Recent content by Glenn MacGrady

A keel can be a bit of a lateral move hindrance when river canoeing in technical waters, as when requiring quick draws, cross-draws, pries and side slips. But those issues don't really arise on lakes.

Great find, Brightraven. Quite a turnaround from the Maryland and Maine canoes we were discussing the other day. The virtues of keels on a W/C canoe are that they protect the bottom from scratches, gouges and breaks; they add strength to the bottom; and they help going straight in or across...

And: "Man plans, God laughs." — Yiddish saying If there's an Apocalypse, I wouldn't go north into a short growing season and freeze-to-death climate. I head south where it's warm all year long and food can be grown all year long. South America. Brazil maybe. Good canoeing there, too. The next...

Congrats, Steve. I'm beginning to have some balance issues. Nothing diagnosed but it's annoying. Is there a difference between the two poles? Non-poler question: Why two?

30 inches center-to-center of aero bars. With 15' canoes, solid as a rock with two belly straps and front and rear V lines. Never tried it with any longer boats but don't see why a 16' canoe would make much difference. I drove the Nova Craft Bob Special from West Virginia to Connecticut and...

It's a removable Mercedes factory rack that screws into bolt holes in the roof. I believe it's made by Thule. The functional crossbar width is 34 inches. That's wide enough to have carried three different 15' canoes on the rack. Yes, on interstates too. First, here's a head-on shot of the...

Whew, I'm tuckered out just reading about this Frankenstein trip: Plans discussed on CTnet. Thousands of miles of driving. Trains. Alone. Flooded river. Space alien cops. Helicopter rescue. Lost equipment. Satellite communications. Mylene in Costa Rica. Mylene comes back from Costa Rica for...

We knew you could do it, Tryin'! We won't complain, much less divorce you. I don't need another canoe, but I'm lusting after that van conversion parked down the curb.

DJ, welcome to site membership! Feel free to ask any questions and to post messages, photos and videos, and to start threads, in our many forums. Please read Welcome to CanoeTripping and Site Rules! Also, because canoeing is a geographic sport, please add your location to the Account Details...

Shawn, I'm not one of the builders or repairers, but I do want to welcome you to site membership! Feel free to ask any questions and to post messages, photos and videos, and to start threads, in our many forums. Please read Welcome to CanoeTripping and Site Rules! Many of the site's technical...

On the Grey Owl website it says the Cambridge, Ontario, company was bought by a hockey stick manufacturer, Roustan, in May 2025, which will move all the paddle-making equipment to Brantford, Ontario, and continue paddle production. Several newspaper articles report this. Here's one...

This is a 32 mile relay race from Catalina Island to Newport, California. It's a relay because different paddlers switch into the boats at specified distances. Some relay switches are shown. Note that all paddlers use bent shaft paddles and most use a double bend. The Tahitian-style hulls don't...

In the following video, you can see the iceberg calving and causing a mini-tsusami in the harbor: I once enjoyably paddled among and around small icebergs in Portage Lake, Alaska, only to lose my camera with all the pictures of my Alaska trip as I was leaving Portage Creek.

Such utilitarian pragmatists. Sheesh . . . where are your aesthetic sensibilities? Do you not polish your scuffed alligator leather boots? Do you not clean spaghetti sauce off your Italian silk ties? Do you not clean smudges off your windows? Do you not buff and polish your nails? Do you not...

Here are the photos from that thread. In the first photo the owner outlined the "WF" initials in Photoshop to make it more visible through the overlying paint. No one could identify the canoe, but some speculated the "WF" stamped on the deck could be the initials of the owner or of a livery.