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hey gang i took out the solo?/extra seat in the kipawa think she’ll be a ok without it or should i add a thwart/or yoke in that area were the seat was???? i dunno it seems sturdy enough but was just wonderin???,if yah have time type out your opinions on this matter
thank you
OBAOK,
It depends…. If you are just taking the Kip down to Kent Lake, it should be fine. Are you taking it on a week on the AuSable? It’ll still make it. Two weeks on the Winisk? You probably want to rethink things.
I’ve taken seats, thwarts, decks, grab handles, etc out of canoes… It’s not that big a deal. Then check to see how fragile it is. Be careful not to smash it too hard into things. But it is surely durable enough to use it for a while… I have a solo Bell Flashfire that I took all the thwarts out of it, except for the center kneeling thwart. Six years later it’s no worse for the wear. In addition, I have a MRC Malecite that only has seats, and has zero thwarts…
PK
PK
@OneBadApple 631 wrote:
you answered my question and i thank you much!!!! just glad i know that some names of swift canoes are river names or you’d have really screwed me up with winisk:D
Actually, I think all the tandem canoes in the Swift lineup are places you can actually canoe… Quetico, Algonquin, Temagami, Dumoine, Kipawa, Mattawa, Yukon, Madawaska, Yukon, Alabany. They are all reasonably named for where they might be used. The only tandem that I can think of that’s not a place is the Prospector 16, but every Canadian Canoe company seems to have one of those for better or worse (Worse in my book). The solos are all birds that I know… Heron, Loon, Osprey, Sheerwater, and Raven. This makes for a nice progression. Surely better than some manufacturers that muddle the waters with regard to naming convention. But we’ll avoid that topic.
I’m glad you liked Pickeral Lake/Crooked Lake. Not a wilderness adventure, but does in a pinch when I’m down on that side of the state. We got out for a 10 mile stretch on the South Branch of the Kalamazoo this weekend from Homer to Albion. It’s pretty shallow, but was nice to get on the water without having to drive too far. We saw dozens of deer, and enjoyed one last warm paddle before having to dig out the cold weather paddling gear.
PK
@OneBadApple 650 wrote:
PK
anyways pk lisa and i are i the market for a royalex rocky shallow mi river canoe for next year do you have any thoughts on those bell morningstars or tandem yellowstones 15’6″ oh nd the rei has a penobscot 16rx on sale right now??? so if you and the others have any suggestions on what might make a great second canoe for us were all ears!!!!
thanks
and hope you have a great fall paddle season…
OBAI won’t touch the gay lesbian issue… not the place and time…
Personally, I don’t think that royalex is needed for anything in the Lower Peninsula. A good composite canoe is all you need. You are gonna scratch it up…but that’s reality. Now you start running Class IIIs and I think royalex is the way to go, mainly because of the potential for wrapping the canoe. As to designs, I like the Bell Morningstar in composite. I’ve never paddled either the royalex version of the Morningstar or the Yellowstone tandem. But I’ve yet to find a royalex canoe that I prefer over the composite version. So that said, I find that all royalex canoes are slow heavy, and don’t really excite me…. that’s why I’ve only owned one, and these days I only paddle it in whitewater or in the winter because it’s deep and I don’t have to worry about it shipping water. The OT Penobscot is a great canoe… faster than either of the royalex Bell models. But if I were going to paddle any river in Lower Michigan and I had to pick between your Kip and any royalex canoe… I’d take the Kip.
PK
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