Before Bluster, and going back many years I have owned a white water kayak, a 18.5 Clipper expedition canoe, a Seafarer sea kayak, a Laser sailboat, a C2 decked whitewater canoe and a Whithall replica rowboat. These have all gone onto new owners years ago including the C2 which was stolen. Compared to the Chebacco any of these little bloats were so easy to pop in the water and go. Recently and nostalgically I have been revisiting my love of these simple human powered craft and particularly the canoe.
In 1979 my good friend Ryan and I spent the summer paddling, pulling and portaging my Clipper canoe from Fort Nelson, BC to the McKenzie River and down this to the McKenzie delta where we traveled upstream for ten days on the rat river. We portaged through MacDougal Pass and then started down the Bell and Porcupine Rivers to the Yukon River and finally to the highway bridge to Prudo Bay. This trip took us three months and I turned nineteen years old on the way.
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| Rat River, Northwest Territories 1979 |
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| Kootenay Lake 2005 |
This past summer Lisa, the boys and I rented sea kayaks for a couple of hours to explore our the waters around Gibsons Landing which was a ball.
I started researching canoes and a local company, Western Canoes and Kayaks makers of the Clipper Canoe line and my first canoe, caught my attention. The next week WCK was having their one week end of summer sale where they slash the prices on demonstration, rental and last years models. I drive by this place every day so I stopped and found they had the model and colour I wanted on for an awesome price.
We now have a new boat in the family. She is a gorgeous shiny yellow 16.5 foot Clipper Tripper S. The S model is slightly different from the standard and very popular 17.5 foot Tripper in that she is a little shorter and less beamy with a subsequent slight drop in capacity (but still plenty). She also has a third centre thwart to be used for solo paddling. At 66 pounds she is pretty easy to put on and off the roof racks and I still have a little canoe dolly from a past boat for rolling along the road.
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| Canoe dolly - brilliant |
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| Easy transport |
