Surfski Knowledge Base

A newbie walks up to a Barnacle………………Dan
Jeff Davis 12/13/22 #32894

A sigh of relief for a good outcome for Dan on a weekend when some weren’t so lucky. Dans day and his thoughtful recounting has kicked off a familiar conversation about safety. Primarily, how to get rescued. Am I really the only one who sees this as short sighted?

Dan no doubt is incorporating new SOP’s in everything from brushing his teeth to what boat he might get next. So he will be on the beach again when a newbie will come up and ask, “Dan, how’d you get such good judgment? And Dan will rub his bald head and think………..Bad judgment. But Dan is one of the most careful, deliberate over dressed people I have paddled with. He has honestly and thought fully outlined the cascading effects of his judgment on his big day. So what is the conversation we might have after such an event?

I’ll start with me. Notice how Barnacle's always get around to talking about them selves? I am not much of a downwinder, never in the winter. I have been on the water allot though, and always with the mantra of self reliance. I am hard wired for it. I can’t put myself in the position of needing rescue. It’s not my idea of fun, it’s a fail in the holy order of self reliance. I will never be the paddler center punching the bay going north or south in winter. I don’t know how I would take care of myself if it went sideways.

I don’t judge judge those who do. We are are a community in which there are people who have a lifetime of paddling at the exstream end who are going to die in bed of old age. The conversation I would like to hear, again and again is how can you be that paddler and not what radio is best to save your ass after you might have been stupid, or unlucky. I started a new thread to separate it from the equipment conversation
JDavis

David Scherrer 12/13/22 #32896

I'm with you on that Jeff…an important conversation.
David S.

Tyler Irwin 12/13/22 #32897

Good post Jeff. One mantra that I've always held for myself, and teach our club paddlers is this; If you ever start to question the conditions, trust your gut and get yourself and your craft back to shore. We can realistically only do so much to prepare with proper gear and safety equipment, but at the end of the day, Mother Nature can be straight up unpredictable and cruel. It's up to us to quickly acknowledge the change in conditions and get ourselves or our crews back to shore as quickly and as safely as possible.

Paul Reavley 12/13/22 #32902

Jeff,

I welcome a discussion on paddler skill and judgement development. At the same time I do not believe these equipment discussions are short sighted either.

1) There may be no personal judgement that will completely protect you from getting into a situation where you might need marine assistance unless your judgement is to never go on the water. Local collisions and near collisions with power boats are one example. The age and potential health problems of our locals who still want to paddle (including myself) is another.

2) Isn't thinking about safety equipment only in terms of your own need or not for rescue a bit short sighted? My belief is that you should always carry and know how to use a VHF radio on all marine paddles because you carry it not just for yourself but also for anyone else you encounter who might either have made an error in judgement, experienced equipment failure, experienced a health problem, or had an accident.

Paul

Jeff Davis 12/13/22 #32903

No argument here, what I felt needed to be pointed to was the dominance of it.

Dan Mayhew 12/13/22 #32904

Jeff raises some great points. I believe the most important action one can take is to accurately decide if you should be paddling given the conditions of the day. The second most important thing is to be thoroughly trained and competent in self-rescue. The third in the priority list is your ability to help others in trouble, and the last resort is the ability to call in professional help when needed.

Anyone that needs to be rescued by the pros, by definition shouldn’t have been paddling that day, myself included. It’s an easy decision in hindsight, but it can be difficult to have all the information at the time of the decision. I think it’s fair to say, that short of all paddlers staying home, there is going to be some probability of a paddler getting into trouble regardless of skill level. Being thoroughly prepared for all four priorities mentioned above increases everyone’s safety.

These priorities may be at odds with each other. The self-rescue mantra was so instilled in my head that I waited to call until my faculties started to fail. I keep thinking I can make even with my legs being non-responsive. I had to convince myself that I had no chance of making it to safety without help before I hit that button. The Coast Guard, firefighters, and just about everyone else have told me that was a mistake. I agree.

I hope I don’t sound defensive. I welcome constructive criticism and put this out there for exactly this conversation. Who paddles in what conditions is easily the single most important factor for that person’s safety, those around him/her/they, and potentially those sent to rescue them. But we have to be competent in the other 3 priorities as well.

paul clement 12/13/22 #32905

Great conversation. It caused me to buy a DSC radio.

