Ready to launch the Queen
Charlotte at Crystal Reservoir about twenty miles west of Cheyenne, WY.
The water was very cold.
The canoe has been a work horse. I've paddled it on about half of the Platte River in Wyoming, Glendo Reservoir, Guernsey Reservoir, Crystal Reservoir, Jackson Lake and Amistad Lake. It's also been used as a tender to a sailboat and to haul camping gear behind my catamaran.
I built the kayak because I wanted a paddle boat I could safely use on larger lakes and to safely transport camping gear. It paddles well and handles waves very well. Like a bicycle you have to actively balance the boat but it is propelled easily and tracks straight. It has become my cool-weather boat. It's nice to go to a lake in spring or fall when there are very few power boats around and take a quiet paddle, exploring all the little inlets and coves.
I bought the Hobie to serve as a tender to my sailboat and so I could kayak more often. It's shorter than the Pygmy kayak so it handles easier and the shape of the Hobie makes it more stable than the Pygmy. Consequently, I'll take it to the nearby lakes whenever possible.
Here are some pictures and narratives covering some of my canoe and kayak exploits.
Ready to launch the Queen
Charlotte at Crystal Reservoir about twenty miles west of Cheyenne, WY.
The water was very cold.
Ready to launch the Queen
Charlotte at Crystal Reservoir about twenty miles west of Cheyenne, WY.
Launching the Hobie, Mellow
Yellow. This is on the 'fishing lake' on the southeast side of
Gillette, WY.
First paddle of Mellow Yellow.
These first two pictures were taken during a canoe trip down the North Platte River between Glendo and Guernsey, Wyoming. The canyon is pretty and there are a few places where one to three foot standing waves form in the bends. We've tried those several times, mostly without success. Putting our stuff in dry bags and making sure everything is tied to the boat is something we've learned to do over the years.
The next four pictures were taken during a trip down the North Platte River south of Saratoga, WY. This section of the river flows through North Gate Canyon. It was during this trip with Dwane Moore, John Couch, Barb Wagner and me that Dwane and John managed to literally wrap Dwane's Grumman canoe around a big rock in the middle of the river. It took us a while to recover the boat. Bending the canoe so much caused the aluminum to crack where the canoe folded. Consequently, it would quickly fill up with water and become very unstable. We didn't have any duct tape with us, but Dwane had some laminted photographs of the river and used the lamination to seal the cracks. Since most of North Gate Canyon is in a wilderness area it would have been a long walk to get back to the vehicles. By the way, we now always carry duct tape with us on every canoe trip.
These last two pictures were taken on the North Platte River just downstream of the US 85 bridge in Torrington, WY. Even though we've gone over some small diversion dams on other parts of the river, we didn't try to go over the mess under the bridge. Kurt Wagner and John Couch were in John's canoe and Dwane Moore and I were in my canoe. Even though Dwane had the cracks and broken keel on his canoe welded he hasn't used it much for river trips since it was folded.
