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March 1, 2001 Issue
March 15, 2001 Issue
March 1, 2001
Kathy's First Solo
By Bill WeymouthI knew she thought she was going to die, but she did it anyway. At the end of the maiden voyage, she said, "I have to have one of these canoes!" My wife Kathy had encouraged me to build a Wee Lassie canoe, a twenty-five pound floating escape pod. Most of a cold and damp Maine spring was spent preparing . pine strips and wooden forms, and building the 12' strip canoe on those forms. The total cost of wood, epoxy, fiberglass and supplies came to about $200. It would have cost less but there is an additional tax in Maine called the crow-bar fee, this fee is applied during the actual purchase of material at the marine store. The harder a store clerk has to pry cash out of a customer's hand, the higher the tax. Most people's tax works out to about two or three percent, mine was pro-rated at six point two percent.
Well, the boat was completed in a few weeks, in time for blackfly season in central Maine. By the time I was able to construct a harness for a blackfly so it could tow me at trolling speed across my favorite pond, the hunters had shot all the big ones. The only ones that were left were those pesky ones about the size of a chickadee. In early June around here one can give to the Red Cross or go boating, we can't do both in the same week though, we just lose to much blood.
Around July the weather and the bugs started to cooperate, and Kathy was persuaded to try out the little canoe. We went to the clos-est pond and set up the boat on the sandy bank. I made sure she had a lightweight double paddle and a good lifejacket and gently pushed her into the pond. After a few minutes she re-alized she wasn't about to die and began to explore the 6" deep shoreline looking for min-nows and painted turtles. Kathy paddled that little canoe for an hour all by herself with only a minute's instruction.
She was successful for two reasons, the non-demanding double paddle, and the canoe being designed to be paddled from a comfort-able and very safe sitting position. I had some plastic chairs without legs that were ideal for placing in the bottom of the boat, keeping Kathy's bottom nice and dry.
If you really want to get away for an af-ternoon, away from complication and people, one can't go too far wrong with a craft that flips upon a vehicle as easy as a bag of groceries. Carry a lunch and a sports umbrella with you in the boat. This umbrella can be used to fend off rain showers, or used as a down-wind sail if you are lucky enough to be traveling downwind. It can be used as a sunbrella, or a privacy screen on land for the inevitable. Also, if one paints 6" yellow eyes with black pupils on the outside of the open umbrella, it will frighten away the various bloodsuckers still around hoping to further their genetics at your expense. The eyes will scare away bugs too.
So find a seam in a stream under your own steam and dream of catching a mean ream of bream. A moment in the company of boats is never wasted. Paddle your own way to sa-vor the best in a day. One caution, don't let anyone know you can build a little boat until you get to go boating to the limit of minimum gratification for that season. It really feels like I got away with something when I was able to do this once or twice between helping friends build their boats.
I'm building a small trimaran now so I have to go underground for awhile and plan my next invasion of the marine supply store.
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