I live in the rural midwest where pretty much everyone paddles aluminum tandems. I'd never seen a canoe locally that I was interested in, even if it wasn't for sale at the time.
An older fella who knew I liked canoeing said he had a canoe in the rafters of his shed. It had belonged to a friend that was going to use it for duck hunting but the friend capsized about 5' away from the boat ramp and swore he'd never get into it again. That piqued my interest a little.
I went to his house to have a look at it and it was still way up in the rafters. It looked like a fast solo design but it had been painted (poorly) camo and had a huge rip in the side that had been poorly patched with resin drips running down the side. He only wanted $100 and I couldn't pass it up. I still had no idea what it was.
Here in Iowa canoes have to be registered so when he signed the registration and handed it to me my heart skipped a little when it said "Jensen" under the model.
I think you definitely need to buy this boat. There just isn't any way to go wrong....unless you capsize and drown. So just don't do that.
Here's one of the only pics I could find of mine alongside some other boats.
Prospector by
Alan, on Flickr
Alan