How to recruit new canoe paddlers?

[memaquay]

I've put hundreds of teenagers through wilderness trips. Some of them even enjoyed it. The thing is, it is now a sport for the financially well off, not for a young couple just starting off and wanting to add to humanity with a litter of future tax payers. Look at the price of swift canoes....it's enough to gag a maggot. But everyone wants a featherweight canoe. I remember when I started out, the 17 foot Grumman white water special, 87 pounds, saw hundreds of miles of trips. Seems like newbies are more technically savvy now, and not willing to put in that initial suffering.

Esquif is coming in at a more reasonable rate, but even still, 3000 bucks for a canoe, 500 for a tent, a few hundred for packs, roof racks for the vehicle, finding the time in busy schedules.....it's a dedicated sport, not for the weekend warrior. Where I live, most young people will buy at 14 or 16 foot tin boat with a motor for under 2500 bucks and call it a day. If they camp, there will be no portaging involved, but they will be very well lubricated internally with a multitude of liquor. I'm not judging, I do that sometimes too.
My buddy chainsaw Rob and I were discussing the future of canoe routes up here last weekend. My portage clearing days are finished, his are coming to a close. There is no one waiting in the wings. The ten or more routes that we kept open will probably fade back into obscurity, ports will disappear..........in a few years, only the dedicated masochists will venture into our neck of the woods.

I am working on a couple of young fellas though.......

 

[jdeerfoot]

I went on a number of BWCA trips with the youth group from my wife's church. They were mostly fun trips, especially with those athletic teenaged boys who made contests of showing off their strength and agility with heavy canoes and packs to impress the girls. This allowed me to saunter across the portages with a load of paddles and lifejackets. Sadly, I am not aware of any of them who continued with trips of their own. The pastor who set up the trips had worked his high school and college summers on the staff of Wilderness Canoe Base at the end of the Gunflint Trail in the BWCA. He tried to recruit some of the kids to sign on as camp staff and was largely unsuccessful.

For many years I took extended family members, mostly kids, on paddle in basecamp trips to the UP of Michigan. They were enjoyable trips with all the usual large family group raucous behavior of our at home family gatherings. Again, as my #2 daughter, who seemed to like these trips, and various nieces and nephews and some of their friends grew into young adulthood, no one continued on their own.

Now, I trip mostly basecamping with a few elderly friends as we watch the evening circle around the campfire grow smaller each year. I am very grateful to have my group of paddling friends, all veterans of 15 years of Wabakimi Project trips. The youngest on some of these trips are guys and a few women in their mid to late 50's.

 

[MrPoling]

Arguments to overcome, keeping in mind that the level of on-water experience is at or near zero.

• Cost of entry is lower for kayaks.
• Small kayaks can be tossed in the bed of a truck or poked out the rear hatch of an SUV.
• Paddle stroke is more intuitive in a kayak.
• Center of gravity is lower in a kayak.
• The seating position in a kayak is more familiar and therefore comfortable to newcomers. Heck, just look at the popularity of back supports and pack-seating in canoes.
• Kayaks are typically solo affairs, which makes for easier group dynamics
• Kayaks get most of the press, AND the shelf space at stores

There are a lot of good evangelism points in this thread:

Kayak vs Canoe - Your Personal Pros and Cons

I'm curious how many of you are exclusively canoeists and how many enjoy both. Personally, I own both and enjoy both for different reasons. Canoes: -Can carry more stuff and are easier to pack -Offer a variety of sitting positions and are much more comfortable -Track better and are more...

www.canoetripping.net

My son is a canoe convert. It took a "big" trip for him to see the light. Portaging and camping make it an easy choice. Throwing a boat in the car for a day on the river? That's gonna be a harder argument to win.

Paddle boards, most sit-on-tops, and many kayaks are safer for beginners because they have more flotation. You can get back on, even if that means laying down on a mostly flooded kayak and paddling it like a surfboard.

