(no subject)

[catsittingstill]

I went canoeing yesterday for an hour in the afternoon.  It is getting chilly (I actually wore long pants today); I hope things warm up a bit in the next week or it will be too cold to canoe by the time I finish Constance.

I discovered that all my canoe carrying muscles and canoe paddling muscles appear to have atrophied.  Patience felt like she weighed half again as much as she did last summer.  I thought working on Constance would keep my muscles strong, but apparently not.

Also I have run into a snag with arranging the seat and back thwart on Constance.  I tried to set up a chair to mimic how I would be sitting in Constance (butt and feet at the correct relative heights (with the assistance of the coffee table and a couple of two by fours) with a bar clamped across the chair back at the right relative height compared to the seat.  It's not very comfortable.  I thought the back thwart was usually a couple of inches behind the back of the seat (that's the appearance in the pictures) Plus when I expanded her middle out to the design width the decks that I so carefully fitted yesterday don't fit anymore.

I need to re-fit the decks, put them in, and put her in the water with clamped in thwarts (I'm faking some up out of two-by-fours) to figure out how far back I want the thwart from the seat.  Which also means I need to fake up a seat.  Plus I may need to seal the gunwales with something (a quick coat of epoxy?) to keep them from being water damaged.

I feel simultaneously like I've been working hard all day and haven't been doing anything at all, as I haven't made any progress on the canoe itself.

Comments

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

I know that feeling!

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

nice icon!

[adamek.livejournal.com]

Different sets of muscles.

I remember my first time in my own canoe (vs one of my parent's). I received it as a gift in November, and was anxious to take it out ASAP. Most of the local ponds already had some ice on them. I went on the only nearby ice free lake. Solo. But this was a 16' aluminum canoe. Aluminum is an excellent heat conductor. Kneeling on boat cushion, freeze feet. Sit on boat cushion on bow canoe seat facing stern, freeze legs on thwart. Sit on boat cushion on stern seat, can't handle headwind. I was VERY thankful for heated seats when I got back to the car.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Oh, brrr!

I completely understand that "I have a new canoe; I WILL put it in the water, or know the reason why" feeling. But I'm very glad you didn't fall in; that could have been ugly. It sounds pretty cold as it was.

I'm seriously hoping to finish Constance while it's still a bit warmer than that.

[adamek.livejournal.com]

Not the craziest thing I've done. Somewhere I've still got my Polar Bear Canoe patch from the old Couples Canoe Club in Bucksport, Maine. To get it you had to go canoeing at least one in every month of the year. It was a full moon at New Year's Eve that year so the Polar Bear subset of the club went for a paddle on the Penobscot River at midnight. Canoeing at night while dodging ice floes, not something I plan on repeating...

One more thing

[adamek.livejournal.com]

My whole family got a bit more sensible about that kind of risk after an incident on the Moose River in upstate New York one Mother's Day Weekend. The water temperature was 40 degrees F. The AMC River Guide said that the rapids dropped 4 feet in 1/2 mile. It was a typo. They drop 40 feet over 1/2 mile. My father and brother were in the lead and swamped in the first part of the rapids. Matt was in the water for about half an hour. He survived, but it was close.

Dad wrote a somewhat sharp letter to the AMC and we never EVER relied on that book again.

Re: One more thing

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Whew! I'm very glad it came out okay!

I'm generally conservative about canoeing and hypothermia. I get nervous anytime the air temperature drops below 70 degrees. The water temperature is harder for me to monitor, but one reason I like the autumn better than the spring is that the water is pre-warmed instead of pre-chilled.

I went canoeing on New Year's Day a couple of years ago. It was a canoe club outing (though everyone but me was paddling a kayak) so there was plenty of help along, and it was flat water, and I took dry clothes in a dry bag.

The high was supposed to be 65 degrees--what I hadn't noticed was that the high was supposed to happen at 10 am. We went out and it got a little colder, and a little colder, and the way back was entirely against a headwind, which the canoe minded a lot more than the kayaks. Nobody made any point of staying with me, and I didn't like to ask. I got back safely to the put in point but I was so cold and tired that I needed help putting the canoe on the car.

I don't think I'll be doing that again.

Maybe if I make a kayak.

Re: One more thing

[adamek.livejournal.com]

A dry bag is always a good idea. We always go with a set of sweatpants and sweatshirt for everyone. Over the years they've been used three times for our family and over half a dozen times for other less prepared paddlers. Gym clothes can be stretched or cinched up to fit a wide range of people under emergency conditions. A number of Maine rivers can only be run in late spring early summer water levels.

Re: One more thing

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I agree about the dry bag. I haven't ever had to use the clothes so far, but it's nice to have them.

Actually two layers of heavy (contracter's) garbage bags inside a duffle bag give much the same effect--they're just a bit more trouble. But I tested them in a backpack before our Quetico trip (I had everybody put in an afternoon of canoe-over-canoe rescue practice) and they kept the clothes inside bone dry for fifteen minutes in the water. I've never had to try it out "for real" but it's my standard method when camping. I like dry bags too, but they're harder to carry than a backpack. But they're handier for stuff I need to get to a lot, and I use them routinely if I don't expect to have to portage.

Re: One more thing

[adamek.livejournal.com]

When I said dry bag I wasn't necessarily talking about one of those submersible kayak bags. Pack basket and two layers of garbage bags was our standard dry bag. One big garbage bag for the whole basket and then individual small bags for each change of clothing.

All this talk of canoeing has me wishing my frozen shoulder would clear up. I've only been canoeing once in the past two years.

[judifilksign.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you got an opportunity to paddle about a bit before it got too cold. I hope Constance is cooperative, and a bit of Indian Summer appears for you to enjoy her out on the water this year.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Tennessee is usually good about Indian Summer. When I went out in Patience the leaves were still mostly green, though a tired, tattered, end-of-summer green.