I recently had the pleasure to watch Becky Mason’s new instructional DVD, Advanced Classic Solo Canoeing.

Advanced Classic Solo Canoeing builds on the foundation strokes that were taught in her first DVD, Classic Solo Canoeing. This time round Becky covers a wide variety of intermediate and advanced strokes including the Canadian, Indian, Sculling Draw, and the Running Draw Slideslip. Most of them are practical but some like the Low Circle are only practical to impress your friends. That doesn’t mean you should learn it. In fact it should be moved to the top of your stroke list for that reason alone. Never underestimate the importance of impressing friends.

From an instructional point of view I have got to say that this is easily one of the best I have seen. The narration shows right from the start that Becky has been teaching this stuff for a very long time. She has a great ability to take very complex maneuver and break it down to 3-4 key points making it easy to remember.

It’s clear that a lot of planning went into the production of the video and the proof is that all throughout the film the narration describing the fine details of the stoke actually matches up with what you are seeing. It might sound simple but it’s actually very a tricky thing to do and requires a huge amount of pre-planning long before production starts.

I think that Advanced Classic Solo Canoeing will be appealing to students as well as instructors and dreamers. If you are an instructor this is a good opportunity to watch a pro on the water teaching. Make notes of how she demonstrates the skills, steal the ideas and use it the next time you are teaching. You will be a better instructor for it guaranteed. Just don’t take all the credit.

If you are a dreamer I think you will also enjoy this DVD. Yeah, it’s an instructional film but it’s easily the most beautiful thing you will watch this month. Picture your perfect day out canoeing on the water. It likely involves paddling around on a very small lake in the early morning. The water is like glass and there is still a hint of morning mist hovering over the water. That scene in your head is pretty much 80% of the film. You are going to love watching it just for that.

I could keep going on about nerdy things like the excellent sound editing and the subtle sounds of the canoe moving through the water or the great selection of overhead and underwater shots to tie it all together but this is clearly a film the you need to see for yourself.

A couple of extra treats do come with the DVD including a full copy of her first instructional film, Classic Solo Canoeing as well as a beautiful canoe dance video set to the music of Ian Tamblym.

Oh yeah, did I mention that Advanced Classic Solo Canoeing won a bunch of awards at both the Reel Paddling Film Festival and the Waterwalker Film Festival? Yes it did.

You should be able to get this DVD at your local paddling shop or from Becky Mason directly via redcanoes.ca. For a limited time canoe and kayak instructors can get a 20% discount. You just need need to be a paid-up member of your local or national paddling body. Here are all the the details.

Bryan Hansel from paddlinglight.com has highlighted what should be a wake-up call to the entire outdoor industry.

The results from a long-term survey were recenrtly released by the US Forest Reserve. The survey (which was completed back in 1969, 1991 and finally in 2007) has been looking into who the users of the Boundary Waters Wilderness Canoe Area (BWCAW) are.

The survey result paints an interesting picture into the health of canoe tripping in the BWCAW and I feel could also be anecdotally applied to other major canoeing areas across North America as well.

…we found out that the average user age in 1969 was 26 and in 2007 it was 45. We also found out that first time visitors have dropped from 30% of visitors to 6%. This means that fewer people are being introduced to the BWCAW. I’d guess that also means that the age of the average visitor will continue to rise and current users grow older. As a point of reference, the average age in Minnesota is 36. The study suggests that one way to explain this is: “While it is important to recognize that younger individuals and first time overnight visitors continue to use the BWCAW, trend data suggest that a strong and substantial cohort of aging, repeat visitors to the BWCAW exists.”

One interesting observation from the study is “Just less than half of the visitors in 1969 had visited other wildernesses besides the BWCAW at that time, but this rose to 57% by 1991 and 75% by 2007.” To me that seems to suggest that once people experience how magical wilderness areas are, they want to visit more of them.

What does this mean for the outdoor industry and outdoor camping? It means that current participants are getting older and we are not introducing young people to the outdoors as our parents did to us. If something isn’t done soon I feel an entire generation will miss out.

More info: paddlinglight.com - Original Survey Report

Flickr Photo Credit: Big Sag - http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/deed.en_CA / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

This past weekend was able to get out to the annual Toronto Outdoor Adventure Show.

