Howdy from Austin, TX

[John B]

Hey folks,

I've been around solo canoes since 1983 in Tampa, FL. Most of my paddling has been in Texas, Arkansas, and a little in Florida. For tripping with my buddy, we paddle his royalex Penobscot. Day trips, I typically paddle a solo Lotus Caper or a Lotus Egret for tandem, both in fiberglass. I recently bought a solo Bell royalex Wildfire for paddling smaller rocky streams and rivers.

I've been lurking on this and other forums for a while without registering. Lots and lots of great info.

Thank you all.

john in austin

 

[Gamma1214]

Welcome John. Buffalo River is on my bucket list... Anything else really good down there?

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

I've been around solo canoes since 1983 in Tampa, FL. Most of my paddling has been in Texas, Arkansas, and a little in Florida. For tripping with my buddy, we paddle his royalex Penobscot. Day trips, I typically paddle a solo Lotus Caper or a Lotus Egret for tandem, both in fiberglass. I recently bought a solo Bell royalex Wildfire for paddling smaller rocky streams and rivers.

John, 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 page in your profile, which will cause it to show under your avatar as a clickable map link. Many of the site's technical features are explained in Features: Help and How-To Running Thread. We look forward to your participation in our canoe community.

I bought my BJX from Mike Galt in Tampa in 1984 and my Caper there in 1986. I've paddled a lot around the Tampa and Gulf Coast regions, I lived in Austin for two years, and also own a black-gold Bell Wildfire.

 

[yixak]

Hi John,

Austin has a funny place in my canoe-related memories which I want to share. My wife and I ordered a PakBoats folding canoe several years ago. They were having free shipping within the continental US as a year end promotion. We live in AK so that didn't apply to us but we were planning a trip to Austin the following April to see the eclipse. Alaska Airlines provides two free checked bags for Alaska residents so we figured we could have it shipped to a FedEx facility and held there for us, then brought home as checked bags. After all, we wanted a folding canoe to fit in a bush plane for a fly out trip so this would just be practice, right? Ultimately, the logistics of picking up a very large package in a small, rented electric vehicle while aligning schedules with other branches of the family, some of who depended on us for rides may not have been worth the cost savings. American Airlines which operated our flight home on behalf of Alaska Airlines didn't honor the bag check policy so we got charged anyways. Ultimately, the fly-out trip never happened but we still have the canoe which fits in the car well enough for road trips.

It was pretty great fumbling through the process of assembling the canoe for the first time by the walking path on the north side of the river in Austin with the the general public walking by. No one came over to stare so I guess it wasn't too far out of line with the "Keep Austin Weird" signs I saw in a few places. Here's a picture from the maiden voyage. The next day we paddled in Ladybird Lake and saw a bunch of small turtles. Good memories.