"Quick" canoeing trip at 13 minutes/mile

What is a realistic time?

What is interesting is the total time a trip really, realistically takes. Not just the actual paddling on the water, but getting there, get into the water, walk around a lock, have a break, etc.

Today's challenge

So today's challenge was to determine what a realistic time and distance would be. Jonathan is my canoeing buddy.

I love Endomondo!

I used my GPS enabled HTC phone to record the trip on Endomondo. I have used this many times in the past for my running and cycling. Very, very cool app!

So according to Endomondo Kayaking Workout: "I was out kayaking 9.21 miles in 2h:45m:48s"

When you click on the link you will see the trip super-imposed on Google maps.

A quick calculation shows that we had an average speed of 3.3mph, including breaks and 1 lock.

Scary Calculations

Based on this, IF, IF.......we did 35 miles per day, that would be a total duration of ~11 hours per day including breaks....and we have to do this 4 days long.....ouch....

Fortunately, Endomondo also provides a speed graph, so you can see how long and how fast we went. From this I can see that we actually went at a pace of ~5mph when we were paddling.

We did not paddle for 4 minutes at the beginning, and had a very comfortable 36 minutes break in the middle. You can also see where we stopped for the lock.

Looking at the lap-times graph it shows that we did an average of ~13 minute miles.

35 miles/dayX13minutes/mile=455minutes=7.5hrs/day of pure paddling without a break...still ouch....

Minor improvements to the rudder

I changed the nylon guylines for steel cable so there is no slack in the rudder. This worked much better than feared, as it is a stiffer system to push, but actually it worked great, as it provided more stability.

Bent pedal

I bent the left foot pedal, so I have bought two extra corner brackets, to create a double strength bracket for my feet.

The Justgiving Charity page is live!

Becs has put the final touches to the charity page on Justgiving for our 2011 challenge. Have a look, and it would be great if you donated to our very worthwhile cause.

Click on this widget to sponsor us!

After years in cramped rooms, and even having to get lessons outside, we finally want to give our children in Nepal what they deserve.

For our students: Their own school, and for our orphans: a place they can call home. Now and in the future.

http://www.justgiving.com/takeonthethames

Canoeing further up the river Soar....and got shot in the back by a 12-bore...

Too close for comfort.....be aware of ricocheting pellets...

Most fantastic pub and hospitality, The Boat in, Barrow Upon Soar http://www.boathousebarrow.co.uk/

Map of the route we took, courtesy of http://www.canoedaysout.com/trip/1065

Need to add one more skull....where the clay pigeon shooters roam free....

Preparation for an interesting day out

Found a great blog about a trip on the river Soar north of Leicester. I read it, studied it, and was prepared for a great trip. I recommend you reading it.

It starts from Barrow upon Soar, goes up via the Grand Union Canal to Loughborough, and then back down again via the river Soar.

vital statistics

10 miles total distance, but it took us 5 hours, including breaks, and an unscheduled stop to call the police and check out my back...

My co-pilot for the day was Jonathan, who was a great guy to have with me on this trip.

The first half - nice and easy

We started off from the Boat Inn in Barrow Upon Soar, where the landlord is used to people using his site to launch boats, so a great welcome start.

The best thing of the first half of the journey was that, unlike last week's trip through Leicester, this time there is not one lock to go through. Well...there is one lock, but that is open this time of the year. The first, and only 2 locks are on the other side of Loughborough, so it is quite nice to focus on peddling, rather than getting in and out of the canoe and walking with >30kg (with all the food and drink) for several tens of meters.

The sound of silence?

The surroundings are quite tranquil, and there are lots of birds flying about. The whole morning we can hear shots being fired in the distance. This is hunting countryside, so I don't think any more off it....The only slight snag was the high number of anglers in the way, which you felt you had to do a careful male mating ritual with to ensure they would let you go past without flinging fish food at you. We stopped past the Boat Inn in Loughborough for an apple and a rest.

Stretchy rudder cables are not desirable

The guy lines I use to steer the rudder have too much slack in them, and this means I have to continually adjust them. This I need to change. I have some wound metal cables, like the ones on your push bike, and I will go and test those out shortly.

Getting shot in the back

We passed the two locks on the other side of Loughborough, and are ready to turn right onto the river Soar. We notice straight away that we are going upstream now, so we brace ourselves for 8km of good peddling.

We go round a few bends, near Stanford upon Soar, and we can see lots of cars and jeeps in a field and the continuing sound of double barrel shotguns being fired is getting closer.

We then see the familiar silhouette of clay pigeon throwers in the field. So at least that mystery is solved. Just lots of people having fun propelling lead at clay discs....I say to Jonathan: Let's just check that there are no red flags up, or if there is a barricade, indicating a no-go area. But as there is none, we keep happily going on our way.

We can see in the field parallel to the water that there is a small group shooting in the same direction as we are peddling. So as long as they shoot in line with us, it should be ok....