While I mainly go visit friends from around Ontario who I haven’t seen since warmer weather I also like to take a quick pass up and down the rows at the show to see what’s up. For me, it doesn’t take long to make the rounds once all the travel booths are knocked out (which is about ½ the show) and all the booths hocking shoe polish and better rags to clean your glasses (no streaks!). I will admit I did get distracted by the booth selling one-piece micro fleece outfits. I don’t know what they were thinking as they were more like a form fitting snuggie then anything else.

Heading down one row I was stopped in my tracks when I came upon a small booth by a canoe company I had never heard of before called Northern Sound. They are a new manufacturing company from the UK who make Birch Canoes that are absolutely the most beautiful things I have seen in a very, very long time.

Northern Sound aims to replicate the feel of birchbark canoes using both traditional materials and historical designs. Since birchbark is extremely limited in supply, the hulls are made from laminated Birch while the gunwals, ribs and thwarts are all made from Cedar. Keeping everything together are lashings made from Willow and Spruce root. The pitch they add to the hull to seal up the cracks has been formulated to still be soft yet not dry out and shrink like regular tar does.

The prices for these boats are not cheap. What you are paying for a custom built, handmade boat that is pretty much a work of art on the water so depending on the model, they range from about $2500 up to about $5400 Canadian.

Talking to company president Roberto Corradi, I found out that they would like to expand into North America so they shipped the boats over from the UK to try to work out some manufacturing/distribution deals. I really hope that they are successful I would love to them out on the water on this side of the pond.

More info: northern-sound.co.uk

Things recently got awkward on a recent episode of Jeopardy! when Alex Trebek struck up a conversation with Duke senior, Greer Mackebee about his love for competitive concrete canoe making.

Trebek’s follow-up question caused the whole mid-show interview to completely sink. (Sorry about that.)

Image credit: knoxville.com

Back before everybody and their brother had small, waterproof GoPro cameras strapped to their head, film makers had to get creative and build their own camera rigging if they wanted to get that unique shot while on the water.

Here is a photo of filmmaker and instruction video pioneer, Bill Mason using a home-made rigging to get overhead footage for his 1977 film and companion book, Path of the Paddle.

I tried to find evidence that Bill used the rigging for overhead footage for his whitewater instructional segments but it doesn’t look like he did. Imagine how awesome it would be to see that monster going down the river back in the day.

Instead of overhead shots for the whitewater elements in his films, Bill borrowed this head mounted camera which was originally designed for skydiving. Apparently the camera was really heavy due to the lead counter weight and could only shoot a maximum of 90 seconds before the film ran out. There is a story in Ken Bucks book, Bill Mason: Wilderness Artist: From Heart to Hand that talked about the time Bill nearly drowned the first time he jumped in the water with the camera. From then on they had to put two or three life jackets on him to provide enough flotation for the camera to stay above water.

Today, filming on the water is considerably easier with any of the small waterproof cameras that have flooded the market like GoPro, Contour or Drift over the past couple of years.

But even with the right camera, getting that unique shot angle can still take some thinking but thank goodness there are more commercial options now then before. One affordable option involves getting an adjustable pole from kayalu.com. Prices range from $89-$249 and can fit most cameras on the market. Kayalu has a good reputation for their well-built equipment that holds up in both fresh and salt water.

If you are working with a higher budget and looking to get more dynamic footage, then a camera mounted cable built by Sea to Sky Cable Cam is the only way to go.

For approximately $36,000 you can get the equipment needed to shoot footage similar to below:

Looking at the demo reel you might recognize some of the footage. That’s because this equipment was designed by sea kayaker,BryanSmith of Eastern Horizons fame and Matt Maddaloni who has been a sponsored rock climber for the past 15 years.

Bill Mason Photo Credits: BIll Mason Productions

Legendary Canadian canoeist and adventurer, Don Starkell passed away this past weekend after a battle with cancer. He was 79.

He was best remembered for his amazing 19,000 kilometre paddle with his son Dana from Winnipeg to the mouth of the Amazon River.

From the Winnipeg Free Press:

"Orphaned as a child, Don overcame his insecurities through paddling a canoe during the great floods of Winnipeg of 1950," family spokesperson, Chris Forde wrote. "A divorce from his wife changed the course of Don's life so he decided to give his boys an adventure they'd never forget - to paddle a canoe from Winnipeg to the Amazon River."

Doug Gibson, who edited and published the story for McClelland & Stewart under the title, Paddle to the Amazon, said he had trouble believing that his old pal’s adventurous life was over.

