Hanger Queen Paddles

[Guest]

This, on a paddle thread, got me thinking about the hanger queen paddles in the gear room.

7 of my paddles are inside the house in fancy paddle hangers. 30 are cold noosed by rope in the paddle shed. I like a couple especially though they will never be on a trip. A Gil Gilpatrick woodburned,, rope edged huge beavertail and a Craig Johson Voyageur shape out of curly maple.

I have given away a dozen or so paddles over the years, sticks we no longer had even a niche use for, but there are a couple of hanger queens I will never part with.

My father’s old Guide stick. Wayyy too long for my paddling style. I have brought it on sailing trips to use as a rudder, but it would be a PITA if I actually had to use it as a paddle.

A long, slender Ottertail, made by a departed friend. Also not my style of paddle, and I dislike the grip, but it is dang near a piece of art and holds memories.

A couple of solid Cherry sticks in the Nashwaak style. My first foray into making my own paddles. I had the cherry and decided that while I had tools in hand cutting, shaping, sanding and finishing it would be as easy to make two paddles as to make one.

They are beautiful if I do say so myself, and I learned a couple of things. First, it is not that hard to make a paddle, even a pretty one. And second, I do not care for the designed blade flex in the Nashwaak design.

Got a hanger queen, and why?

 

[latremorej]

No hangers yet, all I have in my shed are a half dozen or so bending branches paddles of various lengths and models

Jason

 

[Steve in Idaho]

Well, CW says my Kettlewell modified ottertail should be hanging on the wall, and he's probably right. But I actually like to use it when soloing a tandem. If I ever get my butt in gear and carve a suitable replacement out of that cherry plank in my shop, then I might hang that one up. It is an especially beautiful piece of wood.

 

[yellowcanoe]

I'd like my Kettlewells better if the shafts were shorter. They are hanger pawns though. Relegated to the shed cause aside from the bat they are no longer pretty
I too like an ottertail for soloing a tandem Canadian Style .
But the Turtle is far prettier
Years ago Swift brought a pile of Kettlewells used in their rentals in Algonquin to the local canoe store fall sale and gave them away

 

[Waterdog]

I have lots of paddles and they all get used**. For tripping I often use a Kettlewell modified ottertail, or a Fishell in the same pattern. I take along a more standard paddle on those trips for shallow water too. They clean up nice after the trip. **Except there is one hanger in the bunch. The Kettlewell Rays Special. It is a looooongggg blade. I think when I bought it I just really liked the look of the thing. I tried it out and realized that it didn't suit my style of paddling and, I believe, is probably of sufficient length to leverage my 16' prospector upside down with little effort in the right conditions. While I have plenty of cool places in the house to relegate a hanger queen to, I'll just wait until one of them has some sentimental value and a story to tell. Till then they remain in the basement racked like soldiers yelling Pick me! Pick me! I would like to get a nice Turtle paddle someday, but could see it going straight to hanger queen status, and maybe that would be a shame.

Cheers,

Barry

 

[yellowcanoe]

Actually my Turtle is bi. Hanger queen much of the time. Working lady the rest.

 

[Matt Hopkinson]

Perhaps this wouldn't qualify but I have what I call a Greenland Pole. Twelve feet long, all the body-specific dimensions of a Greenland Paddle, except I added the difference between the measurement from my elbow to the water when seated and when standing (times 2 of course). The other departure from Greenland design is that the ends are not thin and blade-like, they are more like rifle butts. It's an awesome double bladed paddle when standing, the "rifle butts" prevent the sinking in soft mud when poling. It was always meant to be a prototype, and the glue has started to separate, so it's decorative at this point.

 

[Guest]

Perhaps this wouldn't qualify but I have what I call a Greenland Pole
The other departure from Greenland design is that the ends are not thin and blade-like, they are more like rifle butts. It's an awesome double bladed paddle when standing, the "rifle butts" prevent the sinking in soft mud when poling. It was always meant to be a prototype, and the glue has started to separate, so it's decorative at this point.

Local poling friend Brian made something similar. A 12 foot pole with stubby double blade paddle ends. His experiment had a 3 inch pole end extending out from the tips of the “blades” for added durability.

It worked well for standing and windmilling, and acceptably as a pole, but I think it also became a hanger queen.

That brings to mind a couple of other shop oddities. I like to mess with the folks at Blue Mountain Outfitters, and have left a couple of bizarre DIY paddles in their racks when I knew the owners were away paddling. The staff was in on the joke and happily eager to cooperate.

The first sported a nifty tag describing it as a “Canadian Style Greenland-style”. It was made of two broken two hockey sticks nicely joined together at the shaft. I stuck it in their paddle racks, with the staff’s in-on-the-joke cooperation, and we all waited to see what would happen.

What happened was that one owner finally spotted it in the racks a few days later, pulled it out and had a “WTF did you order this for?” conversation with the other owner while the staff tried not to laugh.

A few years after that dust had settled I made them a paddle with a drippy Salvador Dali blade shape, including a couple of circles keyhole-sawn through the blade and a bizarre “grip”.

It sported a couple of radioactive hazard stickers and had a “manufacturer label” reading something like “TMI Melt-down Special” (Three Mile Island is but 30 miles downstream from the shop)

Again, the staff just left it in the paddle racks, waiting for some bewildered customer to bring it up to the counter.

Gotta love the staff vibe at BMO. There a photo of the Greenland style paddle half way down their Fun & Games archives:

http://bluemountainoutfitters.net/fun.html

The TMI Melt-down Special was in the 2013 newsletter:

http://bluemountainoutfitters.net/Pd...013_spring.pdf

Note that they found a use for that oddity. The staff discovered that the Dali-esque keyhole voids perfectly hold a shot glass and beer cup.

The staff at BMO are among the best of paddler folk. And the newsletter is both hilarious and informative, and worth signing up for.

It’s been three years, I might have to think about sneaking another oddball paddle into the racks while the owner’s aren’t looking.