It also helps many rec boats are short, slow, and wet. It makes it easier to know you're getting into trouble.

Short kayaks are easier to transport, especially if you have a pickup truck or fancy racks.

I am happy though to see paddle boards displacing some sit on tops and rec, kayaks. At least they're using the right paddle.

 

[RatAssassin]

Rambling here...

The site member activity thread brought this question to my mind again. I think about this from time to time, and sometimes I think I have an answer; but then it never seems to materialize.

I have assumed that paddling with a group of mostly recreational k*y*k*rs would give maximum exposure. For a while, I thought that those times I carried gear that wouldn't fit in their boats would make an impression, but that doesn't seem to have been the case.

I often get comments about how easily my canoe handles and maneuvers, but never any interest in learning about canoes and how to paddle them effectively. I never expected that any k*y*k*rs would be interested in poling (to them, it looks like a cross between physical therapy and voodoo), but it puzzles me that curiosity about the open boat and single blade is just not there.

I have tried to demonstrate the practicality and versatility of canoes at every opportunity. I wonder if I make it look too complicated, but comments are usually about how easy it looks. I even keep the Mohawk Solo 14 in the fleet as a loaner, but so far, no takers outside of my immediate family. Family has been my only success, but I'm done breeding new paddlers.

I was invited to join the local flat water group on the opening weekend of our local lake, but declined. I went out by myself in the Wildfire a day earlier instead. Paddling alone is always so much more enjoyable I'm tempted to just say dash it all, and go paddling. Let the masses be content in their little butt boats.

Maybe it's just the way things are going to go, but it's a shame that this seems to be a dying art. Maybe I'm thinking about it all wrong. Maybe it's just the reality of where I live. What are you all seeing?

Many years ago, I moved 900 miles away and ended up in the northern Midwest. Didn't know anyone. Found myself with my experience teaching kayaking at the local HS with a pool. The big event was the "graduation" where most all participants could do a simple roll in perfect pool conditions with a small unladen craft. Very cool, but hardly practical for the Great Lakes. But we did it and people learned something.
The problem started when, for some reason it took off and recent graduates who had no experience outside if a pool were now teaching as "experts".
And then, the "crew" saw me at the big paddlesports expo and saw me buying a canoe.
The best I got from them was....."Oh...you're one of THOSE people?"
Self righteous morons who later almost lost someone "guiding" them onto the big lake with pool experience and all went scrambling when it went south quick. A few of them ended up being rescued.
Lucky for me, I saw it coming and totally detached from the group with a warning that something bad was going to happen and I wanted no part of it.
A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Especially with no real experience.
Recruiting people is awesome. But I learned that teaching without being able to mentor in real conditions created instant experts that then almost got a few killed.
There's no substitute for practice and building up experience.
If you find folks that want to take the time......awesome.
If in a "regimented program" where they just throw a moniker on you and say, "You know everything you will ever need and you are now the experts". Well that is the book smart equivalent of real life stuff that can kill you.

 

[Jmharrick]

I've put hundreds of teenagers through wilderness trips. Some of them even enjoyed it. The thing is, it is now a sport for the financially well off, not for a young couple just starting off and wanting to add to humanity with a litter of future tax payers. Look at the price of swift canoes....it's enough to gag a maggot. But everyone wants a featherweight canoe. I remember when I started out, the 17 foot Grumman white water special, 87 pounds, saw hundreds of miles of trips. Seems like newbies are more technically savvy now, and not willing to put in that initial suffering.

Esquif is coming in at a more reasonable rate, but even still, 3000 bucks for a canoe, 500 for a tent, a few hundred for packs, roof racks for the vehicle, finding the time in busy schedules.....it's a dedicated sport, not for the weekend warrior. Where I live, most young people will buy at 14 or 16 foot tin boat with a motor for under 2500 bucks and call it a day. If they camp, there will be no portaging involved, but they will be very well lubricated internally with a multitude of liquor. I'm not judging, I do that sometimes too.
My buddy chainsaw Rob and I were discussing the future of canoe routes up here last weekend. My portage clearing days are finished, his are coming to a close. There is no one waiting in the wings. The ten or more routes that we kept open will probably fade back into obscurity, ports will disappear..........in a few years, only the dedicated masochists will venture into our neck of the woods.