"To me, Don always seemed super-human, and thus, immortal, too." Gibson said.

Both The Mundane Adventures of Bryan and Canoe & Kayak Magazine have excellent posts today on Don’s life.

Now I’m hoping even more that the documentary on his famous adventure I highlighted last week gets funding on Kickstarter.

Photo Credit: Don Starkell

Sanborn Canoe Company is a small paddle manufacture based out of Winona, Minnesota that has really embraced the heritage of canoeing.

For a while now they have been building paddle designs based on the local canoeing tradition. Just looking at them, you would think that they were once hanging over the mantel of the local hunting lodge or the dining hall at a kid’s camp.

Paddlers who want to tap even more into the rich history of canoeing the lakes ofMinnesotawill be interested in their new line of painted paddles. For $35 extra, buyers can have a painted shaft design added to any canoe paddle in the line-up.

Of the four designs available I think my two favourites are the “Dorothy” (named for Dorothy Molter who was the last person to live permanently within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area) and the “Nessmuk”; which is in honour of author George Washington Sears who wrote for Field and Stream in the 1880’s and an early pioneer for lightweight canoeing/camping.

In the world of advertising there is that classic phrase, “You are not selling the steak; you are selling the sizzle.”

The reality is that anybody can make a paddle so the trick is how to figure out what sets you apart from the guy down the street. Nostalgia is very powerful andMinnesotahas a very long traditional canoeing heritage so why not tap into it? If you can do it right you will be successful. Heck, L.L. Bean has been selling their products that way for almost 100 years and look where they are?

Things got heated at the Chinese City Games this past Sunday when a fight broke out between two canoeing teams.

From China Daily:

A Guangzhou quartet intentionally rammed its boat to a Nanchang team which had once paddled in Guangzhou''s lane during the 2,000-meter race. The Nanchang foursome fought back with paddles, cutting the face of Guangzhou kayaker Liao Zhensheng.

Liao''s face was covered with blood when he was rushed to the hospital.

Thanks to Wend Magazine for the tip off.

You might remember a couple of weeks ago I wrote about Dave and Matt Turgeon's canoe expedition across Canada to raise finds for the Sick Kids Hospital here in Toronto.

Things were going fine until they reached Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario where they got robbed.

Thieves made off with about $500 worth of Dave and Matt Turgeon's gear when they left it on shore by the city's waterfront boardwalk early Tuesday afternoon to make a quick supply run to Station Mall.

"We were only gone 15 minutes," said an exasperated Dave Turgeon, 42, shortly after talking to police.

Taken was about $500 worth of rain gear, knives, tools, and, interestingly, the GPS tracking unit the Turgeons were using to update the progress of their expedition for the Sick Kids Foundation on their website.

Dave said the GPS unit provides current location data only, meaning the thief could do little with it but give away his or her own location on the Turgeons' website.

"If they're stupid enough to hit the button," noted Dave.

I guess this shows that the woods are safer then the city.

More info: saultstar.com

Prince Andrew just got back from a 12-day, 218-mile canoe trip down the Horton River in the North West Territories. In the photo above he is paddling in an Ontario built, Nova Craft Canoe with a Kokatat PFD and a properly attached whistle to boot. The outfitter set him up with good gear.

Prince Andrew is a huge fan of canoeing and caught the bug after attending Ontario’s Lakefield College School back in the late 1970’s as an exchange student. Since then he has returned to Canada numerous times to go paddling. The last major trip he did was back in 2007 when he paddled down the Natla and Keele Rivers (also in the North West Territories). We covered that trip here.

Of course the UK newspaper, the Daily Mail covered the story. The article is awesome and well worth clicking through for a read. It’s obviously written by somebody who has both never camped and has no desire to ever, ever get out there. It’s obvious by the emphasis on the hardships of the trip and the fact that they write a full paragraph on the lack of shaving and bathing facilities. Oh the humanity!

[blockquote]The holiday, which was organised by Canoe North Adventures, owned by his old classmate Al Pace, started on July 10 when Andrew, 51, took a float plane, specially designed to land on water, to the remote Northwest Territories.

Each night the group camped out under the stars, feasting on fish caught that day in the river. There were no means of shaving – hence Andrew’s beard – and the only method of bathing was to plunge into the chilly waters.

The group even had a couple of close encounters with grizzly bears.[/blockquote]

Photo credit: Michael Peake