Surfski Knowledge Base

Larry Goolsby
07/15/08 #4651

After selling my 3 old paddles last month, I wanted to replace them
with one really good adjustable paddle. After seeing Simon's Onno
paddle and the easy lever-lock for adjusting the length, I set out to
purchase one. This wasn't easy at first because Onno is like a one-
person company and I couldn't get a response back from him (Patrick
Onno)for a two-week period. Turns out that he was moving his factory
(garage)and had not hooked up to the internet just yet. Finally, I
connected with Patrick and my paddle arrived exactly 9 days later. So
my paddle arrived last night and I compared the blade size to my
small Epic. It was actually larger than the Epic small mid-wing and
only a little smaller that the Epic midwing. It's larger than one and
smaller than the other so maybe it has it's uses. The quality of
construction was as good as any other paddle. I actually wanted to
say that it was as good as a Mark Porter constructed Epic and not a
Chinese made Epic, but I held my tongue.

So this morning I met up with 2 locals which I will refer to as Rick
and Marc (I don't want to use their last names in order to hide their
identity). We set out to paddle around Lummi island at 0830 this
morning with some really superb conditions. We went counter clockwise
from the Gooseberry store parking lot and immediately I noticed that
there was a 'creepy factor' when I was alone on the water with them.
I was rather proud of my new paddle and it seemed to be working quite
well as we traveled across Hale's Pass. I looked over at Rick and
asked him “What length of Paddle are you using”?
Rick: “I don't know. Marc, what length am I using”?
Marc: “205”
Larry: So Rick, what model of GPS is that“?
Rick: “I don't know. Marc, what model of GPS is this”?
Marc: “205”
So you can see why this was getting weird. Not weird like the time
that Joost saw that Shaun and I wore matching shoes, pants, shirt,
and underwear, but a twilight zone kinda weird. They only spoke when
I spoke to them and when I thought they weren't looking, they would
communicate with each other by twitching their eyebrows. I would say
something to Marc and he would look at Rick and Rick's eybrows would
start dancing like a Hula girl's backside and then Marc would answer
back to me.
Most of the first half of the trip was against a current and we did
get a few large tug boat wakes to chase down. The Onno paddle
launches you better than the Epic small midwing but you pay the price
of the larger blade when you are going a long distance. So it appears
that the Onno will be superior downwind. The 'catch' feels so much
like the Epic that I gotta think that Patrick Onno has owned a few
Epics before he started making his own paddles.

So we rounded Carter Point and finally starting to enjoy the flood
tide. We were cruising back up through Hale's pass and Rick noted
that we were cruising at a high speed. So I asked Rick “how fast are
we going”?
Rick: “I don't know. Marc, how fast are we going”?
Marc: Twitch, twitch, twitch, twitch.
Rick; “Marc says we are doing 205”.
Larry: “Marc, how many girls did you ask to go on a date before one
said yes”?
Marc: “205”
I stayed quiet after that and kept to myself. As we headed north up
the Pass my GPS showed speeds at 9 to 10.5 mph. A nice way to finish
a long paddle. As I beached my boat I noted that we had taken 205
minutes to paddle around Lummi. Weird, huh?
LG