Thanks for the trip; Beautiful and I think your explanations added later to the camera audio are far more interesting the music some people prefer. I guess you're aware that some tradional canoe paddles and some telescoping standup board paddles have a flat enough blade to use as a lee board, which you get up and down again quickly through those weeds (just supposing lateral resistance of the sharp hull gets a bit poorer as you are slowed up; Some small cats, for surf, have no blades, but sharp hulls, and skid sideways heaps till they gain speed. Sometimes best to go downwind briefly to gain speed for what old timers called 'steerage'. I'm learning bits and pieces from your videos, though I've I had lots if tiny boat experience. Good techniques; with no fuel and OK without extravagant gear; because you know where you're going; I've wasted lots of time over distances like that because I 'aimed wrong'... you're smarter I guess (I hope you don't hide your errors from us). Cheers
Thanks. Your comment about needing a bit of speed to keep tracking is bang on. It can be seen pretty clearly in the vid. I entrr the weeds at about 90 degrees to the wind, as I lose speed, I slowly turn down wind. By the time I exit the weeds I am about 140 degrees off the wind. In most conditions the easiest way to keep a kayak tracking up/across the wind is to paddle. You don't need to paddle hard, just fast enough to keep water flowing over the hull/skeg/rudder.
Good mix of life audio and post-production who is the idiot who suggested that?? ha don't you have a skeg that could get weeds on it? and without a skeg (keel) would be hard to sail against the wind
The skeg is pretty streamlined. When fully recessed, no skeg protrudes. As the skeg comes out of the housing it is angled back starting at 0 degrees, maxing out at maybe 40 degrees for fully down. I normally sail with about 20-30 degrees of skeg down, so the weeds just slide under it. There is nothing to get hooked on. My rudder on the other hand is very near tp vertical/90 degrees, so it will hook weeds.