Not much later, Jonathan says that it looks like as if some of the shot is hitting the water in front of the canoe, splash splash splash.....I don't think any off it, and keep peddling. Moments later, the same splashing sound, except this time, it is ricocheting not just on the water, but also on the back of our canoe, and one lead pellet hits me on the back just above my right shoulder.

It stings.

I shout: SHOT!!!!

I urge Jonathan that we should get the hell out of there.

We peddle like mad, and get round the next bend out of harms way.

Inspecting the damage

We stop a short while later at a convenient landing place so we can inspect the damage and decide on what we need to do. Fortunately, the pellet must have lost most of its velocity, as it did not go through my non-kevlar coated t-shirt, and Jonathan says, there is only a small red mark visible. So no damage, just shock. What shall we do? say nothing, keep going? What if we had come the other way? the shot could have hit us straight in the face, and possibly cause more serious injury. At the end of the day, pellets should not be able to get in a public place. This wont do

Calling the police

So we ring the Leicestershire police on their non-emergency number: 0116-2222222. (what a great number to remember!). The initial response is of course quite scary: "You say you have been shot in the back?" Yes, but no damage was done. Ricochet pellets. They should not have gotten into the water. Could you go and have a word with the shooting club please. They provide me with an incident number and we go on our way.

I have travelled all over the world. In some hostile places, but never ever expected to have this incident in "my back yard"....well...it just shows....

Low water causing lots of little delays

We keep going, as we still have quite an upstream trek in front of us back to Barrow. but every mile or so there are weirs in the water. Now normally these should not have been a problem, but because we have not had much rain for over a month, we are grounding the boat near the weirs, and the flow is quite hard. So we have to get out of the boat, up to our (mostly knees) in cold water, and pull the canoe over the weir. This happens quite a few times. There is one particularly nasty one underneath a bridge, where the water just down stream of it goes through a bottle neck so flows quite fast....If only we had gone the other way....We look if there is an alternative route overland, but it seems that the straight route is the best option. We get out, and this time the water is a bit deeper and wade through the worst of the fast flowing stream, pulling and pushing the canoe. It feels like a little big victory when we finally pull the canoe over the 30cm drop of the weir into more peaceful water.

The final challenge

The one but final challenge are obstructions underneath a railway bridge. Here we have to carefully navigate the canoe between sunken wooden pillars, whilst not getting too close to the massive steel support pillars, where the water is flowing very fast round them. This was actually not too hard in the end, but it looked quite bad initially.

The final hurdle is where the River Soar meets the canal. Here there is a big 3m drop that we can navigate around, so this is the only time we have to get out of the canoe and walk for about 30m through bushes to get back onto the canal. Fortunately I brought carabiners and 2 slings which makes pulling the canoe out, walking and launching a lot easier.

Back where we started

at 15:00 we get back to the public house, and check again with the land lady that it is alright to use their landing place. I get a friendly reply from her: "Yeah...no worries" (I imagined she was Australian, but probably just local).

We pack everything up, surprisingly little water in the canoe, and head back home for some well deserved supper.

From here it is a gentle final kilometer back to the public house.

What should I do next?

I call the police to follow up on this afternoon's events, and they say they are going to have "a word" with the shooting club....is this sufficient? What should I do next? How can I be sure this won't happen next time I go past there? let me know your thoughts....

The first trip on the River Soar

Heron doing a low fly-past underneath the road

me in the canoe with splash-deck.

My mate in the front

view from the front.

On the river Soar
Last weekend we took the canoe onto the River Soar. We started from Riverside Park on the south side of Leicester city centre, and we canoed all the way to the National Space Centre on the north side of the centre and back.

Total distance: 7.6miles

total number of locks:5 (thus we had to get in and out 10 times)

total time to do this was about 3 hours, including breaks, lunch and lifting the canoe 10 times in and out of the water.

Lifting the 30kg lump 10 times

At most locks it was not too difficult to get in and out, as the distance from the water to the wall was less than 50cm. but one of the locks had a distance of a good 1.2m. The key challenge was actually not getting in and out of the boat, as the canoe is very stable, but getting the 30kg lump of plastic out of the water. Then of course you have to carry the canoe around the lock.

Lesson learnt: take 2 karabiners and 2 lengths of rope so we can lift in and out easier.

The water was not very fast flowing, thus there was lots of rubbish floating in the water, which made it rather unpleasant. We got lots of positive vibes from people walking along the canal path.

And we saw 2 Herons. quite cool.