I am working on a couple of young fellas though.......

Sounds like we should have a rendezvous in your area every few years to clear portages…

 

[Steve in Idaho]

I wonder how often people get turned off to this by the wrong equipment.

I was initially discouraged away from canoes after a less than impressive experience with a Coleman and box store paddles. Being introduced to better canoes was an eye opener, but better paddles really sealed the deal.

 

[ppine]

I have lived in Nevada for decades, not a canoeing mecca. But there are plenty of people here that grew up canoeing somewhere else like PA or NY or Michigan. Many of them jump at a chance to go on a canoe trip. i have had some green young people that took instruction well in the bow of my canoe. I could teach them the basics of canoeing moving water in a week. The most technical white water I have ever done was the Trinity River in CA with a smart 16 yo girl in the bow. We scouted all the difficult rapids and made a plan. She would do exactly as instructed like executing a perfect bow draw when I said "Now."

When we travel with canoes on the roof and on trailers we get a lot of interest in places like OR and northern CA. or MT or UT. Canoes are not so common like they are in the NE and Midwest. We meet people at gas stations and restaurants. Plenty of waitresses over the years have volunteered to go with us.

 

[sailsman63]

A couple years ago, I launched just ahead of an Outfitters’s bus. One young man had a rented canoe for him, his not small wife, and

C'mon! you can't just leave it like that... (Honestly, I suspect the forum or the copy/paste ate most of your post)

 

[wjmc]

An outfitter in northern Saskatchewan that I have known for a long time told me that he had more clients than ever, but that the average trip length had shrunk to just a few days. It seems that people are less and less willing, or able, to detach from modern life for more than a few days at a time. Given that the major advantages of the open canoe are its ability to haul substantial amounts of gear, and be readily portaged around obstacles and across watersheds - characteristics less important as trips grow shorter - perhaps this may account for some of the shift away from open canoes to other watercraft.

I have to agree with memaquay about costs. And not just for self outfitting: I was introduced to canoes, and canoe trips, at a summer camp. Canoe camps are now also pricy - even modest 5-7 day programs with limited transportation requirements start at around $1000. Longer programs can be much more. Not really a price point to attract parents with no canoe experience of their own. And guided trips - up north, trips under $10,000 are becoming rare.

Good equipment is nice, but I don't think top of the line stuff would do much for beginners. I won't speak for the US, but there are still many wild and attractive spots in Canada that could be safely, and fairly comfortably, accessed with an old Coleman, Mohawk paddles, a Canadian Tire tent, and a blue poly tarp. It's the willingness to "get away" that is the prime requirement.

 

[Black_Fly]

Sorry, I was at the doc with my wife.

Anyway, the dog and wife were in the bow, she was facing the stern, no paddle, just holding the dog who was easily 90lbs alone. They launched into the current and were spinning out of control, the man furiously paddling with little to no effect, then they crashed into a sweeper where they grabbed on for dear life. I ferried over from my eddie and offered that they should land (pointed to a spot nearby) and move the dog astern to have any degree of control. I don’t know how they ended up because I took off to get some breathing room from the hoard of kayaks still launching from the ramp. The water wasn’t very deep, and the dog was probably a fine swimmer. The couple weren’t wearing their PFDs, but could have let go, capsized and walked to shore.

I can’t remember why I started into that story, but that’s it. Oh yeah, kayaks being easier. Seems like the Outfitter would have gone over the basics of canoe paddling. The wife wasn’t up to the kayak, clearly, but some basic advice would have been prudent before dropping them into the current. To be honest, I don’t think they would be able to trim the canoe by moving the dog alone back, but there is no good way to express that, at least that I could think of on the fly.