in a rowing shell, all things considered.

[randomdreams]

I've thought about river/whitewater kayaking, but I've known too many people who have died doing that.

[ivy]

This sounds like something I should have done before trying sea kayaking, heh. Zero formal education, just "here's a boat, go!" In fairness, that was how my intro to whitewater kayaking went also, and I did later go read some books about it on my own, but I still feel vastly more comfortable in whitewater than I do sea kayaking. (Screw up in whitewater, and dying is probably a couple minutes max. That seems easier to me than getting swept out to sea.)

Do you need a certification to go sea kayaking where you are?

[rebeccmeister]

Well, back in high school, I went on two sea kayaking camping trips as part of a summer camp program. For that trip, our instructions consisted of, "Okay, let's see if you can pop free from the kayak if it's flipped," and then, "Here's a paddle, GO!"

The only reason I would need a class out here is to be certified to rent sea kayaks from the shop that also offers the class. That said, I have been thinking about things from the same standpoint as for rowing: I had suspected there were different kinds of paddle strokes, and ways to improve one's efficiency. Water safety is also incredibly important to me, so I want to make sure I'm fully prepared, mentally, for the kinds of trouble one can get into on the water. As our instructor pointed out, currents through the Golden Gate Bridge can get up to ~5 knots/hour, and the typical rule of thumb for paddling speed is that one can manage around 3 knots/hour (I suspect this is a bit high and 2 knots is more realistic). Thus, if one doesn't pay any attention to currents and tides, it would be easy to get into trouble. There's also the element of learning the read the water to figure out where a person might get sucked under/etc.