Greetings from South Africa

[AdrianT]

Good Day All,

I live in the beautiful city of Cape Town near to the beach and have been involved in various watersports all my life. My canoeing experience is limited to a short trip on the Zambezi (Mana Pools) as a youngster (maybe that is where the boating bug bit?) and a multi-day trip down the Orange River.

However, I have been kayaking since 2004 and I guess would be considered an "expert" as I was sponsored by many different companies for several years and have run first descents in West Sumatra, Central Java and paddled in Norway, Sweden, Zambia, Swaziland and all across South Africa. Those exploits have all been carefully documented through over 240 articles on my paddling site. I also own a surfski and do a fair amount of sea kayaking too. My main sport remains windsurfing though, and when the waves are good I'll bodyboard too.

However, I am here because I am really keen to get into canoeing on whitewater. Single bladed exploits for all intents and purposes simply don't exist in South Africa. We have the odd person paddling C1 sprint boats on flat water, but even our open canoes that are around, people sit and use a two bladed paddle. My aim is to build an open canoe for whitewater (composite), and a wooden paddle. It will certainly bring a new challenge to me as I have never C1'd in white water before and I'm looking forward to learning from the wealth of knowledge that exists here. Especially for the build and layup thereof.

Kind regards,
Adrian Tregoning

 

[memaquay]

Welcome to the site! Do you have a design in mind yet? will it be primarily for white water or are you thinking of a multi use canoe?

 

[AdrianT]

Thank you!

I'm possibly going to design something similar to the Blackfly Option, but a little longer. Perhaps 280cm, sorry I know most folk here use the imperial system. So yes, purely for whitewater. But my desire to push the limits is now gone so I doubt I'll paddle past class 4 much. I prefer the adventure aspect of paddling, rather than let's scare ourselves, which is what I used to do. I'll create a 3D model first as I was a mechanical design engineer for many years before deciding I prefer working with my hands than sitting at a desk.

At a later stage I'd really love to make a wooden strip canoe for flatwater paddling but at the moment time does not allow with a 7 month old and being self employed. I can't get enough of seeing those wooden beauties though.

 

[memaquay]

Ha ha ha, in an open canoe, such as the ones we paddle, class 4 would be really pushing the limits. Don't think you'll find many playboaters here, we are mostly a crowd of sedate trippers, getting out into the wilderness. I know of one fellow you did build a playboat style cedar strip, I'll see if I can find a pic later to post.

 

[AdrianT]

I have no interest in playboating I find it rather boring these days - as in, park and play in a hole or a wave. Sold my playboat last week.

Yes I am seeing that this perhaps is the wrong forum and more flat water/class 1 type stuff?