The rudder held up, the sun was shining, good test of a longer trip. It was a nice way spending some hours on a Sunday morning on the water.

making a kayak rudder for <£25

the prototype:

here are the photos of the first prototype

using kitchen drawer runners with a corner brace, attached to rope for the foot mechanism
the flat hinge, adjusted to fit in the slot that is there for the original rudder, you can also see that the rudder can be lifted up
the rope is connected to the corner braces using two key rings, you can also see the 3 pvc roof thingies (I'll find the proper name) to ensure a water tight seal on an angled face.
full view of the rudder, including a good view of the ability to angle the rudder such that if you hit something in the water, it won't rip the rudder off the back, and also for transportation purposes

Ingredients:

for the rudder:

plenty of M6 bolts and nylon lock-nuts

each bolt 2 washers

flat hinge

1.5mm aluminium plate

2 key rings

3X 3m tent guy lines

2 angled braces

2 corner braces

3 PVC sheet fixings

for the foot mechanism:

2 kitchen drawer runners

2 corner braces

and a bunch of tools, including:

metal jigsaw

metal files

drill bits

benchdrill

pliers

Initial testing:

I have crossed the wires, such that when you press the right pedal, the rudder turns left, thus you turn left. This is in contravention of the airplane rudder protocol (push right, turn right), but it makes more sense when you are canoeing (to me anyway).

The rudder holds up very well, of course the flat hinge is not stainless, thus rusts a bit.

In testing on the water it ensures the canoe is extremely stable, in normal situation, only feathering the rudder is required, and it acts as a keel. when the boat "wants" to go off course, it is easily brought back on the straight and narrow, thus we can focus on putting the pedal to the metal/water in a very straight line!

Thus I will keep this rudder, but will make some more adjustments, including a remotely retractable rudder, and adjustable guylines, to take up slack in the rope, or slightly different foot position, or if Sam (who has slightly shorter legs) want to give the steering a go.

a new rudder: make or buy?

After the rather interesting challenges of canoeing in a straight line with two people, I start researching into rudders for kayaks. The web brings up lots of links, just type it into ebay or google images. There are even videos on youtube of how to make your own.

so the options are: buy or make?

Buying one off the shelf sets you back anywhere between £70 from ebay to £250. And of course these are not bespoke to the one I own.

The obvious solution would be to contact the manufacturer of my canoe, and ask them for one...easier said than done. Who makes Ace Explorer 515, apparently they are a UK outfit, but the web is very devoid of any information. The closest matching links I have found are from a German and a US boating company.

Anyway, there is always the challenge of making one yourself for less than the price of a commercial unit.

So the challenge is set: can I make a rudder for less than £25?

Where to get your canoe license from? BCU!

Did you know:

1. you need a license to take your canoe onto the water?

2. you can get different types of licenses from different institutions?

3. they costs different amounts of money, and only give you limited access?

Option 1:

so you could get your license from the Environment Agency, which has ownership of 2000km of water in the UK. This is really tailored towards motorised boats, and would cost, theoretically for a canoe, £150.

Option 2:

Alternatively, you could get your license from British Waterways, which has ownership of the other half of the water; 3220km to be precise...again, tailored for motorised boats, and would set you back about £375...

The smart option:

The British Canoe Union, does a combined license, which not only gives you access to the rivers and canals looked after by the EA and the BW, but, for good measure, they also throw in the access to the non-tidal part of the Thames....and all this for only £32.75. Now...call me a cynic, but that sounds like a tremendous good deal to me, especially as it actually includes the stretches of water I practise on, and will be doing the big race on.

You fill in your details online, and within 5 days you receive in the post a sticker for your boat, and a little creditcard sized ID to carry on your person. You also get a welcome pack, including a bi-monthly magazine and other useful information.

So..now we are legal on the water; all 4500km!

here is an extract from their website:

• Licenses to paddle on 4,500km of Britain's navigations and canals
• 3rd Party Liability Insurance (up to £10 million)
• Canoe Focus magazine delivered every two months
• Great rates on boat insurance

Special discounts including:

+ 10% discount at selected canoe and kayak retailers!
+ 15% discount on all Cotswold Outdoor products
(with £5 of every £100 spent going back to the Young People's canoeing)
+ Save £7.45 (over 20%) when subscribing to 12 issues of Canoe & Kayak UK magazine!

The canoe behaves like a TVR.....

Its now spring, and finally for the first time took the canoe onto the water.

Nearby is the Grand Union Canal, and there is a lovely part next to Newton Harcourt, where there is a couple of miles of water without any locks.

Here I take it onto the water with a mate who has done a lot of canoeing in the past and is showing me the ropes; how to hold the blade, move your upperbody, getting in and out without flipping over. We have some quite cool paddles, with aerofoils, so they glide really nicely through the water.

The canoe is very stable, but, when we put some welly into our pace, and the canoe goes slightly off course, it behaves a bit like a TVR. Great in a straight line, but once it goes off course, it goes, and it is very hard to correct. so the emergency brakes have to be applied, which in turn creates a lot of water that gets into the boat.

We do about 1 hour, and it is quite hard.

I have seen some designs online of rudders, so decision is easily made. Make a rudder, and let it help the canoeing.

Interestingly there are plenty of die hard canoeists out there that frown upon people attaching rudders to river canoes, (technically unskilled, learn how to use your blades as a rudder,....)but I think it is a case of "every little helps"...