I meant Cliff Jacobson a couple years ago at Quit Adventure Symposium and asked if he had any advice for getting kids interested in and building skills to enjoy camping and paddling. He recommend I give them his book Justin Cody's Race to Survival. I purchased a copy and brought along on trip and we all took turns reading out loud. It is filled with good info and adventure. It help reinforce the lessons I was trying to teach and sparked deeper conversations about why, when, how to simply, comfortably and safely travel in the back country.
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Happy Leif Erikson Day! ⛵🪓🛡️
Getting Kids into Canoeing
- Thread starter Glenn MacGrady
- Start date
I was in Boy Scouts but we didn’t do any canoeing to speak of. Summer camp in the Adirondacks, I’d do some with my uncle. But it was mostly with my high school cross country team where I built fond memories paddling canoes in a group. Utter mayhem and I loved it!
I started hauling my kids around in 2020 I guess when the twins were 9 and 5. Now one of my 14yo daughters doesn’t want to go anymore, her twin sister would go but is dancing 6 days a week, and I get my 10yo twins out occasionally. I think some cheap yaks might be in order to keep their interest up, and also more down river stuff rather than down and back up.
My worst misstep was putting the two older girls in an 18’ Wenonah on the lake by the house and before I could get myself launched the wind blew them to shore in the tall weeds. A fun afternoon turned into a sullen tow and that was it for a while. They’re all big enough now to handle appropriately sized solos, it just comes down to logistics. Need wider bars, need to install roof rails on the family Odyssey…
I started hauling my kids around in 2020 I guess when the twins were 9 and 5. Now one of my 14yo daughters doesn’t want to go anymore, her twin sister would go but is dancing 6 days a week, and I get my 10yo twins out occasionally. I think some cheap yaks might be in order to keep their interest up, and also more down river stuff rather than down and back up.
My worst misstep was putting the two older girls in an 18’ Wenonah on the lake by the house and before I could get myself launched the wind blew them to shore in the tall weeds. A fun afternoon turned into a sullen tow and that was it for a while. They’re all big enough now to handle appropriately sized solos, it just comes down to logistics. Need wider bars, need to install roof rails on the family Odyssey…
I grew up spending summers in a family group camp in NY where my family maintained a cabin (one of 60 an the camp) throughout my childhood. Kids could go out in rowboats with an adult, but weren't allowed in canoes until they "swam the flags", which was a 150 yard swim (supervised, of course) in deep water around the flags marking the perimeter of the swimming area. Once they swam the flags for the first time they got various privileges including using the diving board, swimming to the float, and using canoes, so it was (and still is) an important rite of passage, which many kids did as young as age 5.
Most families had canoes, and everybody wanted to be allowed to go out in one for the first time instead of the clunky old rowboat. Canoeing was just something that everybody learned and did, without making a big deal of it... it was the best way to pick blueberries around the lake shore, or go fishing.
There was also the annual "canoe regatta", where the various camps (family camps like ours, but also boy and girl scouts, YMCA camps, and other groups) got together for a day of racing.
Today I'm at our cabin in the same camp doing some repair work on the same canoe my Dad bought over 60 years ago and that I and my own kids learned to paddle in... so I can take our 5 year old granddaughter (who swam the flags for the first time this year) out in it, though she's already been out with her parents in other canoes.
Most families had canoes, and everybody wanted to be allowed to go out in one for the first time instead of the clunky old rowboat. Canoeing was just something that everybody learned and did, without making a big deal of it... it was the best way to pick blueberries around the lake shore, or go fishing.
There was also the annual "canoe regatta", where the various camps (family camps like ours, but also boy and girl scouts, YMCA camps, and other groups) got together for a day of racing.
Today I'm at our cabin in the same camp doing some repair work on the same canoe my Dad bought over 60 years ago and that I and my own kids learned to paddle in... so I can take our 5 year old granddaughter (who swam the flags for the first time this year) out in it, though she's already been out with her parents in other canoes.
@Woodpuppy, did I read your post correctly? You have TWO sets of twins?! As a twin dad myself, all I can say is God bless you!
Yes sir! Two sets of mayhem. First set was easy. Second set complicated things a bit
I never paddled as a kid. I was 29 when my father got me out in a canoe for the first time. We paddled the Pontock Rapids on the Androscogin River with the Boston AMC in his then brand new Mohawk Whitewater 16. I loved it, but had a 2-year old at home, and another on the way. It was 15-years before I started paddling again.
By then I had three kids. The two oldest had absolutely no interest in paddling. The youngest liked it. I would paddle with her in that same Mohawk Whitewater 16 that I paddled with my father. I moved the bow seat forward (way forward) to balance our weight and so she could get the paddle over the side easier. She got pretty good as a bow paddler. She also got her own kayak.
Paddling with my daughter lasted about 5 years – her age 10 to around 15. Once she got into the teen years hanging around with dad and a bunch of old folks wasn’t quite as cool anymore. For me it was fun while it lasted.
Me and my daughter, and me and my father in the Mohawk Whitewater 16.
By then I had three kids. The two oldest had absolutely no interest in paddling. The youngest liked it. I would paddle with her in that same Mohawk Whitewater 16 that I paddled with my father. I moved the bow seat forward (way forward) to balance our weight and so she could get the paddle over the side easier. She got pretty good as a bow paddler. She also got her own kayak.
Paddling with my daughter lasted about 5 years – her age 10 to around 15. Once she got into the teen years hanging around with dad and a bunch of old folks wasn’t quite as cool anymore. For me it was fun while it lasted.
Me and my daughter, and me and my father in the Mohawk Whitewater 16.
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