Conditions change significantly over the course of a single downwinder (or even laps). Betting on wind increasing, decreasing, changing drection is a fools errand. We do what we do to the limit of our abilities and somtimes go past. We have all been there, whether it's being picked up by a boat, helicopter or just shepherded to safety in big conditions by a more competent paddler. I have been told that I wasn't competent to do downwinders with the group and I have walked away on my own accord. Both are difficult. Like Clint Eastwood said, “ A man's got to know his limitations”. Sometimes you just don't know them til you get there…

I appreciate your honesty in all this Dan and I hope you are okay with the myriad views on what to do or should have been done. No need to worry about all that. It all worked out as it should given the circumstances and your response. Shoot, You got your health back. You got your boat back. It's like a Country song backwards…
Go paddle.
pc

Michael Medler 12/15/22 #32917

As a 250 pound 60 year old who can’t balance on one foot, I am no one’s paddling guru. Nevertheless, I have a few opinions about all this. A decade ago I went through the traditional chain of skinnier boats finally leading up to a V10. It was great for racing and fun in the waves. However, I eventually had a “situation” on a cold winter downwinder. I came out of the boat and then missed a half-dozen remounts. I then spent about 10 exhausting minutes in the water and had my butt saved by some outrigger remount help. Besides rethinking my will, many other things became clear and promises were made.

Most of all, there is a lot to say for staying in the boat in the first place and being able to remount easily in big winter wind if you come out. I now only paddle fat-boats in the winter. Honestly, the only downside is not being able to keep up with folks in skinnier boats on flatter water. But when I am out alone I never notice, and when I sideline my ego it is all a hoot. I can sit sideways couch-style in big conditions and the surfing is still just as fun, and upwind is actually fun too when I work on my rotation in the fat-boat.

Surfing in a fat-boat is a blast. The best run I have ever had in the Hatch was in a borrowed V8. It was huge that day, but the whole thing was low-stress hootin’ and hollerin’. Admittedly, paddling the flatter water leading up to the Hatch was a slog, but it wasn’t a race.

I know owning two boats is a stretch for those of us without a ski area, but it is like remount insurance. Not every winter paddling session needs to be like a race where you are in the fastest boat you can handle in a summer race on a lake.

MM

robcasey 12/15/22 #32919

I'm with you on stable boats for rough water paddling. I have a Carbonology Cruze 18'x21“ and its still faster than any sea kayak I've paddled and can surf and paddle big waters including surf on the Strait with never a worry of capsizing. Definitely not fast off the finish line but still fast enough with others paddling in bumps as I'm focused on going forward vs stability.

In sup races we've seen the same, the 21” boards may be fastest on flat water but usually end up swimming a lot in bumps, boat wakes, tidal current etc.

DDatHot@…12/16/22 #32925

I have been reading (almost) all the responses, related threads, and even re-read the details of Dan's writeup. Learning what I can vicariously has always seemed pretty inexpensive to me. I am a fairly new paddler (2 summers in the Gorge) and have yet to summon the courage to come up to B'Ham and get schooled in a very different body of water. So “listen and read” has been my approach here, waiting for someone to point out what seemed to me as being really significant in my first reading of Dan's account. If it has been mentioned, then I am reiterating it here under the “Avoiding Rescue” idea.

Safety systems MUST work or they should be modified until they DO work. Not just rescue systems, but safety systems, and in this context I am talking about leash(es). Coming from other disciplines where you can kill yourself (and people have) if your gear doesn't work, Dan's description of tangling leashes (i.e. radio and boat leashes), and more importantly having to spend extra time in the difficult conditions/cold water repeatedly unwrapping his boat leash from the rudder and the boat plug… well, this stuck out to me. One of the first paddler-in-trouble stories I heard here in the Gorge was someone who was using 2 different boat leash systems and the leashes became tangled making for a traumatic experience on an otherwise fun day. I use a waist leash. From studying other people's setups and a little (lot) of huli experience, I'm aware of a few of its drawbacks, and also it's strengths. I have seen here in the Gorge some waist leash setups that are not well thought out, and it is just a matter of fortune as to whether the owner has a bad day in the future. I have even managed to get my waist leash tangled with my hat leash. Although that sounds trivial, that 1 experience illustrated the potential hazard of using multiple leash/string-things at the same time. Hence I am still flip-flopping on the relative merits/drawbacks of a paddle leash that is always connected.

So. Long winded. However, in my previous experiences with climbing and sail boats and kiting, safety systems that are as foolproof as possible are a key factor in avoiding rescue. The more hazardous the environment, the more critical this becomes. Once I have to give up on self-rescue, I am in the waters of fortune and reliance on others that I simply do not want to be in. Thanks Dan, for surviving (!), and for providing a near-home, real-life working session to give this community a chance to gain from vicarious learning. Don't want to ever be out there, waiting, hoping, wondering about my radio, or recent budget cuts to the Coast Guard. Sayin'…

David D